JANESVILLE鈥 The city of 糖心Vlog传媒 is hosting a community design workshop on Oct. 14 at the Hyatt Smith Commons at the UW-Rock campus to get public feedback as an ad hoc panel advances designs toward a master plan for the GM/JATCO site.
The last workshop the city hosted in June gathered information on what the community would like the city to explore 鈥 whether it be mixed use, housing, grocery stores or manufacturing.
Similar to the June event, the upcoming open-house event, which will run from 5 to 7 p.m. at the Commons, 2909 Kellogg Ave., will include stations for community members to walk through and visit with advisory board members and project consultants from Stantec, the hired project manager.
Attendees can review the redevelopment concepts that they weighed in on at earlier meetings, any market research and environmental assessments.
At the October meeting, people can give more feedback on updated land uses, site layouts, public amenities and rail connections.
They also can explore design options that Stantec and the city have produced through maps and visual tools.
Resident feedback at earlier forums showed interest in mixed-use redevelopment at the GM site. During the in-person visioning workshop, industrial development ranked as the top priority, followed by housing, commercial use, and parks and recreation.
Survey responses showed a slightly different emphasis, with recreation, green space and commercial uses ranking highly.
Amy Worsham, the project manager from Stantec, said at an advisory board meeting in July that industrial use was a lower priority in the survey responses 鈥 but a top choice at the vision workshop.
She said that there was a push to connect the south side to the rest of the city through trails and development.
One challenge, she said will come as the city tries to balance community desire with what the market would actually support.
The Advisory Board is now midway through an 18鈥憁onth planning and strategy process. This work includes environmental review, market analysis, feasibility studies and continued community engagement.
Feedback from the Community Design Workshop will directly inform the next round of concept refinement, leading to the a comprehensive redevelopment master planning & development strategy for future city council consideration.
More information on the project is available at .