If you had a magic wand, what would you bring to Nashville? (Memphis: living in, zoned)

[nashvols]

Originally Posted by bigcitymike

Great point. Funny you should mention that..

Check out Facts & Comments <-- Save Oak Hill

There's nothing about the Oak Hill development that suggests it will be dense -- just commercial. I think that's a completely different discussion.


Though from the link, whoever is running that site seems to think all commercial enterprise is evil. I wonder where they shop?

[artemis]

Originally Posted by nashvols

There's nothing about the Oak Hill development that suggests it will be dense -- just commercial. I think that's a completely different discussion.


Though from the link, whoever is running that site seems to think all commercial enterprise is evil. I wonder where they shop?

In Brentwood.

[bigcitymike]

Originally Posted by nashvols

There's nothing about the Oak Hill development that suggests it will be dense -- just commercial. I think that's a completely different discussion.

I don't have a dog in the fight, but I can see one leading to the other.

[groovamos]

Originally Posted by JMT

I'd bring (in no particular order):

• IKEA
• more high-rises to downtown/midtown
• more Trader Joe's and Whole Foods around town
• a music-themed theme park (à la Opryland but larger)
• light rail and regional trains everywhere

l[/url]

I've been to Austin a couple of times in the last year, and read an article about the city a few years ago including an interview with a big mover type of guy up there and boy was he proud of the "light rail" coming to Austin.

So last fall I happened to see a "light rail" train going north as it crossed under IH-35 and saw it was on a legacy track, and seemed to be entirely empty, on a weekend.

I was there a couple of months ago visiting friends in NW Hills and was thinking of going downtown for dinner on a weekday around 5:30. Since parking down there is truly awful and so is traffic, I suggested taking the rail and my hosts clued me in that the rail makes 2 round trips per day. Some light rail huh?

It just makes no sense in almost all American cities. Boston, NYC, Chicago, and SF Bay yes. I'm not sure about Dallas and Atlanta, and other west coast cities. I think in those they suck taxpayer money in the extreme, I know the one in Houston does. Light rail is the trophy wife of civic boosters.

So far as high-rises in Nashville, I invite all you guys to spend a couple of days in Houston, #3 in the nation for high rise portfolio count, by far most of them outside the CBD -- and guess what: no zoning. Every time zoning has come up for referendum it goes down, people know a good thing. I look at how Nashville metro zoning has each commercial district zoned for building size and shape and I have to laugh. The city puts a limit on how valuable a property can be, and what an owner can build there. So since the city has limited the value of a property in this way, why should a developer bother to economize by adding more floors? The skyline there is dominated by 25~31 floors and has the only flat-top look of all the cities in its class. You have smaller cities like Omaha, Des Moines, and Tulsa, with 40 story buildings, Ft Worth has one 36 story, New Orleans Shell Plaza is 50 stories. Look at your peer city Austin, many buildings there are 40+, one is 55. I think the business community and the citizenry there should wake up, and maybe statewide, if you want to better compete with GA, NC and TX for business development. City density is a much better trophy wife than transportation boondoggles

[Greenciti]

Originally Posted by groovamos

I've been to Austin a couple of times in the last year, and read an article about the city a few years ago including an interview with a big mover type of guy up there and boy was he proud of the "light rail" coming to Austin.

So last fall I happened to see a "light rail" train going north as it crossed under IH-35 and saw it was on a legacy track, and seemed to be entirely empty, on a weekend.

I was there a couple of months ago visiting friends in NW Hills and was thinking of going downtown for dinner on a weekday around 5:30. Since parking down there is truly awful and so is traffic, I suggested taking the rail and my hosts clued me in that the rail makes 2 round trips per day. Some light rail huh?

It just makes no sense in almost all American cities. Boston, NYC, Chicago, and SF Bay yes. I'm not sure about Dallas and Atlanta, and other west coast cities. I think in those they suck taxpayer money in the extreme, I know the one in Houston does. Light rail is the trophy wife of civic boosters.

I agree with your statement about light rail being a trophy. As a Nashville transplant living in Boston I believe the whole light rail thing may be cultural. Us southerners are so use to the convenience of our cars and not having to plan activities around public transportation that we do not take advantage of it. Frankly, public trans can hinder spontaneity aka freedom. In fact, we even learn at a young age that once you are old enough to drive you are "free." This makes us less likely to jump on the light rail or city bus to go into town because it was never habitual for most of us, and even taboo for some. Besides, we do not have the same parking congestion and high parking costs as Boston, NYC, Chi, etc so there is not much of an incentive for southerners to utilize public transportation. Once it starts to take two hours to drive from downtown to Goodletsville, Antioch or Old Hickory or you spend an hour driving around looking for ANYWHERE to park when you drive downtown then public transportation will start to be a real option and not so taboo.

[Shakeesha]

Originally Posted by Greenciti

I agree with your statement about light rail being a trophy. As a Nashville transplant living in Boston I believe the whole light rail thing may be cultural. Us southerners are so use to the convenience of our cars and not having to plan activities around public transportation that we do not take advantage of it. Frankly, public trans can hinder spontaneity aka freedom. In fact, we even learn at a young age that once you are old enough to drive you are "free." This makes us less likely to jump on the light rail or city bus to go into town because it was never habitual for most of us, and even taboo for some. Besides, we do not have the same parking congestion and high parking costs as Boston, NYC, Chi, etc so there is not much of an incentive for southerners to utilize public transportation. Once it starts to take two hours to drive from downtown to Goodletsville, Antioch or Old Hickory or you spend an hour driving around looking for ANYWHERE to park when you drive downtown then public transportation will start to be a real option and not so taboo.

It's statements like these that let me know any serious action on mass transit in Nashville will never happen.

[mcredux]

* Tennessee Tech relocated to Nashvillle and rebranded as UT-Nashville.
* Charter schools widely-accessible to all income levels and neighborhoods.
* Lower taxes.
* Less emphasis on music and tourism as paths to prosperity.

[Sigequinox]

:wiggle wiggle: (or whatever sound a magic wand makes)

Large VC financial base and collaborative university efforts to establish a biotech hub in/around Nashville. a "silicon valley of The South" w/o all the BS that comes with Cali/SV, of course (sorry N.cal).

Biotech clusters into hot spots where resources can be shared/exchanged, talent acquired and centralized, funding leveraged and synergized. I would LOVE to see Vanderbilt and local universities start producing spin-off start up labs taking advantage of the new biotech boom.

I believe there is a project underway called onec1ty which is taking initiative on such an effort, but some big players and deep pockets will need to be involved to reach "hub" status. This would bring every type of STEM job to Nash in large numbers.

[Kristin85]

Originally Posted by Shakeesha

It's statements like these that let me know any serious action on mass transit in Nashville will never happen.

Greenciti is right that it will take major headaches to bring the public on board with mass transit in Nashville. I'm originally from CT. In CT if you commute to work in New York City you're looking at 2+ hours of driving during rush hour. Meanwhile, it takes 40 minutes on the train to get to work in Manhattan. When it takes that long to drive to work, mass transit becomes attractive.

It takes an hour or less for most people to commute from the suburbs to Nashville during rush hour. With that little time spent in traffic, I can imagine most people being unwilling to give up their cars. Skip ahead to 2025 and Nashville traffic is going to be a nightmare compared to the way it is now. That's probably when we'll be having a real discussion about mass transit.

[ChesterCopperpot1]

Didnt read the whole thread, but here are A few things:

1) Better mass transit - light rail, better buses, AMTRAK (it's insane that AMTRAK doesn't service Nashville).
2) Major League Baseball. I know, FTP just opened, but it's still just MiLB. I'm a baseball nut and I've dreamed of MLB in Nashville my whole life.
3) More direct international flights in and out of BNA. It sucks that to fly anywhere internationally not named Cancun or Toronto that you have to connect through another city. Hoping that we can get a direct from BNA to Heathrow. One day, I hope.

These are just a fEw. I'd also like for a retractable roof stadium for the Titans in 20 yearS. I want a Super Bowl in Nashville. Its the only way it'll happen.