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Greer Stadium site/Fort Negley expansion/redevelopment


markhollin

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Huts? Huts? Not boxy enough. Flatten the tops, set them back 200' from the street and you're approved. Also, you must provide 1.5 parking spaces for the maximum number of inhabitants. You're parking options are as follows;

1. Use 75% of your land for surface lots. 

2. You can build a parking garage, but it must be above ground and cladded with cardboard pizza boxes. 

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1 hour ago, nashvillwill said:

Huts? Huts? Not boxy enough. Flatten the tops, set them back 200' from the street and you're approved. Also, you must provide 1.5 parking spaces for the maximum number of inhabitants. You're parking options are as follows;

1. Use 75% of your land for surface lots. 

2. You can build a parking garage, but it must be above ground and cladded with cardboard pizza boxes. 

:rofl:

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  • 3 weeks later...

From today's Nashville Post:

Metro board upholds decision to award project to Cloud Hill group

An unsatisfied developer on Wednesday unanimously lost his appeal over the process that led to a different group being selected to redevelop the Greer Stadium site. 

Devinder Singh Sandhu, one of the developers behind the proposed Nashville Adventure Park, had protested the Metro decision to grant the redevelopment opportunity to the Cloud Hill Partnership, which includes developer Bert Mathews and music producer T Bone Burnett.

The Metro Procurement Appeals Board upheld the decision after a lengthy public hearing, at which Sandhu accused various Metro officials of obfuscation throughout the process.

Nashville Adventure Park (pictured) would have included a dense development with housing, a hotel, indoor sports facilities, a farmers market, retail space, offices, restaurants and an amphitheater at the site of the old baseball stadium. The Cloud Hill group has proposed a similar mixed-use development with park space, housing and commercial uses on the 21-acre site in Wedgewood-Houston.

“I’m not opposed to the Mathews group,” Sandhu said. “I know they do wonderful work. I am, however, quite disturbed with the procurement process and the selection methodology.”

Sandhu questioned why his proposal scored lower for diversity, considering he is of South Asian descent, and he claimed certain closed-door meetings to review bids were inappropriate. He asked that the decision be rescinded and the process be re-started.

Metro officials, including Jeff Gossage, the purchasing agent who recently moved to a position with Metro Nashville Public Schools, countered Sandhu’s claims, stating the closed-door meetings were required by state law and the diversity score followed guidelines.

Mathews attended the appeal hearing and was given the chance to respond.

“We’re very proud of the work and our history in Nashville and each element of our submittal,” he said. “Hopefully we’re looking forward to moving ahead.”

The failure of Sandhu’s appeal is not the last roadblock for Mathews and his group, though.

In recent months, a number of community activists have questioned the chosen development plans, citing, in part, potential impacts to the historic Civil War site Fort Negley, which sits adjacent to the stadium.

Sandhu adopted some of those criticisms during his appeal hearing, saying that his proposal followed Metro’s suggestions but was not what he would choose for the site.

“We’re forced to do this development, which I think goes against what we need for Metro,” he said. “We can have development around the park, but this plan as it stands would take away from the magnificence of Fort Negley.”

Any development on the site still requires Metro Council approval.

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Amid controversy over the future of Greer Stadium, Metro Parks & Recreation on Monday kicked off what they say will be just a two- to three-month process to conduct an archaeological evaluation of the 21-acre site that sits downhill from the Civil War-era Fort Negley.

Although archaeologists have looked at the fort's footprint, the undertaking is considered the first to look exclusively at the Greer portion of the area.

Fieldwork to collect the data, expected to take 10 days, doesn't start until next week. It will be followed by a 60-day process to complete a final report by the end of the year.

http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2017/10/03/greer-stadium-archaeological-study-begins-nashville-amid-cloud-hill-debate/727114001/

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19 minutes ago, titanhog said:

I really wish they would just go ahead and make this our city's "Civil War" site.  We should have something that's 100% dedicated to telling the story of Nashville's part in the war (like Franklin and Murfreesboro).  Belle Meade plantation shouldn't be the only "big" Nashville Civil War site.

I agree. It would be cool to put a Civil War museum on the site. 

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A preservation group that supports the Civil War-era Fort Negley has asked the Tennessee Historical Commission to intervene to stop Nashville Mayor Megan Barry's proposal for a mixed-use proposal plan called Cloud Hill on the city's abandoned Greer Stadium site.

Friends of Fort Negley, the plaintiff in a legal petition filed against Metro on Monday, asks the Tennessee Historical Commission to issue an order finding that the entire acreage of the Fort Negley site, including the Greer Stadium site, is a "historical memorial" under state law.

Historic memorials, under the Tennessee historic Preservation Act of 2016, cannot be disturbed or altered unless the public entity that controls the memorial is granted a special waiver from the Tennessee Historical Commission.

http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2017/10/09/friends-fort-negley-sues-nashville-push-stop-cloud-hill-redevelopment-proposal/745716001/

https://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/news/2017/10/09/cloud-hill-debate-friends-of-fort-negley-file-suit.html

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2 hours ago, markhollin said:

A preservation group that supports the Civil War-era Fort Negley has asked the Tennessee Historical Commission to intervene to stop Nashville Mayor Megan Barry's proposal for a mixed-use proposal plan called Cloud Hill on the city's abandoned Greer Stadium site.

Friends of Fort Negley, the plaintiff in a legal petition filed against Metro on Monday, asks the Tennessee Historical Commission to issue an order finding that the entire acreage of the Fort Negley site, including the Greer Stadium site, is a "historical memorial" under state law.

Historic memorials, under the Tennessee historic Preservation Act of 2016, cannot be disturbed or altered unless the public entity that controls the memorial is granted a special waiver from the Tennessee Historical Commission.

http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2017/10/09/friends-fort-negley-sues-nashville-push-stop-cloud-hill-redevelopment-proposal/745716001/

https://www.bizjournals.com/nashville/news/2017/10/09/cloud-hill-debate-friends-of-fort-negley-file-suit.html

So these people presumably have had no issue with the large, crusty, currently unused baseball stadium and surrounding gravel parking lots that have been sitting there for decades, but when it comes time to actually build a useful community in that space suddenly they are concerned with how surrounding development will impact Fort Negley.  What gives?!  I fail to see how the Cloud Hill development will negatively impact Fort Negley and I laugh at this group's insinuation that one must inherently be anti-Fort Negley if they support this development.  If anything I would think that this development would lead to more visitors to the historic site, which would likely lead to more investment being poured into  it.  I am all for historic preservation, but why is it that so many of the groups formed to promote that agenda are seemingly incapable of seeing the forest through the trees?!  It's maddening.  

Edited by BnaBreaker
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31 minutes ago, BnaBreaker said:

So these people presumably have had no issue with the large, crusty, currently unused baseball stadium and surrounding gravel parking lots that have been sitting there for decades, but when it comes time to actually build a useful community in that space suddenly they are concerned with how surrounding development will impact Fort Negley.  What gives?!  I fail to see how the Cloud Hill development will negatively impact Fort Negley and I laugh at this group's insinuation that one must inherently be anti-Fort Negley if they support this development.  If anything I would think that this development would lead to more visitors to the historic site, which would likely lead to more investment being poured into  it.  I am all for historic preservation, but why is it that so many of the groups formed to promote that agenda are seemingly incapable of seeing the forest through the trees?!  It's maddening.  

I think they're hoping to "reclaim" the land that was misused in the past (such as building a baseball stadium on the land).  It may be similar to reclaiming battlefield land in Franklin...and trying to stop more encroachment on Stones River Battlefield in M'Boro.

I'm not 100% sure how much of this Greer land should be deemed historic...but it's worth exploring and getting right.

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2 minutes ago, titanhog said:

I think they're hoping to "reclaim" the land that was misused in the past (such as building a baseball stadium on the land).  It may be similar to reclaiming battlefield land in Franklin...and trying to stop more encroachment on Stones River Battlefield in M'Boro.

I'm not 100% sure how much of this Greer land should be deemed historic...but it's worth exploring and getting right.

I didn't live here then, but I understand there was objection against building Greer stadium on the site for the same reasons being raised now.    The argument against redevelopment now is that this is a chance to start over and "get it right".     I'm waiting for the results of the archaeological study, but the more I learn about the history of the site,  the more I tend to agree with those pushing for preservation.     

I don't consider myself a civil war buff, but I went up and walked around Ft. Negley this spring after the city cleared the overgrown brush.    This was before the Cloud Hill development was announced.      It's really a spectacular site that has been all but neglected for decades.      As I read the historical markers around the fort, what really struck me were the stories of the thousands of slave laborers who built it and who were forced to live (and die) in inhuman conditions, lacking food and shelter from the elements.     That, it seems to me, is as much a part of the story of the site as its use as a Union garrison.     So, yeah, I get the argument for having the fort as the focal point of a larger public space that also honors those who gave their lives building it.       

 

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1 hour ago, Pdt2f said:

Excuse my lack of local historical knowledge (especially glaring since I have a history degree!), but did the union build the fort using slave labor or did they capture a fort that had already been built with slave labor?

It was built by the union army.   Here's an excerpt from an article that describes Ft. Negley's history and efforts since the early 1900's to maintain it as a public park.    

Most of the 55 acres in Fort Negley Park once belonged to Judge John Overton, one of Tennessee’s most prominent early citizens, who began acquiring the land between 1805 and 1828. Overton’s tract, which featured a rocky prominence known locally as “Saint Cloud Hill,” remained undeveloped until the Civil War when the Union Army occupied Nashville in 1862 and seized the land to fortify the city

Constructed of white limestone on the crest of Saint Cloud Hill, Fort Negley was the crown jewel of the federal fortifications and entrenchments that ringed the city. Federal troop encampments sprawled towards the city on the slope north of the fort while Negley’s large guns protected the railroad and approaches to the south.  To build these defensive works, the army “impressed” African Americans who were either being held as slaves or had fled from enslavement to the protective lee of Union lines.

Edited by CenterHill
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Nashville's Fort Negley is drawing attention from another national organization, this time by a group that celebrates cultural landscapes across the U.S., as historic preservationists fight a controversial mixed-use development near the Civil War-era fort called Cloud Hill.

The Cultural Landscape Foundation, based in Washington, D.C., on Thursday recognized Fort Negley — built in 1862 by the Union Army in occupied Nashville — as one of a dozen nationally significant landscapes that are at-risk. They include sites protected under the Antiquities Act or facing threats such as development or confiscation. 

http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2017/10/12/fort-negley-threatened-landscape-foundation-nashville/755321001/

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A telephone poll financed last week by Barry’s campaign committee, obtained by The Tennessean, shows that on the issue of Cloud Hill development, the poll found 55 percent favor the project at the site of abandoned Greer Stadium and 32 percent oppose it. The question described Cloud Hill as a privately funded project that would create more green space, parks space and affordable housing. It did not mention Cloud Hill's retail component, nor did it note that Greer Stadium sits on public land that is part of the original Fort Negley Park footprint.

http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2017/10/12/mayor-megan-barry-mass-transit-poll-nashville/758478001/

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16 minutes ago, markhollin said:

A telephone poll financed last week by Barry’s campaign committee, obtained by The Tennessean, shows that on the issue of Cloud Hill development, the poll found 55 percent favor the project at the site of abandoned Greer Stadium and 32 percent oppose it. The question described Cloud Hill as a privately funded project that would create more green space, parks space and affordable housing. It did not mention Cloud Hill's retail component, nor did it note that Greer Stadium sits on public land that is part of the original Fort Negley Park footprint.

http://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2017/10/12/mayor-megan-barry-mass-transit-poll-nashville/758478001/

Seems they left out some pretty crucial info...

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