Melissa Ross
The public will have another chance Wednesday night to sound off on their vision for a redeveloped Jacksonville Landing, and the man leading the redesign project says this “charrette” process is key.
“We want to hear from the community,” said Aundra Wallace, CEO of the city’s Downtown Investment Authority.
“What’s their vision for the Jacksonville Landing?” he said during an appearance on WJCT’s First Coast Connect.
“It’s one of the key assets downtown. You have to get it right. And it takes time. There will be varying opinions. You try to come to as much of a consensus as you possibly can.”
The DIA is sponsoring a second public forum, or “charrette,” as design professionals, the public, and other officials discuss how to reconfigure the Landing with an emphasis on public open space, increased river access, attractions such as “the right bars and restaurants,” and how to build parking and private businesses into a small urban space.
“One of the challenges is, it’s only a 6.6 acre site,” Wallace said. “It’s a very compact site. How much development can you put in to generate a rate of return? That’s where you get into some good debates. But it sits in the heart of downtown, and we can’t make a mistake. Right now, the square footage of retail space at the Landing is not working. Right-sizing that is critical for this project to succeed. But if you have the right type of retail, people will want to go there.”
That’s been the ever-elusive unicorn bedeviling the Landing almost since its inception, of course. Finding the right mix of businesses and attractions to keep visitors coming. For Wallace, opening up the site to the St. Johns River is a must. New eateries and bars — the right ones — are also part of the vision.
“It has to be something you can’t get anywhere else in Jacksonville,” he said. “You need the right type of restaurants and bars, microbreweries, when you are able to connect those to other nodes, like the Performing Arts Center, then you have something.”
Still an open question: how the Landing redesign will be funded. Wallace says City Hall’s buy-in will be a key piece of the process.
“The DIA, while it has its independence, we are seamlessly interlocked in with the current administration and that process is working very well. We have to have that relationship, because the DIA does not have all the investment capital we need to do those projects, so we need to partner with the city.”
“First, we’ve got to come up with the right design. Second, I need to sit with Mayor Lenny Curry and his team. Is there the need for any additional public sector investment? Right now it’s premature to have a discussion on the financing, but there are certain things that will need to be done in terms of roads and infrastructure for this development to be done well,” he said.
“For the Landing to be successful, this has to be something Northeast Florida owns. Once we are drawn to it, then others will come to it.”
