Updated with corrections.
MUSCATINE, Iowa— Dan Burden of Blue Zones, LLC and Jim Harbaugh of Bolton and Menk Engineers and Surveyors invited the public Tuesday night at the Mississippi Drive Corridor Project Kick-Off Event at the Riverview Center to a brainstorm session for the design of Mississippi Drive.
The city renovation project will begin its preliminary design process now and construction around December 2017. The project will take about a year to complete.
The room was filled with record attendance for a discussion of this kind, according to Burden, revealing that the people are very passionate about the city’s appearance and ability to attract visitors and residents.
“This is something that everyone in Muscatine wants to happen,” Jill Hopkins, wife of Mayor DeWayne Mark Hopkins, said.
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The basic need for this development is to reduce flooding that causes road blockages and damage along the river front. However, many Muskies feel that modernization and pedestrian-friendly areas are necessary for the quality of life too.
As an activity, the team asked attendees to place a one-word describer indicating “why they live in Muscatine” on a sticky note. The designers plan to match these values, including friends and family, community, history and the river, to the priorities attendees specified during the meeting. Out of over the 40 priorities debated, some included accessibility, entertainment, a river-walk, public art, bike lanes, greenery, on-street parking, restoring and reusing historic buildings and updated alley-ways.
Burden spoke of narrowing the street to two lanes instead of four, adding attractive landscaping and gathering places and focusing on the brand of the waterfront and downtown areas. He also spoke about how design can slow speeders by adding tall trees, businesses and on-street parking to make the area more pedestrian-friendly.
“He gave words to the thoughts, it was really helpful,” Susan Stensland, owner of the Mississippi Pearl Bed and Breakfast said.
According to Harbaugh, Landscape Architecture Group Manager, the construction process is sensitive to the impact of the local businesses located along Mississippi Drive and have planned to renovate the road segments in phases, eliminating long-time blockages.
“We are very cognizant to the fact that businesses will be effected during that time,” Harbaugh said.
Correction 09/03: The $100 million previously stated in this article includes improvement projects in Muscatine like Mississippi Drive, the Merrill Hotel Project, HNI's campus improvements, raising on the railroad, MPW's utility line contributions of water, telecommunications, cable and electric.
