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| CRBJ Home > November 2006 | |||||
Downtown Madison an example for Chapel HillKim Dawson
What did we learn? We learned you can blend the old with the new, and can have high-rise buildings alongside two-story buildings as long as it is done with the right architecture, materials and color. This has been a big concern for us with our Franklin Street down-town area, so it was refreshing to see it so well done on State Street in Madison. We also saw that it is possible to have "life" downtown when the college students are not around. We enjoyed seeing families on a Sunday afternoon shopping and dining, and during the week, adults with children Downtown shopping. We attributed this to the variety of restaurants and shops available, and the Overture Center and the Children's Museum which bring families and children to the Downtown area. We liked the relationship between the town and cultural centers and their coordination of activities. People are able to take advantage of all that Downtown has to offer because of that coordination -- attend the museum, have a picnic and attend events on the Capitol lawn. Chapel Hill needs to do more of this. Many from the city and the university gave of their time to share with us how Madison deals with specific issues participants had interest in. Breakout sessions included workforce housing, city-university relations, the environment and land, and arts and culture. These sessions provided insight as to what is working, any kinks that may have occurred in planning and what is happening now. Lots of ideas were gained from these sessions. At the workforce housing session I attended, we learned of mistakes made with the inclusionary housing policy, including the loopholes allowing the builders to keep their required number of units for workforce housing at market value. In Chapel Hill, we have similar loopholes -- our policy was focused on limiting the size of properties, thinking that a smaller square footage would keep the cost down. Instead of keeping the cost down, smaller homes added all the bells and whistles to keep the price up. The Yahara River View Apartments -- a project by Common Wealth Development finished in 2003 -- was exciting as it included the whole community. There is housing for the workforce and garden space available for anyone. It was also built with energy efficiency, which is key to keeping housing costs down in the future. The environment and land use group learned you can actually increase the amount of green space by tearing down and building on a smaller foot print and building up. In Chapel Hill, we need to consider both of these issues strongly as we are losing green space. When development extended out into the neighborhoods, it appeared to us that the communities were informed from the beginning. We found the newer development to blend well with the old, although it may be due to the heavily-treed streets and the fact that homes are set back off the street with sidewalks on both sides of the street with larger grass parkways than we have. We also do not have "neighborhoods" as you do -- filled with history, local groceries and shops. The collaboration and communications that occurred along each program was the key to success. In Chapel Hill, we need to include all levels of the community in the process so there is a collaboration of efforts and nobody feels left out. The future has to be a joint effort by all and we all need to want it. We need to either make the commitment to improve our downtown area or stop talking about it and deal with what we have. That said, many of us feel we can have what Madison has and would like to see it happen in Chapel Hill. Kim Dawson is president of the Chapel Hill Board of Realtors. madison.com ©2009 Capital Newspapers. All rights reserved. |
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