• Building a Stronger Downtown
  • Map 14: Linkage to Downtown

Building a Stronger Downtown

With its financial, governmental and cultural resources, Downtown Knoxville has long been recognized as the heart of the region. While it has a diminishing share of the county’s office space and has experienced a decline in retail, it largely maintained its strength in the 1990s. The existing downtown plan was created in 1988. With such significant development as the Convention Center and opportunities in the State Street area, an update is warranted.

The need for further residential development has long been recognized. Mixed uses, which are associated with “New Urbanism,” can be a vehicle to attract more people to downtown living. Given the complexities of downtown development, a new downtown plan is beyond the scope of this sector work. It is recognized, however, as a major need and is recommended as a component of the Metropolitan Planning Commission’s and City of Knoxville’s work program in the next few years. “Nine Counties One Vision” also has identified the need for a new downtown plan. Through their work and that of MPC in preparing the county-wide General Plan, a number of principles have been identified:

• Make Downtown a regional destination that is vibrant and livable
• Respect the natural and historical setting
• Create a vibrant social environment Downtown
• Establish and perpetuate the character and quality of Downtown districts
• Take appropriate advantage of opportunities for Downtown housing
• Invest significant resources in the commercial capacity of Downtown
• Enhance downtown as a center for government while maintaining a balance with other uses
• Design a pedestrian-friendly Downtown with safe, appealing streets and public spaces
• Create a transportation system that balances pedestrian needs, transit and convenient parking
• Reconnect Downtown and the surrounding neighborhoods, both functionally and visually

Restoration of historic assets is one measure of building a stronger Downtown. (Illustration courtesy of Crandall Arambula and Benefield Richters.)

Emphasis on restoring neighborhoods that are near downtown is a critical linkage strategy.

Linkages to Downtown
Downtown is attractively and well defined on three sides by World’s Fair Park and the Convention Center, the riverfront and James White Parkway. To the north, however, there is a “gray area,” characterized by vacant and underutilized property, railroad tracks and interstate highway ramps, that negatively affects access. The means to provide more attractive, more secure pedestrian and transit linkages to neighborhoods is needed, particularly to the north.

A significant linkage issue is to better balance the needs of the homeless, neighborhoods such as Old North and 4th and Gill, Downtown redevelopment interests and the residents and businesses in the Emory Place/5th Avenue area. There has been initial discussion between homeless service providers and neighborhood interests to address various issues. The discussion should be formalized whereby homeless service organizations (for example, the Salvation Army), the neighborhoods and businesses, including those in the 5th Avenue/Emory Place area, and other service providers, including Helen Ross McNabb and the Police Department, come together as a task force to address service delivery and revitalization issues.

Preservation, renovation and redevelopment in the 5th Avenue/Emory Place area are several strategies to create better connections between Downtown and nearby neighborhoods.

Proposals:

• Mixed use districts adjacent to Downtown
• Streetscape and sidewalk improvements on corridors leading through the Central City
• Neighborhood conservation in nearby areas
• Transit and greenway connections to Downtown
• Linkage north of Downtown
• Task force to address homeless and neighborhood revitalization issues

Looking west from 5th Avenue and North Central Street.