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Spartan....we built all those brick piers on Ezell street. The granite came from up under the road that was used inside the piers. A guy I work with that is an older man told me that the train actually used to back up into that area. Kind of strange. I wouldnt mind having a few truck loads of that granite. I could build a pretty chimney out of it.

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Awesome work :) I'm really excited to see the final product and to hang out at those restaurants.

And yeah, there used to be train tracks crossing all over downtown, so that doesn't surprise me. If you look at the Sanborn Fire Insurance maps from the 1920s you can see how ridiculous it was.

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  • 2 weeks later...

It appears that Crossroads coffe and Cafe Isi are closing up shop. I hate this because both filled a nice niche downtown. Neither say that finances were involved. Crossroads is owned by two Converse seniors and they are unsure of their plans after graduation, and the owner of Cafe ish has personal reason for her closing.

I hope that at least one of them can find a buyer to keep a neat coffee shop downtown.

ARTICLE

Edited by hub-city
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The DuPre House that used to sit where the Marriott is today, now sits on Howard St near Magnolia...... its finally been restored to its "Historic" status on the National Register. The City and the Preservation Trust are doing good work to get that house restored. I can't imagine how long it will take, but last time I was over there noticeable progress had been made. Its really amazing how much downtown has expanded over the years. Grand houses such as that one used to line Pine Street, East Main, and Church St. Pine and East Main used to be more a part of Converse Heights than of downtown.

Article

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Wow that is a great letter. It speaks volumes about what is going on in Spartanburg, and I almost felt like he was talking to us at UP for a moment. I appreciate that he is trying to get people to understand that what is good for our center city is good for the entire county- and even further to the entire Upstate and State. Spartanburg has come a long way in 2007.

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Does anyone know why the old Spartanburg Ice Company building has been leveled. It is right off West Main St and on the right at the beginning of Reidville Rd (John B White). It is kind of off the beaten path, but apparently something is going to happen there or they would not have torn it down.

This is where we used to buy beer as well as our kegs when I was in college. It was the coldest beer around and cheap too.

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It looks like Wofford might be the site to build an ethics training center. The center would cost around $12 million and would host weekly seminars for business and goverment leaders. The hard copy had an artist conceptual drawing that didn't thrill me too much...typical white 1 level Wofford building, but the thought of having leaders from all around the country come and stay here could be very exciting.

ARTICLE from HJ

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In other news, Spartanburg will be getting Dunkin Donuts (again), but this time they will be located downtown... well, on the edge. Over on Pine Street in the new strip center next to Arby's. This isn't the 'downtown' location I was hoping for, but it will do.

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Its not a bad location though. When they actually reduce Main St to 2 lanes and line it with the proposed trees, I think you will see more folks walking from Converse Heights to Downtown on Spring and Summer evenings. It would be nice to stop in for a doughnut and some joe on the way back home.

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Well from what I have heard, Converse to Pine is supposed to start this Spring. Thats the one that really counts. I didn't know they were doing anything from Pine to St John and I'm not sure why they would for that short stretch.

Yes, we have discussed that here, which is actually in this thread. The idea would be to continue that feel of a smaller road with large sidewalks and trees through that area where there are restaurants in order to make that whole area around the Main & Pine intersection more of a 'district' within downtown. There are lots of businesses along there that are somewhat pedestrian oriented except that the street is not. Something to think about.

Also, all of the downtown road improvements may warrant their own thread.

East Main Road Diet

Converse St Road Diet

Converse St Extension

Promenade Road

Liberty St Streetscape

Liberty St Extension

I'm also open to suggestions on making topics easier to find. The search feature works pretty well. We don't want to get into a situation where we have one thread for every little topic, but having more specific subject threads may make sense. Thoughts?

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I know we discussed it in this thread as I remember reading it there and in the Herald but from what some of my friends downtown say, its still on the books to go through this spring. I think its just going to be a little harder to get that "district feel" from Pine to St John because of all the traffic that exists at the Pine/Main intersection. Pine St is the real problem because it takes people so many places south of town that no other road does.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The small store fronts along main just before St. John need to be incorporated into the plan IMO. The Pine St. crossing needs attention, but with Mellow Mushroom and several small specialty stores in a row, I think it makes sence to jump over Pine. All the large developments from Pine to Denny's have almost eliminated the small shops and make less of a destination for the average pedestrian. The small specialty shops and food joints make it more intresting to walk. I think this is why ground floor retail/ restaurant space would have been ideal in the large buildings that have been added (mixed use).

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The new Eastern Gateway project that will intensify the density of the Main & Pine strip center will create more of a need to cross Pine Street. We also need to consider the poor pedestrian environment along Pine Street too. Even without crossing Pine Street it is important to utilize the existing shops on the East side of South Pine. Over time, it is my hope that the crappy cluster of drive-in motels will be redeveloped into more intense developments. We need to get the best infrastructure in place now to go ahead an establish that this area is ped-friendly.

I think that the best first step is to remove the left turn lane on northbound South Pine. Now whether or now we continue to allow lefts at this location is up for debate. But either way, lefts could be more easily made at St John. Infact, its usually easier to turn left on Kennedy or St John as it is today (depending on traffic). So, by removing the left, we can create a pedestrian island that would allow a safe refuge for pedestrians trying to cross. Since the travel lane is probably 10 pr 11 feet wide, that would give plenty of room to plant some nice street trees in that location.

From the south bound approach of North Pine it would require more design consideration since there is the right-turn only lane there. But IMO if we are really going to make progress in Spartanburg, we're going to have to rethink channelized turning lanes in the urban core. The right only is useful, but if we could take that lane to shift the through travel lanes over we could create the same type of pedestrian island with street trees in the center.

This would make driving there a bit slower because you would likely get more vehicle queueing, but that creates a better pedestrian environment which is something we desperately need in the urban core. If we prohibit rights and lefts on both approaches of Pine Street to Main Street and rely on other parts of our road network to carry the auto traffic we could better accommodate all users. By that same approach we would set up that part of downtown to become a more pedestrian friendly area. Future redevelopment would only serve to reinforce this concept since it will likely be more urban in nature.

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