Downtown Denison set plan for decade
Denison has adopted a new plan and vision to guide the city’s downtown district through the coming decade. The Denison City Council recently approved the adoption of its new 2021-2030 Vision Forward plan, which will highlight community priorities for the city’s historic downtown and offer direction for future growth.
The new plan comes at the end of the city’s previous visioning document, which covered 2014-2020.The upcoming plan is also one of the first city planning documents to come and a show a vision for the city post COVID-19.
“It is our guiding document for downtown Denison for the next 10 years,” Main Street Director Donna Dow said. “Really, it is an overall focus based on the stakeholders that our survey and was made by our board and agreed upon by the city council.”
The city started work on the new plan in late 2020. Unlike previous plans, the city was unable to use larger town hall style meetings and focus groups to gather public input. Instead, city officials relied on a series of surveys that were conducted in December and January to gather public feedback.
In total, 542 people participated and gave feedback for the plan.
“We are very grateful for everyone who completed the survey and shared their thoughts with us,” Dow said. “We are very impressed that so many people participated and gave their thoughtful perspectives.”
When Denison first joined the Texas Main Street Program in 1989, the city had goals of increasing shopping, investment in downtown and preserving the city’s historic assets, among others. The spirit of many of these goals live on in the current plan, but have become more nuanced and focused on the city’s current climate.
The plan outlines 10 goals for downtown over the next decade, including three primary focus areas. The primary goal is to continue moving forward with the city’s multi-million dollar Designing Downtown Denison project — also known as D3 — which will see streetscape improvements and a redesign of Main Street. The phased-project will see the street redesigned to modernize it with new focus on walkability and outdoor spaces.
Down said this was a continuation of a focus in the 2014 plan, which called for the creation of the D3 project. Now, the city’s goal is to follow up on the work that was done in the past decade.
Like the D3 project, the second focus area continues on the work from a 2014 priority. The new plan calls for a five percent increase in street level and residential low occupancy by five percent each. Priority will be given for businesses, including dining, night life and family-oriented entertainment, that follow the downtown vision.
Dow said the 2014 plan called for an occupancy increase, but this was focused mostly on the business level. Now, this focus has been extended to other symbiotic uses.
The third primary focus is to “create a healthy, clean and safe environment that meets the needs of citizens, businesses, visitors and residents of downtown Denison.” One of the key components of this will be the city’s parks, pocket parks and other green spaces that dot the downtown corridor, Dow said.
The plan outlines several steps to increase to health and safety in downtown, including work with the city’s homeless population, increases in police presence and the addition of dedicated bike lanes, among other initiates.
Other goals in the plan call for the creation of branding and a signature image for downtown and its businesses. The maintenance and preservation of the city’s historic buildings and landmarks also continue to be a goal going into the new decade, highlighting the impact the city’s past has on its present.
