Would you want housing for seniors or possibly a new park in the Division Street area? How about a food truck plaza? Or improved streetscape and infrastructure?
These were just a few of the proposed opportunities unveiled to Arlington residents at a Discover Division public meeting on June 21 at City Hall. The recommendations were the result of suggestions taken from residents at a previous meeting on March 29.
Approximately 35 attendees heard details about each proposal and then were asked to rank the opportunities according to what they thought was most important. In addition, residents could write down any new idea they envisioned for the area. The Project Prioritization Worksheet is available online through mid-July for residents who were unable to attend the meeting at webapps.arlingtontx.gov/tmp/planning/divisionstreet.html.
The Open House was one of three to be conducted by the City of Arlington as part of its Division Street Corridor Strategy to address the mile-long strip of Division Street between Cooper and Collins streets. The recommendations were presented by Wendy Shabay, a consultant from Freese and Nichols, and included:
- Housing for seniors.
- Residential lofts.
- Auto mall to house smaller car lots along the street.
- Restaurants to fill in gaps between businesses.
- A mixed-use office/retail/housing development with a parking structure
- "Community Kitchen" to accommodate the vocational education of individual chef-entrepreneurs.
- The possibility of redeveloping the current central library site to allow for a major research and development office with associated housing and restaurant space.
- A civic anchor that would move parking at City Hall into a mixed use garage building due west of the building, allowing for a new urban library and a possible civic plaza.
- A mobile food plaza to accommodate urban food truck vendors.
- A new park south of Front Street and east of Mesquite Street.
- New parking area south of Front Street and West of Center Street.
- New neon signage to promote history and create a new sense of place.
- Streetscape and infrastructure improvements.
Most of the residents who heard the presentation stayed to participate in ranking the opportunities. Members of the city's Community Development and Planning Department and the Division Corridor Advisory Committee were on hand to answer questions.
The Division Street project is designed to find ways to support Division's historic past and keep it commercially viable, while finding new investments for the area.
"If you do the same old, same old, you are going to get the same old, same old," said City Council Member Lana Wolff. "These are all viable opportunities. This provides a chance for land owners to work with interested private developers to create new avenues for financing and development."
The City will now begin creating a draft version of the strategy. One more public meeting will be conducted before the final version is taken to the Planning and Zoning Committee and the City Council, who is scheduled to review the document by the end of the year.
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