JEFFERSONVILLE — There's not much on Michigan Avenue. The two-and-a-half blocks in downtown Jeffersonville are mostly home to concrete and empty buildings.
" ... Right now, we have people that come off the [Big Four] bridge and they go around Spring Street and they make a loop to the river and they come back, and they don’t go much further," Jeffersonville Public Arts Administrator Dawn Spyker said.
City officials are trying to change that.
The goal is to transform the corridor into an arts and cultural district, a walkable connection between booming Spring Street and the soon-to-be-developed Gateway property at 10th Street.
"We want to make sure that there’s going to be plenty of activities for people to do — from arts and museums and the [Big Four Station] playground, to eating at the restaurants, going to the microbreweries, hitting our downtown shops," Redevelopment Director Rob Waiz said. "This is just one area of town that we need to focus on while other things are being built up around it."
THE PLAN
Waiz has sketched a detailed map of his hopes for the short corridor. It incorporates new and existing attractions — the Clark County Museum, Vintage Fire Museum and Safety Education Center, Maker13 and WE Studio art gallery and public arts facility — with new infrastructure such as art installations, greenspace and sidewalks.
"It's been in our plans for some time to get this area developed because we need to get this section [of the city] completed," Waiz said.
He wants to redo sidewalks on the east side of Michigan Avenue, continuing past West Seventh Street and looping around the perimeter of the Vintage Fire Museum's property. One idea is painting the sidewalks with a UV-powered luminescent spray-on coating called STARPATH, patented in the United Kingdom, that lights up at night and requires no utility connections.
"We do want to make it something new and unusual and fun," Waiz said.
The plan is to brighten up the area with the addition of public art pieces. Waiz has spoken with Duke Energy about painting murals on their water tower and adjacent building — likely a Jeffersonville Public Arts Commission project — and replacing or enhancing the surrounding chainlink fence.
Some ideas for the fence include painted slats that form an image when people drive by or a tall wrought-iron fence with welded art sculptures.
"So there's a lot of different ways we can make this aesthetically pleasing," he said.
Waiz has an idea for what he calls the "triangle lot," or the parking lot on the Vintage Fire Museum site. The plan shows a food truck with tables, a freshly painted lot and larger-than-life games, such as checkers, as some examples. He said the arts commission would also likely be in charge of that project.
The plan also shows parking and greenspace in the empty lots closer to Sixth Street and near the Clark County Museum site.
It's still in its infancy stage, though the location of Maker13 and WE Studio at the former Gray and Wells building, 629 Michigan Ave., are the beginning pieces of the district.
Spyker said the redevelopment commission will come to the arts commission in March and invite the board to participate.
"I anticipate that the commission is going to be on board with the arts and cultural district and want to help in any way," she said. "I think it'll be a good collaborative effort."
Waiz said he would like to "see a substantial improvement" on Michigan Avenue over the next year.
The Indiana Arts Commission will meet with city officials this spring to talk about an official arts and cultural designation.
Miah Michaelson, deputy director of the Indiana Arts Commission, said criteria for the designation includes buy-in from the city, evidence of active artist engagement, programs and management of the district.
"We want this designation to have real meaning, and to have this real meaning, it needs to be a well thought out, integrated program and plan with a real commitment from a municipality that it's really part of its economic and art strategy," Michaelson said.
Only six municipalities in Indiana have the state commission's designation — Madison was the last to receive the title — though Michaelson pointed out that communities can call an area an arts and cultural district if they choose.
The commission is opening applications for certification, likely in the fall, she said.
THE BENEFITS
Not only will the district be a hub for artists and a town center of sorts for the city's recent public arts push, it also will draw visitors by broadening downtown's active scene and supporting existing attractions.
"I feel like an arts and cultural district kind of validates what we've been doing over the last four years by way of public engagement projects in the arts, getting the word out for what we're doing in the community, and brings it together all in one location," Spyker said.
Ohio Avenue resident Chris Bryant, whose house is next to Michigan Avenue, said the plan to redevelop the area is needed.
"It's all industrial feeling and abandoned," Bryant said. " ... To get [investment] on this side of Court Avenue would be awesome."
Curt Peters, president of the Vintage Fire Museum board of directors, said the district will be helpful to the museum but also to everyone in the area.
"We are very excited about what they have in mind, and we'll be working with them to make sure that it works well and doesn't interfere with other uses," Peters said.
Arts and cultural districts can define a community's identity, bringing together people of "all walks of life," Michaelson said.
"A cultural district can build on whatever community authenticity there is to communicate a real unique sense of place to people who come and visit there," she said.
"We've got up-and-coming generations that that's what they're looking for — they're looking for authenticity."
They also help draw out-of-towners, too.
While these districts sometimes hold the attractions that draw tourists there in the first place, they're more likely to be places where people go when they have extra time on their trips, said Clark-Floyd Counties Convention and Tourism Bureau Executive Director Jim Epperson said.
"Whether the expansion of those kinds of experiences are the motivator or they are the amenity, they are an important part of us being a competitive destination," he said.