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Site Plan May Emerge from Downtown Study

The many Knoxville residents who think they have the perfect idea for downtown's hole in the ground will have a chance to speak their minds. A few months ago, Nine Counties/One Vision and the Central Business Improvement District commissioned Portland consultant Crandall Arambula and the Knoxville architectural and planning firm Benefield Richters to produce a downtown master plan. That process is just beginning, says Benefield Richters president Trey Benefield. And the fate of the former Universe Knoxville site will be a part of the process.

"I can't help but think that by the time we are done, some logic will develop that identifies a specific use for that property," Benefield says. "This is not one of the major goals of the plan, but there is so much talk about that site that it will be hard for us not to talk about it."

Benefield says that a large part of the study will be to help find ways to make downtown work better as a pedestrian area. "We have a lot of things that are wonderful, such as the Riverfront Park and Market Square and the various museums, but there are many pedestrian barriers between them that keep them from working better together," he says.

Benefield says a series of public meetings will take place from January through June at which the general public will be asked to come, give their ideas on the future of downtown, and even vote on different concepts. "No one will be excluded," he says.

The Knox County Development Corp., which is working on a plan for the State Street site, is not obligated to go along with the recommendations of the Crandall Arambula plan; in fact, it may move ahead with a plan for the Universe Knoxville site before the downtown master plan even comes out. But a lot of people in Knoxville think it would be wise to wait for the downtown master plan before moving ahead with a development on State Street. Among them are two of the three announced candidates for next year's mayoral race. "It would be a real mistake just to grab the first developer and put something there just so we can say that we put something there," says Madeline Rogero. "I think the way to do it is to bring in the stakeholders and look at the needs of government and the needs of downtown and the needs of the residents and let the process work itself out." Candidate Bud Gilbert has another way of putting it. "That's the people of Knox County's hole in the ground, and I hope the county will take the time to listen to what people say."

When asked about his ideas for the site, mayoral candidate Bill Haslam made no mention of the prospective downtown master plan. He said that he was open-minded about every possibility for the site. "Right now, the main thing is for the county and the city to divide what we wish would be true from reality," he said. "But I personally think that the key is getting some retail concepts that work downtown, and retail only follows people."

— B. C.

New ideas for downtown Knoxville's notorious hole in the ground

by Bill Carey

The ugly, barren block guarded by a chain-link fence and bordered by State Street, Central Avenue, Union Avenue, and Commerce Street constitutes less than one one-hundred-thousandth of the land in Knox County. But downtown's hole in the ground, as many people refer to it, is probably the most argued-about parcel in Knoxville. It is the site where nine buildings were torn down in 2000 to make room for a new Justice Center that Knox County Sheriff Tim Hutchison wanted to build. The Justice Center idea fizzled, and it then became the prospective site of the Universe Knoxville planetarium and children's museum. Now, that idea has also fallen apart.

Today, the 3.2 acres of dirt and weeds have become a reminder of two embarrassments: the inability of the various arms of Knox County's government to get on the same page, and Knoxville's failed attempt to emulate other cities like Chattanooga, Nashville, and Charlotte and build something large and glorious to help revitalize its downtown. Officials are determined to get rid of this unappealing symbol. Knox County Executive Mike Ragsdale has ordered new Knox County Development Corp. executive vice president Jim Harrison to develop a plan to turn the empty plot into something that taxpayers can be proud of and something that will help downtown.

"We are not predisposed for or against anything, at least almost anything," says Ragsdale's spokesman Mike Cohen. "All we know is that it won't be a jail, won't be a planetarium, and won't be a big, empty lot."

So what should it be? Metro Pulse asked more than 20 people: developers, architects, city planners, politicians, folks who have been heavily involved in downtown development in other cities, even people who are none of the above but just have strong opinions on the matter. We heard several different ideas, but a few common themes emerged.

Foremost is that the county should stop dreaming about a "silver bullet" attraction that could theoretically turn downtown Knoxville into a major tourist attraction overnight.

Another frequent refrain was the idea that the parcel be strongly considered as a possible residential site.

A third point repeatedly made is that the planners and developers of the site pay attention to how the project interacts with the rest of downtown, especially from a pedestrian point of view.

Library

A few people suggest the idea of turning Knoxville's hole in the ground into a children's discovery center and downtown library (the site is easily large enough to accommodate both). After all, a major part of the now-defunct Universe Knoxville project was a children's museum. The impetus for attaching a children's discovery center to Universe Knoxville is that Knoxville has fallen behind other southern cities such as Birmingham, Chattanooga, and Asheville in the construction of large, updated, and interactive children's museums.

The notion of a new downtown library may seem a bit premature, given that the Knox County Public Library system doesn't even have a permanent director right now. However, many advocates of the library have pointed out that Lawson McGhee—the main downtown library—is outdated and overcrowded.

"When Lawson McGhee opened in 1971, there were no computers, no need to have space for public access computers, and no need to have offices for the people who maintain the computers," says Patricia Watson, who retired as library director this summer. "There were also no videos, no talking books, and no CDs, and the section of the library where those are housed now takes up a lot of room. Today, we are so short of office space that we had a lot of people sharing desks." Watson also points out that the downtown library lost its loading dock when the Duncan Federal Building was built next door. "They let us use the loading dock in the parking garage for vans that bring books back and forth from the various libraries, but we couldn't load and unload large items such as furniture because the truck is too big. Large things had to come through the public entrance, and that is a hassle."

In Watson's opinion, the State Street site would be a good site for a new library, particularly because it is so large that it would easily accommodate the facility's parking needs.

Also excited about the idea of a downtown public library on the State Street site is former Metropolitan Planning Commission director Don Parnell. "Part of the problem now is that the library is so close to the convention center," says Parnell, who is now with a commercial real estate firm called Realty Trust Group. "If the library were built on a new site, the city could put something on the existing library site that is more compatible with conventioneers and tourists." Parnell lists several reasons that the State Street site could be great for a new library. "The visibility would be great from James White Parkway, and it would be very close to all the residential [properties] being developed on Gay Street." He also says it would make sense to build the library and children's discovery museum side by side, since the two facilities would share a lot of synergy, not to mention parking facilities.

The idea of a library combined with a children's discovery center on the site hasn't been promoted publicly very much. (However, a year ago, Bearden activist Terry Faulkner suggested the idea in writing to then-county executive Tommy Schumpert and several commissioners but got almost no response to it.) Today, reaction to the concept varies among urban planning types and city and county officials. Architect Buzz Goss, who has renovated many old buildings downtown, says he loves the idea of a new downtown library. But he believes both the library and children's discovery center belong on Gay Street. "Gay Street is East Tennessee's ceremonial Main Street," he says. "All of our institutions that are regional in scope should have a presence on Gay Street." Goss also points out that there are already a couple of surface parking lots on Gay Street, and there's about to be another, when the News Sentinel building is torn down this spring.

There is another reason that the dream of a children's discovery center and downtown library is very much alive. A few months ago, County Executive Mike Ragsdale visited the new $55 million downtown library in Nashville. Ragsdale said he was "impressed" by the facility, and he said that as he was touring it he thought how wonderful it would be to have such a facility built in Knoxville.

Ballpark

Another idea that has a few backers is the notion of putting a ball park on the Universe Knoxville site that theoretically would be used by the University of Tennessee baseball team. The logic behind the concept goes as follows: UT needs to build a new women's softball field (the Lady Vols softball team now plays at Tyson Park). Under current plans, this new facility would be built on the school's agricultural campus across the Tennessee River.

However, the idea of putting a ball park on the south side of the river has it opponents, such as Sequoyah Hills residents who would rather the property across the river stay pristine and undeveloped. A small group of developers has approached UT about a different idea: convert Lindsey Nelson stadium on the UT campus into a women's softball field, and build a new home for the men's baseball team in downtown Knoxville's hole in the ground.

If this were done, the thinking goes, UT baseball attendance would go up because the games would be taking place in a more public location and because fans would be able to drink beer at the off-campus stadium (which is not allowed at a campus stadium). Downtown would benefit from the number of people who come to see the games. Meanwhile, the stadium could be used in the off-season for outdoor concerts. "If such a thing were built, I'm sure that we could use it for concert venues," says event promoter Ashley Capps. However, Capps points out that he is not one of the developers behind the idea.

The idea of putting a stadium on the old Universe Knoxville site has its problems. In order to fit a baseball field there, the plot would have to be extended halfway through the adjacent block that backs up onto Gay Street. The land is very hilly; construction costs would be high. College baseball season runs from February through May, which means that there wouldn't be nearly as many games as followers of professional baseball might at first believe. And of course, the Knoxville Smokies asked for a new baseball stadium on the site five years ago before leaving the city for Sevier County. Some have argued that the time to build a stadium was then, not now.

One thing that is clear about the idea of a baseball park is that it won't happen without a public endorsement from UT. So far, that isn't happening. "All I can tell you right now is that developers have talked to the athletic department about the use of the stadium if it were placed downtown," says UT director for operations Phil Scheurer. "But right now that's just conversation."

Knoxville 37902

An overwhelming majority of the people contacted for this story would like to see the land used to bring more people to live downtown. The logic behind the argument is that even though there are already several residential projects in the works downtown (most notably the 100-unit Sterchi Lofts at 116 Gay Street, which will be completed by the end of the year) that many more are needed. "Downtown is still sort of like a ghost town on weekends, and with the newspaper moving away, that gets worse," says First Presbyterian Church pastor Carswell Hughs, whose 900-member church is located only a block away from the State Street site.

David Dewhirst has bought, renovated, and converted about a dozen downtown buildings for residential use during the past decade. He says that the city and the county should seriously consider a major residential project on the site because he says downtown will have a hard time achieving the ambitious goal of a so-called "24-hour city" without considerably more residential stock. Dewhirst says that he and Goss have done an informal study that shows that if every vacant building in downtown Knoxville were renovated and converted to residential, it would add only about 750 residential units to downtown. Even when that number is added to the approximately 1,700 people who already reside in the city core, "that's still not enough to have a lively sustainable downtown," Dewhirst claims. "We need at least 5,000 people down here to really sustain the kind of retail venues that people talk about. So we need to look at all property downtown from a residential-first perspective, and this piece of land is a very rare opportunity."

When Dewhirst refers to "the kind of retail venue" that people talk about, he says he means a combination of unique shops and businesses that people who live in the area would routinely use, such as dry cleaners, video stores, and a grocery store of some sort.

Dewhirst's number of 5,000 residents comes close to that of Bob Talbott of Holrob Investment, a suburban developer which has done most of its work putting up upscale strip malls and big-box retail developments. "A general rule of thumb in this business is that you need to have at least 6,000 residents in an area in order to support a grocery store," Talbott says. "We have to have a threshold of people downtown, and we're not there yet," he says.

Talbott is one of many people who suggest the idea of a complex with underground parking, retail on the ground floor, and residential above. "This kind of thing would be wonderful for Knoxville," says Talbott. "It would not only bring people downtown, but it would also help take care of their needs once they got there." However, Talbott is aware of just how tough it can be to do downtown residential. Two years ago, he tried to develop a small condominium project near the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame, but backed out when he was unable to pre-sell enough units. "We found that it was really tough to do pre-sells," says Talbott.

There is also some irony in the number of people who are suggesting a mixed-use project with residential on the Universe Knoxville site. In the mid-1990s, developers Paul and Marsha Trausch purchased a four-story building near the corner of State and Union, intending to convert it to eight residential apartments, offices, and retail use. "The building was about 80 years old, and had once been the headquarters of the Tennessee Mill and Mining Company," says Paul Trausch. "It was solid as a rock, and would have been great for that purpose." The county bought the structure from Trausch and tore it down for the jail project. "It they hadn't done that, we could be doing what everyone is suggesting now, only with a beautiful old building."

UT Downtown

Because downtown residential on the open market can be so risky, the idea has also been floated that a development on the State Street site could be affiliated with the University of Tennessee. Marleen Davis, dean of the UT College of Architecture and Design, visualizes a project that would target young professionals and graduate students. "It would be ideal to have a critical mass of 2-400 graduate students and new faculty in a mixed-use facility," she says. "If it were a high-quality residential development with a higher price point than the typical student development, I think it could work," she adds.

However, Davis, who is chairman of UT's Campus Planning Committee, is careful to point out that the current campus master plan does not call for residential developments downtown. "This is my opinion, not the school's," she says.

Another person who links the success of a residential development with UT is County Commissioner John Schmid. However, Schmid's idea is slightly different from Davis' in that he thinks the project would work better with undergraduate students. "Graduate students have no money," he says. "Undergraduate students have credit cards; they make up a very large percentage of the people who go to these downtown events like Sundown in the City."

Whether it targeted graduate or undergraduate students, Schmid says there are several reasons downtown would benefit from a UT-related development. Students could either walk to campus or take a trolley, which would increase the use of public transit and reduce the school's need for parking. A student housing development would provide downtown retailers and restaurants with a cheap employment base. Finally, a UT housing development, if it were large enough, might be accompanied by a small UT Police precinct office, a small coffee shop, or other amenities.

Dewhirst is another developer who likes the possibility of a UT-related housing development on the site. He adds yet another reason he thinks it would work: student preference. "Downtown is where the students want to be," Dewhirst says. "You wouldn't believe the number of calls I get from UT students absolutely craving a place in downtown Knoxville."

There is one major problem with the idea of UT- related development, however. The school isn't interested, at least not now. UT's long-term plan calls for students to be housed in three structures, none of which currently exist. The first, for undergraduates, is the massive 800-unit complex in Ft. Sanders being developed by the UT Foundation. The other two buildings are 400-unit dormitories for graduate students that are, like the ball fields, planned for the agricultural campus.

Scheurer says that the idea of housing students downtown "has come up and been bounced around before." And although he describes the school and its long-term planning committee as "open minded," it sounds unlikely that the school will jump headlong into the idea of shifting its focus to downtown. "The only way that I see us diverging from that [the school's current plan] right now is if the university population grows at such a rate that it would require us to develop more housing than we currently envision," he says. "That's not anticipated."

Eli Fly, president of the UT Foundation, gives a similar account of the situation. "We have no plans to do that at this time," he says, when asked about the idea of a school-related residential development downtown, "but we would certainly consider it. Our minds are not closed."

Urban Village

Most of the developers and city planner types who talk about a mixed-use residential development on the Universe Knoxville site think in terms of a large, vertical project financed by a small number of developers. But there is one notable exception. Mark Schimmenti is the design director of the Nashville Civic Design Center and a faculty member on leave from the University of Tennessee's School of Architecture and Design. He has thought long and hard about the site during his last two years of driving back and forth from Knoxville to Nashville.

Like Dewhirst, Talbott, and many others, Schimmenti believes the site should be turned into a mixed-used development with residential as the largest component. "I have seen studies that indicate that a downtown resident is worth between 35 and 57 times more to a city than a tourist and conventioneer based on their spending and the amount of money spent by people who visit," he says. However, Schimmenti says the residential development should be focused on owner-occupants rather than renters, arguing that downtown Knoxville badly needs units for sale in addition to the ones for rent. And Schimmenti believes that the details of the development should be left up to dozens, maybe even hundreds, of homeowners and small business owners. "Let's come up with a plan and a set of architectural guidelines for how and where you can build a house, how and where you can build an office, and how and where you can build apartments, that work within the urban area, and then subdivide it into hundreds of small parcels," he says. "Then, a young couple might put up a small house. A medium-sized developer might put up a larger structure. And a wealthy person might put up a large house.

"This is the way people used to build cities in the old days."

Schimmenti says a project that allows many people to participate as owner-operators would be better for downtown. "The most interesting things in the cities that have interesting downtowns are the small things, not the big corporate things," he says. "Take downtown Nashville. The things that do well downtown are the small honky-tonks and shops—not the corporately owned theme restaurants that have come and gone out of business."

Schimmenti isn't specific about the type and density of housing he would recommend. He says the project might have a combination of row houses (similar to the Kendrick Place development next to Chesapeake's restaurant), courtyard apartment buildings, and multistory apartments. "It might take 10 years for the whole thing to be developed," he says. "But in the long run we would be building something we could be proud of, and we would help put a population base downtown."

When told about Schimmenti's idea for an "urban village" in downtown Knoxville, many people contacted for this story said the idea seemed interesting. But some were concerned that the concept might not provide downtown with a large enough number of residents. "We need more density than that to really help," says Dewhirst, saying that he thinks that a project on the site should be able to contain a minimum of 500 units.

Neighborly

Another concern that arises when people talk about a development on the State Street site is that whatever goes on the site "works" with the rest of downtown. "In my opinion, Universe Knoxville was not integrated into the urban fabric of the city," says Goss. "Regardless of whether this is residential or a library, this has to be."

Goss gives many examples of the kind of thing that he means, including the direction the development faces, the ability to easily walk to it, its street appeal, and its tendency to create life for the rest of downtown. "There are some developments that encourage the flow of foot traffic and some that don't," he says. One example of a structure that works well with the rest of downtown, he says, is the new building on Union Avenue that houses the newly relocated Pete's restaurant on the ground floor and a parking garage in the rest of the building. "Parking garages are usually ugly buildings that you don't want to walk past," he says. "But the people who go eat at Pete's would never know it's in a parking garage."

Goss believes that whatever goes on the site will work better if Summit Hill Drive gets a major redesign. During the urban renewal era, an entire block-wide swath was cleared so that eastbound drivers could quickly make it through downtown. Goss thinks it makes sense to bring the block back. Not only would this slow vehicles, it would turn the now-pitiful road known as Commerce Street back into an active street and give downtown Knoxville's hole in the ground a presence on the block. "A lot of cities and towns are undoing some of the mistakes that they made during urban renewal, and this was one of the mistakes that was made here," he says.

The Bottom Line

The idea of a mixed-use development on the State Street site won't fly if a developer can't come up with the right combination of private dollars and public support to make it work. "I would love to see a project that would encompass almost everything that is needed downtown, from housing to parking to retail and entertainment," says Raja Jubran, the president of Denark Construction and the chairman of the board of the Knoxville Area Chamber Partnership. "But the most important thing is that it has to be bankable." Chamber Partnership CEO Mike Edwards has another way of putting it. "The easy part is figuring out what's good for downtown," he says. "The hard part is finding a way to make it work."

The county and the Knox County Development Corp. have a few ways to help a prospective developer (or developers) pull off a project on the site. One is the price of the land. The county paid close to $9 million for the many parcels that now make up downtown's hole in the ground. Depending on the nature of the project, and depending on how much the project helped the city, the sales price is theoretically negotiable.

Another tool that the local government can use is called tax-increment financing. TIF, as it is known, is effectively a tax break that allows the local government to take property taxes collected on an improved parcel and dedicate them to help retire the bonds financing that project.

Another factor to consider is that, under a state law that was passed to help Knoxville finance its convention center, any retail dollars collected on the site could theoretically be diverted to help retire bonds that built the project. Today, looking at the hole in the ground, it may be hard to imagine that it has much in the way of a retail future. But Edwards points out that if the residential component were large enough, some level of retail would likely follow. "There are a few types of retail that would look at the site if it were done right," he says.

However, all the news on the public-private partnership side is not good. Leigh Burch, the developer of Sterchi Lofts, says that the idea of a mixed-use development on the State Street site "sounds appealing." But he points out that many of the things that helped him put his project together wouldn't apply to new construction.

"We got the building for about $8 a square foot," he says, referring to Sterchi Lofts. "Then we got historic tax credits that allowed us to borrow money for a much lower interest rate."

Burch says that it will take a very creative plan and a lot of help from the city and county governments to make a residential development work on the site. He says that whoever comes up with a plan should research every government program available, such as one that offers low-interest rates for projects that have a large low-income housing component.

"A lot of people are very excited about what we've done," says Burch. "But it took a lot of effort to do this, and a lot of things had to go right. Downtown residential is tough."
 

November 20, 2002 * Vol. 12, No. 47
© 2002 Metro Pulse