Dallas leaders are laying out a new vision for the city’s downtown core, with a goal of doubling the number of people who live there over the next decade.<\/p>\n
Downtown Dallas Inc. shared its Downtown Vision 2036 plan Thursday during the State of Downtown. The strategy focuses on growth and economic development, including connecting popular areas such as the Farmers Market and Arts District with more walkability and green space.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is about big ideas; it is about bold action,\u201d Chris Beynon of IMG said.<\/p>\n
Jennifer Scripps said the plan provides a starting point for work in the years ahead.<\/p>\n
\u201cNo plan is ever perfect, but it gives a really great first wave of work for the next couple of years,\u201d Scripps said.<\/p>\n
Scripps said work on the future of downtown began a few weeks after AT&T announced last January that it would move its headquarters to Plano.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat was definitely the kick in the pants to get it started,\u201d Scripps said.<\/p>\n
The vision also calls for continued improvements to key north-south corridors, including St. Paul and Harwood streets.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe need to go in and plant more trees, and make more gracious sidewalks and bike lanes \u2013 and make that a place people want to make that walk, and connect it,\u201d Scripps said.<\/p>\n
For Gino Batala, who has spent 30 years at the corner of San Jacinto and Harwood as the owner of Carmine\u2019s Pizza, change is nothing new.<\/p>\n
\u201cDowntown Dallas has changed a lot,\u201d Batala said.<\/p>\n
Batala welcomed the ideas outlined in the new plan.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a good idea that\u2019s good for the community. They think about improving this area,\u201d Batala said.<\/p>\n
The key now, Batala said, is turning those plans into action. He hopes to see at least some of the improvements before he retires from serving slices, likely sometime in the next decade.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s what life is about: progress and new things, new ideas,\u201d Batala said.<\/p>\n
This story was originally reported for broadcast by NBC DFW. AI tools helped convert the story into a digital article, and an NBC DFW journalist edited it again before publication.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dallas leaders are laying out a new vision for the city’s downtown core, with a goal of doubling…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":453366,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[102,104,103],"class_list":["post-453365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-dallas","tag-dallas","tag-dallas-headlines","tag-dallas-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=453365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/453365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/453366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=453365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=453365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=453365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}