We are the closest we’ve come to getting a downtown master plan in decades, with Athens Downtown Development Authority board members and Athens-Clarke County commissioners both seeming eager, at a meeting last week, to hire Jack Crowley (and a couple of plucky grad students), Atlas-like, to single-handedly shoulder the job of determining the future of downtown Athens.

Crowley, the former Dean of the UGA College of Environment and Design and current head of its Environmental Planning and Design program, made clear at a presentation to the ADDA board that he would operate primarily as a professional consultant, and not as an academic, if contracted to produce the master plan. He rattled off a list of many of his previous projects around the hemisphere, most notably a downtown master plan for Tulsa, OK. Crowley has also lent his name to some controversial projects in Athens, including his pitch for streetcar service along the little-used rail line through downtown and the UGA campus, and a proposal for two highrise apartment buildings on the edge of Dearing Street by the developers of the stalled Oak Grove subdivision. Likewise, Classic Center Director Paul Cramer repeatedly invoked Crowley in pitching the currently under-construction convention center expansion.

Crowley offered to do the work essentially for free, with a $30,000 price tag to support a few graduate students and provide materials. He also described an input process that would be largely informal but “absolutely transparent.” The first step, he said, will be to define the actual boundaries of downtown as it functions, which differ from the legally defined zone that ADDA is charged with managing. (Given that the study area would likely spill beyond the area of ADDA's purview, Mayor Nancy Denson seemed eager to put up ACC's fair share of the cost, supplementing the authority’s money.) From there, he’d go about meeting with business and property owners, block by block.

There are some deficits that were noted: this plan won’t provide a thorough market analysis or a detailed study of infrastructure. Last fall, the Mayor and Commission put a temporary moratorium in place to consider the capacity of downtown sewer lines. Perhaps they should look at spending a little more to hire consultants to complete those supplemental analyses, ensuring that Crowley has the most accurate and up-to-date information as he conducts this plan.

This a big opportunity, and while Crowley is an enthusiastic and competent resource, he is one man, and that does raise some questions about whether we’ve fully considered all the possibilities that going this route has to offer. “It’s good to see this partnership with UGA,” noted Commissioner Mike Hamby, who along with Denson sits on the ADDA board, in reaction to Crowley’s pitch—but in order to make this process into a true and effective partnership, that relationship has got to be defined a bit more broadly than one faculty member and one document. The College of Environment and Design has a world-class faculty and a world-class Community Design Center, and those are resources that Crowley didn’t really discuss as he described his team of one, plus some unnamed grad students.

While the ADDA board members present seemed eager to approve this process at their July 17 meeting, perhaps it’s worth slowing down for just a moment to consider that Crowley’s services might be only one ingredient in a successful, sustainable and accountable process. If Athens is going to partner with its university to plan for the future, the partnership should be much fuller, so that as needs change over time, the plan that Crowley authors can be updated and truly evolve.

Crowley’s eagerness and enthusiasm should be taken note of in a town so frequently paralyzed by inaction and indecisiveness, but we should make sure that we can guarantee this isn’t just the work of a single person. Crowley claimed that he’s been on “all the sides of the table that deal with urban development,” listing off his resume of real estate, planning and development jobs and projects. That seemed to address concerns by ADDA board members worried about property rights, taxes and similar practicalities.

But there are so many other variables that define downtown Athens as something other than a development site. There are the dishwashers, bartenders and line cooks; musicians and artists and baristas; studiers, partiers and procrastinators; panhandlers and street-preachers and a global network of expats who all love this city and call it home, even when they haven’t been back in years. Has Crowley sat on all of those sides of the table?

This project is a serious exercise in trust, with the entire notion of downtown planning on the line, along with the university's and the College of Environment and Design’s reputations as community partners. If the process isn’t accountable enough or doesn’t produce enough buy-in across the broad network of Athenians, it’s unlikely we’ll get a second try. Athens’ reputation is that of a creative city, and downtown Athens is, in a way, our collective work. Crowley appears finally to have spurred us to action to protect and enhance it.

On the front end, we need to be creating the necessary partnerships among the university’s various resources, local business groups like the ADDA, Economic Development Foundation and Chamber of Commerce, and local governmental departments like Planning, Public Works and Leisure Services, to make sure all are part of the team and on the same page. We also need to explore new input techniques that harness the creative and crafty ethic of Athens. Rather than sitting back and watching Crowley work, we need to make sure that we’ve crafted a plan where we’re all sharing the load.

If you’ve got ideas about the downtown master planning process, the Athens Downtown Development Authority is eager to hear them. Send them an email at [email protected].