mainonmain

You worried it might take 6 minutes instead of 5 to get to Wade's?

I wanted to give the developer the benefit of the doubt. And some of the delays in the delivery of this project were not their fault (supply chain, some other issues). But this is absolutely atrocious.

At one point, the building owner's plan was to move the paper into the Wells Fargo building when they were ready to demo the HJ building. I know the hotel they're planning for that block isn't scheduled (according to the dev agreement) to get started for a couple of years, but it could be that the Johnson Group is going to go ahead with demo? Or at least go ahead and get everything out of there?

You have no idea what you're talking about. The city has disbursed dozens of small business grants and tax breaks to restaurants wanting to locate downtown. Literally have paid for the cost of installing hoods and fire supression systems that account for a big chunk of the cost of getting a restaurant open. They've given millions in property tax abatement to developers building or renovating buildings downtown to enable them to house small retail and/or add apartments. How do you think the city has gone from roughly 50 downtown residential units in 2010 to the hundreds that are there now, which should create the demand for the small businesses you're talking about. What do you think spending $15 million on Morgan Square is all about, or the record tax incentives for the AC Hotel and the ballpark development are all about? Cribb's Kitchen, the brewery, Delaney's ... literally name a restaurant that moved downtown this century and they received money from the city. Is downtown where anyone wants it to be? Nope. But get out of here with that nonsense that the city hasn't done anything to encourage small biz development downtown. A horrendously poorly informed take.

If First Baptist ever does anything to help a "night-focused business (like a bar)" I will do the worm in a Speedo down Main Street.

Well you're going to be disappointed because that abomination is going somewhere else. Also - you keep referencing tax dollars. Do you know which "tax dollars" are being used for this project?

Why does it make sense? And why does Midtown make sense if giving it a name makes sense. If we're all about preserving Spartanburg's history and keeping it from being just like everywhere else. Doesn't dropping a name that means absolutely nothing and is used by a thousand other cities run counter that goal?

Do you know what the funding source for this project is? Pedestrianize Broad Street? So people can what? Safely walk from City Hall to the Square where they can be promptly run over by a car? The Square should be devoid of cars. Thankfully, it is and will remain so.

What is this recent fixation on layering in an unoriginal and certainly inauthentic brand/label of "midtown" to the east main corridor? Juxtaposed with a desire for more historic preservation makes an unoriginal name with no local resonance really, really bizarre. "Where is that place?" "On East Main. Between Mills and Connecticut on the right." "Where? I can't place it." "You can't place those two blocks?" "Wait ... are you talking about MIDTOWN?!!!"

"When you Google "spartanburg" images, the tower features prominently" Yes. And what an unfortunate thing that is. Even more reason to blow it to smithereens.

So improvements in Barnet Park will pay for themselves but improvements to Morgan Square won't? You actually ever looked at the financials on concerts? Also, a 1979 clock tower improves a sunset the same way stilt houses improve a beach or a mountain.

People's attachment to things is important, but so are memories, and blowing that clock tower up would be a spectacle that people would remember forever.

That 1979 clock tower adds no value to downtown. The only idea better than moving it is to strap it with some dynamite and blow it up.

The original clocks and bells were removed from the clock tower several years ago. The clock in there now is a digital contraption.

There is nothing special nor historic about that clock tower. There are better places for it, and certainly better uses for the dirt it currently sits on.