October 30th Update

PUBLIC MEETING ANNOUNCEMENT

City staff invites the public to a meeting on the Cumberland Avenue Corridor Project. The meeting will be held on Thursday, November 12th at 6:00pm in the UT Visitors' Center, 2704 Kingston Pike. The meeting will provide an update on the streetscape project and focus on the draft Form Based Code for Cumberland Avenue. Staff will outline the next steps in adopting the draft code and highlight the opportunities for public comment and input.


Fort Sanders Long Range Planning Subcommitee Meetings

The next meetings for the subcommittees will take place on November 5th at 3:30pm (please note the different time) in the Howard Baker Center for Public Policy. Parking is available on street within the neighborhood or at the University's Public Parking Garage on Phillip Fulmer Way.

Quality of Life Subcommittee will meet in Rooms 207/208 and discuss final recommendations for the larger committee.

Long Range Physical Planning Subcommittee will meet in the 3rd Floor Board Room and discuss traffic information and final recommendations for the larger committee.


All of these meetings are open to the public and anyone is welcome to attend. If you need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact me at awallace@cityofknoxville.org

October 16th Update

The notes from the October 1st Ft. Sanders Long Range Planning Committee meeting are posted in the Links section of this page. In follow up to the discussion at this meeting, City Staff, UT Representatives and Knoxville Area Transit (KAT) met to discuss concerns regarding the signal at Metron Center Way. A brief summary of that meeting is available in the notes. Additionally, the notes from the September 3rd Quality of Life Subcommittee meeting are also posted and were handed out at the last full commitee meeting.

City staff attended the Transportation Planning Organizations Technical Committee meeting on Tuesday, October 13th. A couple of items of interest were presented at that meeting: 1) The Federal Government's recission of funds for the Federal Highway Administration on October 1st will have a local impact because of the reduction in TDOT and TPO funding. A specific impact to Ft. Sanders is that the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality (CMAQ) funding that was requested for sidewalks and bus shelters in the neighborhood will not be available this fiscal year. 2) Some reduction to the Surface Transportation Program (STP) funds will occur, but project funding is decided at the local level. If you have any questions regarding this information feel free to contact me at awallace@cityofknoxville.org.

Finally, a City Council Workshop was held last night to discuss the Downtown Wayfinding Project. This project is anticipated to be the starting point for future wayfinding efforts in Knoxville's core neighborhoods. The consultants, Merje Design, out of Philadelphia have started design development based on several stakeholder meetings and two public meetings. This information was presented to Council and the public last night. The consensus from the workshop was that the general design concepts were reflective of downtown Knoxville and that a few relatively minor tweaks would have the design in great shape. If you'd like more information on this project please visit: www.cityofknoxville.org/wayfinding.

October 2nd Update

Thanks to the Knoxville Museum of Art (KMA) for hosting our Ft. Sanders Long Range Planning meeting on Thursday, October 1st!

It was a great opportunity to learn about the master planning process that the museum recently underwent with Sasaki Associates out of Boston. The image to the right is a concept plan that shows connectivity to the neighborhood and World's Fair Park, as well as, some inventive ideas for reusing parking lots and providing additional landscape in the area. Please note that plan shows some land outside KMA's ownership and that the designs for these areas are just to show potential possibilites.

Image Courtesy: Sasaki Assoc.

If you would like more information about the plan, please visit:
http://www.sasaki.com/what/portfolio.cgi?fid=497&project_type=4&page=1

If you would like more information about KMA, please visit:
http://www.knoxart.org/

Thanks also to all of the stakeholders who participated in this meeting. I am compiling the notes from the meeting and hope to post them next week. Have a great weekend and go Vols!