There are several historic buildings on Washington and Jefferson Streets in need of a new life. What would you like to see?
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Idea#93
There are several historic buildings on Washington and Jefferson Streets in need of a new life. What would you like to see?
In addition to lofts/condos as someone else has suggested, some retail infrastructure is desperately needed to support both the daytime work crowd and residents. Specifically, we need: convenience store (office supplies, umbrellas, basic foodstuffs, OTC meds); a coffee shop with workspace and solid wifi (preferably one that serves kaffeeklatsch coffee, rather than a competitor); a co-working facility with by-the-day or by-the-hour meeting space rental options in addition to hot-swap and monthly rental workspaces; dry cleaners). And, frankly, the city needs to start encouraging more hi-tech businesses to put office space downtown.
This is crucial. Belk Hudson Lofts and the other condo buildings are excellent starts but downtown will not attract more residents until there is retail (especially a convenience store). I also agree about a co-working facility or on-demand office space, which would allow small startups, artists, and entrepreneurs to have affordable, collaborative office space, increasing the work force and foot traffic downtown.
This is a beautiful building. As suggested in another idea, why not tear down the courthouse and replace it with some really cool civic & park space, to extend Big Spring up into the square and give the downtown a more beautiful focal point? Courthouse workers and services could be moved into some of these other vacant buildings in the area (such as the one pictured above), thus achieving multiple goals (beautiful focal point, more active square, increased civic spaces, inhabiting vacant buildings, getting a parking garage out of the center of a very small city). Also consider how the traffic patterns in the city (i.e. there are a lot of one-way streets that should probably be two-way) impacts visibility and wayfinding to various downtown destinations. Providing better access (on foot, by bike, by transit, by car, etc) would increase business viability and property values.
I would love to have a space in one of these old historic buildings as a place to design, sell and display my chain mail. I have been toying with the idea of opening a shop but to find a space that could fit my small business both in an esthetically pleasing sense and also be cost effect for my business. As a small business owner, I would love to rent out something inside of these old historic buildings but the issue for me would be the renting out of the space. The cost effectiveness of it. I know not everyone is into the artsy aspects but I think the downtown area can really diversified with all kinds of small business whether being graphic designs, technical businesses etc, the list can go on. Some small business just need help in rental space costs or even help with start up in renting a space.
Cities with revitalized historic buildings always include basic conveniences downtown- shops for everyday items, cheap fast food, and places to go that aren't bars. My idea is an arcade/independent film theater. During the day, this can be a family destination, a place for kids and big kids to play arcade games before/after feeding the ducks at Big Spring. Then at night it becomes a trendy downtown movie theater showing movies that the big-three theaters (Carmike, Monaco and Regal) won't touch. I've been to several such movie theaters in the revitalized downtowns of other cities. This encourages local independent filmakers to have a place to show their work. You can even hold indie film competitions to draw tourism. If you could get one of the big three theaters to partner with the idea of a theater downtown, then you'd really have some funding! After 8pm, you could make it a place with nice snacks and adult beverages to take into the movies with you- one of Monaco's biggest draws is the Prive area. You could make the whole theater Prive after 8pm. And the arcade games will still get used by the adults as they wait for movies at night. This historic building will provide a beautiful atomosphere for movie nights and as stated earlier, people can leave a movie and go on one of the downtown tours or other events. It won't be a direct competitor with our other theaters, because it will never show any of the big name movies. Except Rocky Horror on Halloween, of course!
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