Open house this week will present vision for Cape Girardeau's future

Imagine a Mississippi River aquarium at Broadway and Main Street. An amphitheater where 1,000 people could watch a concert with the Mississippi River as the backdrop. Or a 100-room hotel at Pacific Street and Broadway.

All that -- and more -- is part of the concept for downtown renewal offered from Peckham Guyton Albers & Viets Inc., the St. Louis architecture and planning firm that has worked under contract with the state to develop Cape Girardeau's DREAM Initiative. An open house at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday in the Convocation Center of the Southeast Missouri State University River Campus will present visions for the future culled from surveys of residents, visitors and businesses and enhanced by imagination.

Cape Girardeau was chosen to participate in the Downtown Revitalization and Economic Development for Missouri, or DREAM, Initiative in October 2006. The program, created by Gov. Matt Blunt, was designed to bring planning help to smaller cities that could not otherwise afford a costly consultant and to focus state economic development help on those cities. Cape Girardeau was one of 10 communities chosen to participate in the first round.

Cape Girardeau has three DREAM areas -- the Broadway corridor, the riverfront and the Good Hope-Haarig area.

"This is all very conceptual," said Russ Volmert, associate director of Peckham Guyton Albers & Viets. "After all these two years of research and asking questions and analysis, we are being paid to come up with a plan. It includes intangibles, like rebranding downtown Cape Girardeau and creating a Community Improvement District, and also tangible elements, such as this is what a street could look like or what a hotel could look like. We would fail if we did not propose some ambitious ideas."

The Cape Girardeau riverfront at Broadway might be a potential site for an amphitheater. (FRED LYNCH ~ flynch@semissourian.com)

Proposals visitors to the open house will be asked to review include:

* An aquarium focusing on the Mississippi River, with the National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium in Dubuque, Iowa, as a model. City-owned property at the corner of Broadway and Main Street could be used as the site, the report suggests, with an adjacent visitor center.

* A midrange hotel along Broadway, perhaps at Pacific Street. The hotel would be expected to draw heavily on parents visiting Southeast students and other travelers with ties to the university as well as be an anchor for what would become a "university village" of shops and restaurants targeting students and faculty.

* An amphitheater on the Mississippi River front for concerts or viewing fireworks, connecting the city to the river in a more intimate way. Other concepts for the riverfront include a small marina and a dedicated dock for excursion boats. The major obstacle to the idea would be obtaining permits from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to perform work that could alter currents in the river.

* Developing much of the land along the soon-to-be-constructed extension of Fountain Street from Morgan Oak Street to William Street. The concept to be presented Tuesday extends Fountain Street north for an extra block to Merriwether Street and builds Merriwether through to Middle Street. The concept also expands the size of Indian Park.

* Creating a Community Improvement District, capable of raising money through property and sales taxes, that would guide the downtown development and give Old Town Cape a bigger presence and a more secure source of funding.

The proposal also lists 10 priority goals ranging from increased residential use to developing an arts district along Fountain Street.

Some of the ideas, such as the hotel or Community Improvement District, seem to be integral parts of the proposal. Others, such as the aquarium, are more based on a conception of doing something major.

"The reality is that downtown needs a destination property, something to pull people in," said Steve Hoffman, professor of history and a former president of Old Town Cape's board.

After the meeting Tuesday, Peckham Guyton Albers & Viets Inc. will return to work and present a final plan in coming months. The redevelopment plan for downtown will be dovetailed into the city's comprehensive plan, completed in late 2007, city planner Sarah Wallace said. Overlay districts in the zoning code and a strategic plan based on the planing firm's proposal will help push the ideas to implementation, she said.

While the DREAM Initiative has already resulted in more than $2 million in state grants since 2006, the city will need more and likely will have to offer development incentives to get the program started, said Tim Arbeiter, vice president of the Cape Girardeau Area Chamber of Commerce. "The most exciting thing is that this is the first real opportunity to have a coordinated plan for the downtown area."

Arbeiter said progress should be measured over years, with up to 10 years needed for some of the most ambitious parts of the proposal.

Once the plan is formally approved, said Marla Mills, executive director of Old Town Cape, it can be used to sell downtown to potential investors and developers.

Another part of the proposal would create gateways into the key areas, signs to make sure visitors know how to reach significant destinations and general work to bring a more spruced-up appearance to the DREAM areas.

The proposal is wide-ranging and puts forward the best vision the consultants could craft, Volmert said. "It is time to dream big, and that is what we have been tasked to do as the planning consultants," he said.

rkeller@semissourian.com

388-3642

Pertinent address:

Southeast Missouri State University River Campus, Cape Girardeau, MO