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Tennessee
Chattanooga Finds Success with Residents' Participation in Renaissance of Downtown and Riverfront Areas
With Chattanooga drawing plans to advance its 1990s riverfront and
downtown renaissance even further, the Chattanooga Times Free
Press rallies residents with a call to do it ''the Chattanooga
way,'' a planning approach admired by national experts, which
''combines the broadest possible public involvement with a
commitment to 'think big' and set high standards for development.''
This approach, says the daily in an editorial entitled ''The
Chattanooga way,'' was born with Vision 2000 in the mid-1980s, when
''substantial public participation in community planning has grown
from a novel idea to a powerful community-building tool'' and become
a norm, with its powerful impact highlighted by this month's
observance of the 10th anniversary of the Tennessee Aquarium. This
world-class attraction, the editorial notes, was not only ''a major
catalyst for the brick-and-mortar transformation of the urban
riverfront,'' but also ''the transformation of the spirit in this
community.'' The centerpiece of a strategy to reconnect Chattanooga
with the Tennessee River, the editorial continues, the aquarium
accomplishment ''infused the community with an extraordinary sense
of civic pride and confidence,'' gradually permeating the city's
''psyche.'' Amazed and impressed in the mid-1990s by what become
known as ''the Chattanooga way,'' a consultant for the blighted
Southside's redevelopment, now executive director of the Congress
for New Urbanism, Shelley Poticha, recalls, ''There was a sense that
people felt they had a real responsibility to be part of the
process of determining the future of the community.'' And that's
what we must repeat, the editorial concludes, to ''take riverfront
development to the next level'' and to complete the downtown renewal
with the ''huge infusion of residential development'' required for a
truly vibrant 24-hour city.
5/6/2002
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