Allen Creek Development: RA Smith Open House---summary

"Mike" of RA Smith Consultants made a presentation on the Allen Creek Development Design concepts last Tuesday at Redevelopment Authority. Developers, Planners, City Administrator, Mayor Decker, as well as some citizens were present: Yes, "Grumps" and "The Evansville Observer were present.

The presentation opened with the market analysis. Mike said that Evansville has a broad market citizenry of about 10,000 citizens in the market area---most of the shopping that they do, or over 200 million annually is done in Madison or Janesville. Of the possible businesses that could elect to come to Evansville, fear that a WalMart would come is inappropriate---all of the folks wanting to come would be smaller. And all of the jobs that these small businesses could generate would be entry level retail positions.

There are three areas for commercial to go---downtown, East and the Union Allen Creek Area, and the city has the role of deciding who will go where.

On the railroad line-----Considering the lack of population density, and the huge cost of railroad development, there is NO possibility of any passenger use of it. There might be more shipping but that is unclear.

On trail/ bike path along Allen Creek---Chris Eager asked whether we would live to see such a path---the answer was that because of the layout of the area, it would have to be an unconventional path, and if the engineers had their way and it had to be to the widest specs, it would not happen.

"Mike" said that folks he talked to wanted to keep zoning the same "MOSTLY". Then he presented a series of large pictures that included East Main in the Allen Creek project.

Jim Brooks noted that in the past the critical flaw of development process had been the lack of consultation with the neighborhood, and it seemed that RA Smith was headed in the same direction.

Tony Wyse asked who had been consulted with. Right in the process of answering the question, Adams Roofing spoke up and said that their phone calls had not been returned with respect to input. But--they hoped that any development would be done with a professional process that was inclusive of the parties involved and they had understood that their property was not probably the best use possible, and IF it "made business sense" they had no firm oppositon to positive change.

Tony Wyse also suggested that the Allen Creek Project should stick to its focus and not wander.......

Citizens who have a interest in these matters should attend next month's Redevelopment Authority meeting. There are five videos of the essential presentation. Stay tuned.