What You Thought 10 Years Ago.
In January of 2010 I asked If Tucson needed a U of A / Downtown Planning Interface effort with Neighborhoods. Since then we spent well in excess of 1.5 billion dollars. It included a $200,000,000.00 street car, 7-10,000 luxury student beds, residential projects valued at $500,000,000.00 and hundreds of millions in commercial starts within a mile radius of Tucson’s core hotbed of development….and still counting. Unfortunately we also have seen losses in traditional family oriented home ownership in the core. You may be interested in what you said about this ten years ago. Do you like what you see today? Are we creating enough opportunities for a robust home ownership bordering the university and within our great historic centers like downtown and the 4th Avenue District? Here are some thoughts you shared in 2010; paraphrased from memory:
- Chuck Albanese, Architect and former dean of the College of Architecture and Landscape Architecture, CALA – Embraces the idea. Would like to see the architectural community involved. It is a good time for discussion
- Gal Witmer, Architect, Member of WUNA long term university area resident and representative. She supports supports embracing these sensitive issues
- Robert Vint, Architect, Preservationist and president of Vint Associates – Thinks it is a great idea and a good time for it.
- Jim Mazzocco, Senior City Planner. Something like this is needed. Nothing specific addresses this issue. The City would have to manage the creation of any new plan for it to functionally work and be administered. The City of Tucson’s budgets are too impacted to embrace a major effort.
Bill Ford
Urban University Interface.com 