What if Jacksonville suddenly woke up?

[JaxMortgageGuy]

Why do we all feel such a strong need to label our city? It is what it is. I am from New York and proud of it... its the largest and best city in the world...but.. I always say, "great place to be from, wouldn't want to live there!" LA, I am sure is the same way. People in mid America look at both those cities and have no desire to be a part of those messes.
Miami is not enviable to most. Boston and Chicago are freezing 8 months of the year. New Orleans......Let's not go into that powder keg.
Jacksonville is a city on the rise! We all just have to be very very patient. In my very humble opinion, we are residents of what used to be a closely guarded secret, and now the cat is out of the bag. I think we all sense that, and that is why we are so passionate about the decisions that are made by current government officials. Here's a personality to grab onto, "Jacksonville....growing everyday"

[thelakelander]

The same could be said for Charlotte, Austin, Tuscon, Phoenix, Columbus, Indianapolis, Nashville, Raliegh or any other rapidly growing second tier/lessor known growing city in America. Right now, we're known as a poster child for sprawl and suburban development, which is not seen as a good thing. Its no secret that, that our spread out nature has always been one of the major gripes from many visiting the region. I believe the need to label is really a need to identify and bring focus on promoting the special things that make Jax unique. Without that, we're an Anyplace USA and that will hurt us in the long run, since the trend for economic development now sets a high standard on a community's "sense of place" and "connectivity" in the battle to attract high skill talent and the companies that employ them. To that degree, if we can focus on those things that are unique to Jax no one will have to create a label, it would happen naturally.

[Stephendare]

I think this process is how we arrive at that.
Jacksonville is already a unique city with cool things that make it different from every other place.

weve started a pretty good list.

what else is there?

[JaxMortgageGuy]

Good point Lake, one thing that we do not address all that often is the huge amount of tax dollars that were spent for the "Better Jacksonville Plan" While I think good things resulted from that effort, I think a similar tax (that should include surrounding counties, St Johns, Cecil, etc) could go towards investment in programs and infeststucture geared towards landing big business. Thats is what a lot of the cities you mention are doing. Culture and prosperity comes from attracting higher paying careers that promote growth.

[Stephendare]

Size and money, are immaterial to creating a Great City.

New York was still New York when its population was the same as Jacksonville.

Paris was the top of our civilization when its population was only 400 thousand.

Moscow was still one of the most important cities in the world even after Hitlers drive was met with Stalin's scorched earth policy.

But those cities always SAW themselves as the center. They expressed the zeitgeist of their times and people.

Jacksonville has the population of Chicago in 1920.

It has the money of Mexico City in 1980.

I think its merely a question of putting the peices together.

Shove off the detritus of a city trying to be something it isnt. Celebrate what it is. Centralize and plan the growth, pruning the cardboard development of transient communities and preserving the permanent and already infrastructured neighborhoods, permitting expansion only in such a way that allows the city to conservatively grow from its center.

Charles L'Enfant found Paris in pretty much the same state that Jacksonville is in today. He ruthlessly ordered it into a machine of planning and growth.

Admit that its a southern/piratical floridian/vibrantly black and redneck cultural fountain with all the benefits of the tropics and an actual season change.

We are the only city in Florida that doesnt require a second language in order to function in the day to day unless you count Orlando (or whatever Disney is calling their housing policy these days.)

Embrace our creative legends and encourage them with city dollars.

Preserve our colorful past.

Boast about our contrariness.

Subsidize magazines and books about our character.

In short, do the things that worked for the Eternal Cities.

[Stephendare]

Create an interesting and colorful course that teaches our history and the cities issues and require that it be taught to all 7th graders.

I wish I could adequately outline the effects of a visionary woman from First Baptist by the name of Mary Frances Whittaker, who fundamentally changed The Arts in this city, by creating (with participation and backing from First Baptist) the Douglas Anderson School of the Arts.

Now the idea of an arts community is commonplace, but at the end of the 70s it was subversive. In the Jacksonville I grew up in, 'Artsy' rhymed with homosexual, and 'Intellectual' was a synonym for Communism.

[johnmeeks1974]

I don't think that it would work if we tried to make Jacksonville into something that it's not.

Lakelander mentions those cities that are more in our 'league' but even cities like Austin have a kind of allure...

My question, though, is -- "Are city politics in places like Charlotte, Indianapolis and Phoenix as crazy and crony-based as ours?" If we continue to have a political situation where a select few make all of the decisions and pat their friends on the back, our 'best kep secret' will remain so...

[Claude91098]

Originally Posted by johnmeeks1974

I don't think that it would work if we tried to make Jacksonville into something that it's not.

Lakelander mentions those cities that are more in our 'league' but even cities like Austin have a kind of allure...

My question, though, is -- "Are city politics in places like Charlotte, Indianapolis and Phoenix as crazy and crony-based as ours?" If we continue to have a political situation where a select few make all of the decisions and pat their friends on the back, our 'best kep secret' will remain so...

Stephen can probably tell you John, ALL politics in say, INDIANA, are about as crooked/corrupt and croniefied as they come! Jacksonville doesn't have a corner on that market one little bit!

Politics in general, IMHO, is lacking one basic foundation block: INTEGRITY!
People without integrity have no ethical code, or at least not one worthy of emulating. The subject is suseptable to everyone's individual interpretation depending on what their "agenda" is.

My personal belief is that you are an ethical person or your not! One can determine what the ethics are of a person by observing their actions. Words mean nothing.

[Keith726]

Task Forces,and we lead the nation in empty surface lots.sarcasm

[Scarlett]

Stephen, I love all your ideas. Jacksonville has so much potential but is allowing it to waste away. I met someone last night who I feel summed up our city perfectly. He said, "Jacksonville is a diamond that wants to remain coal".

[Keith726]

^^^Excellent statment

[Stephendare]

true

does it have to be?

[pearlstone]

absolutely not.

[Onyz1]

Originally Posted by thelakelander

Here's a few more:

One wouldn't have to travel hundreds of miles to Beale Street, Auburn Avenue or Harlem for a decent blues and jazz scene. Instead people would flock from around the country to visit the " Great Black Way" (Ashley Street), while staying in the old room of Duke Ellington at the historic Richmond Hotel on Broad Street.

The city's urban park system's trophy would be the sparkling Hogan's Creek balustrade, that attracts preservations and Architects from across the world to see the works of Henry Klutho in person.

One could catch the state-of-the-art commuter rail line from historic St. Augustine, travel up to downtown Jax for a minimum fare to spend the day at the Jacksonville Silent Film Museum.

La Villa would be known as the South's premier Farmer's Market district, with renovated historic warehouses converted into a mix of uses making the market district just as popular as the Strip District in Pittsburgh and Ohio City in Cleveland.

Downtown would be a hub of activity, partially due to the large cruise terminal located at the Shipyards. While docked tourist could take the riverwalk over to Metropolitan Park and tour the USS Saratoga.

Cecil would be on its way to being the South's premier industrial center with FED Ex's massive freight hub and Toyota's newest assembly plant as economic cornerstones.

WOW!! You remember the Richmond Hotel on Broad Street? The building is still standing.

[Onyz1]

Originally Posted by thelakelander

Here's a few more:

One wouldn't have to travel hundreds of miles to Beale Street, Auburn Avenue or Harlem for a decent blues and jazz scene. Instead people would flock from around the country to visit the " Great Black Way" (Ashley Street), while staying in the old room of Duke Ellington at the historic Richmond Hotel on Broad Street.

The city's urban park system's trophy would be the sparkling Hogan's Creek balustrade, that attracts preservations and Architects from across the world to see the works of Henry Klutho in person.

One could catch the state-of-the-art commuter rail line from historic St. Augustine, travel up to downtown Jax for a minimum fare to spend the day at the Jacksonville Silent Film Museum.

La Villa would be known as the South's premier Farmer's Market district, with renovated historic warehouses converted into a mix of uses making the market district just as popular as the Strip District in Pittsburgh and Ohio City in Cleveland.

Downtown would be a hub of activity, partially due to the large cruise terminal located at the Shipyards. While docked tourist could take the riverwalk over to Metropolitan Park and tour the USS Saratoga.

Cecil would be on its way to being the South's premier industrial center with FED Ex's massive freight hub and Toyota's newest assembly plant as economic cornerstones.

Lake it's incredible that you remember the Richmond Hotel. Many really big acts performed there.

[thelakelander]

Here you go. The Richmond Hotel


http://www.metrojacksonville.com/content/view/164/5/

[johnmeeks1974]

Stephen, I love all your ideas. Jacksonville has so much potential but is allowing it to waste away. I met someone last night who I feel summed up our city perfectly. He said, "Jacksonville is a diamond that wants to remain coal".

True!

[Jason]

Great topic Stephen.

To add to that I would have to say that Jacksonville could likely be an insurance mecca and have a modern skyline comprising of a multitude of glass skyscrapers.

The urban population would have increased faster adding to the corporate scrapers due to the less restrictive city policy and would make Jacksonville the premier city in Florida if not the south east.

The sports venues would have been built into the urban fabric allowing neighboring establishments to feed off of the activity.

We would have an iconic courthouse and a bustling government district.

We would have a multi-use convention center producing activity 24-7.

The surrounding neighborhoods would all be connected to the core via a comprehensive network of light rail or skyway.

Visitors to the city would have a multitude of wayfinding signs leading to attractions, parking, and districts.

[Jason]

Add to above...

Locals would be know as "Jaxsons" not "Jacksonvillians"

[Stephendare]

There would be a permanent exhibit of Joe La Rose's shoes at the City hall or perhaps the LaVilla School of the Arts and students would host John Fluevog competitions for shoe design every year.