ANDERSON — Over the past 50 years there have been several efforts by government officials and the business community to breathe new life into downtown Anderson.
Back in the 1970s, Meridian Street was the heart of the local business community. Retail shops and restaurants lined the street. Downtown's hustle and bustle meant that the biggest problem was parking.
J.C. Penney’s, Sears, Montgomery Ward, Hoyt Wright and Woolworth’s were all within easy walking distances in the downtown area, which also boasted dozens of locally-owned businesses.
That was before Penney’s, Sears and Montgomery Ward moved to Mounds Mall, fire destroyed Woolworth’s and Hoyt Wright closed.
With the loss of the major retail outlets, downtown traffic diminished and smaller businesses closed or relocated to the Scatterfield Road bypass. In 1977, many downtown streets also became one way.
Today, the downtown area is home to only a few remaining retail stores and a handful of restaurants. After those who work downtown leave for the day, few people can be found in the area.
Over the years Anderson’s downtown has lost hundreds of housing resources, with the closing of the Tower and Delaware Court apartments.
In the mid-1960s, the idea first surfaced to convert Meridian Street into a pedestrian mall. In 1970, business leaders picked the development of a mall as one of the key downtown issues.
In the 1970s, with the advent of Mounds Mall and strip malls in the city, the administration of former Anderson Mayor Robert Rock attempted to make Meridian Street a pedestrian mall with a serpentine streetscape.
When that effort failed, a team of planning experts came to Anderson in the 1980s to complete the Regional/Urban Design Assistance Team (RUDAT) study of downtown Anderson. They recommended construction of a downtown conference center and hotel. The study also advised that the White River should be accessible and a focal point of the community.
But with the decline of the local automotive industry, which had once employed nearly 25,000 people in Anderson, the hotel and conference center idea quickly faded.
The last concentrated effort to revitalize downtown came during the administration of Mayor J. Mark Lawler in the 1990s. The city contracted with Fortune Management of Kokomo to rehabilitate downtown Anderson's existing storefronts to lure new businesses.
The city and four local banks invested $4 million in the project, which ended in 2004 when Fortune Management’s Anderson Preservation LLC went bankrupt.