River City 2020: City needs to face downtown

Downtowns are cities’ faces before the world. Passersby who see life there, who feel a district’s vibrancy are inclined to stay and spend and come back to do it all over again, possibly to relocate a business there, possibly to be part of the action and excitement. Passersby who enter a city core to find empty storefronts and desolate streets are driven to keep moving, right on to the next town.

While beyond Waynesboro’s central district there is a hum of commerce – in the West End, a retail mecca has bloomed, and even amid manufacturing’s decline, Polymer Group Inc. has announced a major expansion and Invista and other industries have continued to operate – downtown fades to silence after 5 p.m. This fact universally was acknowledged during a visioning session held in the City Council chambers late last year. The News Virginian has opined: “Embalming rooms have stronger pulses” than Waynesboro at 9:30 on a Saturday night.

A critical first step must be taken to tackle this problem: City leaders must acknowledge it, and they must acknowledge its significance.
Orchestrating downtown revitalization while managing tight public budgets and working with merchants who are feeling a squeeze of their own is a complex task. Such work cannot happen without an acknowledgement of need and a commitment to fulfilling it.

The latter should include the city teaming with merchants as well as Waynesboro Downtown Development, Inc. to craft a downtown renewal plan that clearly establishes a marketable identity for the city and builds from it. And then the city needs to set goals for a makeover.
But first the city needs to face the reality about where its downtown now stands.

The facts about downtown are stark: More than a third of building space is vacant. One in four structures is in substandard condition. New shops frequently fail. Such findings played prominently in an unprecedented downtown inventory completed by Waynesboro Downtown Development, Inc. staff and volunteers and Tom Carlsson of the Waynesboro Waynesboro Redevelopment & Housing Authority.

Over four months, that group surveyed 91 businesses on 114 properties in a 72-acre downtown core area bordered by 11th Street, the South River, Ohio Street and Maple Avenue. Wayne and Arch avenues and Main, Market and Broad streets also were included.

The inventory found:
* Downtown businesses employ 8 percent of the city workforce.
* Newer businesses, especially with irregular hours, frequently fail.
* A fourth of buildings are vacant; 90 percent of warehouses are underutilized as defined by the percentage of space used for long-term storage.
* A fourth of buildings are considered substandard by city assessor ratings.

State Department of Housing and Community Development Program Manager Chris Thompson told The News Virginian that physical blight, vacancies and unattractive storefronts could be improved in Waynesboro. Downtown housing, formation of an artisan network and establishment of a loan pool could help, he said.

“The materials [Waynesboro] submitted to us were very thorough, very comprehensive,” Thompson said last year. “There seems to be a fire burning.”
WDDI and the city are utilizing this information to pursue Community Development Block Grant money, a vital first step in pushing the city toward a badly needed downtown makeover.

Since the start of 2006, Waynesboro Downtown Development, Inc. has reported to Virginia Main Street a net increase of 31 businesses in the city’s Main Street District. Eileen O’Rourke at River City Art and Wine Emporium said increasingly savvy business people are choosing downtown, aware that startups frequently lose money before prospering.

She said WDDI merchant meetings, events such as Third Fridays and more shop-to-shop referrals are building unity among business owners.

“The best way to convince people there are exciting things going on in downtown Waynesboro is to present them with the facts,” said Terry Short, who serves on the city Planning Commission and recently opened Short & Sweet Bakery.

Short and his wife knew foot traffic would be lacking, so they’ve tried to generate it.

They also keep relatively short – but consistent – hours and cross-market with other merchants.

Owners who allow long-term vacancies are still a drag on the downtown, Short said.

“It’s annoying to see empty storefronts,” O’Rourke said, adding that half of her tourist-type customers ask about vacancies.

Many merchants try to see past the dark windows.

“Falling-down buildings or not, we’re building a community,” said Heather Owens, owner of Natural Beauty Studio, which opened 14 months ago.

“It needs to be a slow, gradual thing,” Short said of his bakery’s growth. “Just like growing a downtown.”

While manufacturing revenues in Waynesboro fell more than a third from 2006 to 2008, retail sales have doubled since the mid-’90s, fueled almost entirely by the West End’s transformation from fields to bustling retail district.

Officials said courting small manufacturers is still a goal, but the future of downtown remains unclear.

“The past is ingrained,” City Planner Mike Barnes said of those reluctant to see the city change. “But it’s a question of viability.”

Main Street Discount owner Bill Mikolay said the city has been “lost” on the downtown in his five years there.

“This sounds like they’re heading in the right direction,” Mikolay said, referring to efforts to secure grant money for downtown.

Couple this with other recent initiatives downtown or in association with that district – such as last year’s decision by the City Council to pursue completion of the second phase of a city streetscape along with the advance of a greenway project – and one finds reason to be encouraged.

But there is still a mountain to be climbed.

How then to spur downtown to life? Here are a series of action steps toward that end:
1. Create an identity: Waynesboro is in the throes of an identity crisis brought on by manufacturing’s struggle and evolution. For years, the city has been known as a tough, hard-working blue-collar community. But Waynesboro’s identity is all around. The city is set against the picturesque Blue Ridge Mountains, with Shenandoah National Park, the Blue Ridge Parkway and Skyline Drive all at Waynesboro’s doorstep. Waynesboro needs to see and market itself as the gateway to the Shenandoah Valley. Crafting an identity for downtown needs to begin here.

2. Unite merchants and the city: Wherever the city is bound, merchants will need to be part of the process. Involve merchants in helping mold not only the city and downtown’s identity but also in crafting a plan to build downtown around that identity. Plan to include merchants in tracking and steering the development of a downtown strategy and in regular meetings between them and the city to ensure growth downtown.

3. Get a plan: City and Waynesboro Downtown Development, Inc. staff already have done some of the work, defining the boundaries of downtown. Those two can combine under the leadership of the city’s new economic development director to establish the city’s identity, under the same style of branding initiative recently undertaken by Augusta Health. From here, the next step is to develop a plan for revitalizing downtown that pulls in the brainpower and commitment of all of the key stakeholders, the city, elected leaders, merchants and the community. As the Brookings Institution explained in a 2005 study, the plan needs to identify all of the key components of downtown, including not only branding, but retail, housing, infrastructure, culture, marketing and values.

4. Work the plan: Here is where the city has fallen short in previous efforts. The Riverfront Commons conceptual plan for downtown up to the South River is an example. Elected officials need to take a lead role in helping pull together people from all walks around a plan around which the community can coalesce. And elected leaders, city staff and merchants need to be committed to advancing the plan as the months and years progress. Set goals, and then fulfill them.