Urban News and Linkage - Valentine’s Day Edition
02/14/07 • Posted in: Brooklyn, Downtown Jacksonville, News, Springfield by Joey Marchy 7 Comments »
Before you start to read this post put on the PB Wolf V-tine’s Day mixtape and grab a glass of chardonnay.
13 votes to 3. The council [hearts] Brad Thoburn. Brad says “I would have been happy if they found that guy [the super-planner] but they just [the mayor] didn’t do it”. - From the Brad Thoburn interviews @ Boomtown
Do you need to do some last minute shopping for your sweetie? Check out new Spring arrivals at Wolfgang and Tiara.
Do you love Brooklyn? Tony Allegretti does. He wrote a great post yesterday about our long-forgotten, first platted, Jacksonville neighborhood Brooklyn. And those jerks at the city wanted to rename the neighborhood because Brooklyn has a bad connotation. Tony intelligently points out that “Five of Jacksonville’s top ten corporations are located in one of downtown’s most storied and beautiful neighborhoods.” Show your love and read Where Brooklyn At?
Yesterday I did an interview with the TU about the influence of the Metro Jacksonville group on downtown policy makers. Keep and eye out for the story, I’ll link it up when it drops.
What I loved about this interview was my analysis of the difference between groups like Metro Jacksonville and Downtown Vision. Basically I said Downtown Vision is a marketing organization that is selling downtown to the city and beyond. Their ultimate goal is making the existing state of downtown Jacksonville more appealing.
Metro Jacksonville is trying to influence policy and change the way downtown functions in terms of rules and regulations. Thus making the environment, laws and zoning more hospitable for new and existing business. DVI is active, Metro Jacksonville is pro-active.
Inertia is having a birthday party this weekend: storewide sale, free keg, water balloon fights, and other horse-assery. Inertia @ 5 p.m. (tip: Josh and Jaxopolitan
Bye Bye Gullet’s Grocery. I wrote about Gullet’s Grocery at First and Walnut in Springfield a while back. It was demolished yesterday.
Here are some links you will love:
Inside the Park View Inn (Metro Jacksonville)
Homeless Family’s Blog endorses Linda Storey for District 4
Help this guy find his jacket (YouTube)
Park & King Shopping District: Photo Tour (Metro Jacksonville)
tags: jacksonville, brad thoburn, springfield, metro jacksonville, brooklyn
horse-assery made me laugh!
Is the pro-activity of Metro actually proving beneficial? Aside from generating publicity? Which has its benefits…
Yes, I would say very much so. They were influential in the city changing its parking meter policy. They also pressured city hall to reverse it’s decision to restrict public access to the City emails over the Internet.
They do have some good information and commentary on their site, it’s the publicity for some of their “ideas” (Friendship Park / Maritime Museum, downtown lighting, etc) that have little relevance to the greater issues of downtown that bug me most I guess. It seems to water down their altruistic intentions…IMO.
lol…Linda’s not exactly endorsed by me. I’m still looking seriously into both the existing officials as well as contenders. Honestly, I probably will make my choice clear, as well as the reasons behind it.
Lets not forget that MetroJacksonville were the ones who put the Mayors Big Idea on the back burner, helped push the First Timothy Baptist Church issue into the public eye, pushed the Brad Thoburn issue into the public eye, and drew attention to the “Main St Pocket Park” issue. There are many others, but these might be the biggest.
MetroJacksonville, if nothing else, gives the mayors office reason for pause when putting ideas on the table. A restrained mayor is a good mayor in many cases.
“It’s the publicity for some of their “ideas” (Friendship Park / Maritime Museum, downtown lighting, etc) that have little relevance to the greater issues of downtown that bug me most I guess. It seems to water down their altruistic intentions…IMO.”
At least they are trying. Perhaps all of their ideas are accepted as perfect, and immediately put into construction, but thank god we finally have visible downtown advocates like UrbanJax and MetroJax.