Lamar Avenue redevelopment

[Bears]

It seems as if Lamar I-240 area will now get into the act of redevelopment. I'm not really familiar with this side of town so I don't know if the impact on the city will be that impressive. Is this a good development or is it just rebuilding the sprawl from the 1970's?

http://www.memphisdailynews.com/Editorial/...d.aspx?id=91846

[mandrws1]

It seems as if Lamar I-240 area will now get into the act of redevelopment. I'm not really familiar with this side of town so I don't know if the impact on the city will be that impressive. Is this a good development or is it just rebuilding the sprawl from the 1970's?

http://www.memphisdailynews.com/Editorial/...d.aspx?id=91846

I'm familiar with the area and this is going to be tremendous! The people who live nearby always complain about the lack of shopping opportunities, so this should really help the area out.

[Clobber]

I'm familiar with the area and this is going to be tremendous! The people who live nearby always complain about the lack of shopping opportunities, so this should really help the area out.

I guess I'll be curious how it looks. I think the community needs to consider alternative styles to the strip mall. Even upper-scale developments are basically strip malls, and it's getting so repetitive it's depressing. I know the area needs retail, so that's great. I just wish the designs would add something different to the region, something actually town square-esque (not as contrived as the new mall out east). It's probably asking too much from something this desperately needed in this area. But everytime new retail outside of downtown is announced, I hope, and my hope gets dashed usually. Except for the possibility out at Riverbend, and an announcement a while back that Bartlett was looking to recreate its downtown in a town square kind of direction. I envy Kirkwood, MO (a suburb of St. Louis); it seems to be a quaint alternative to Clayton. I wish Metro Memphis had that kind of diversity in suburbs to add to what we already have..

End rant. Sorry.

[hgupta]

The end of Lamar near downtown seems to be doing better. A project similar to Uptown and LeMoyne-Owens Gardens is happening near Lamar and Pauline. Its supposed to be mixed income housing that will be aimed at nurses, doctors and researchers who want to be near the medical center.

Its such an important avenue for people to access downtown that its renaissance can't be far behind/