The Providence Phoenix: At Kennedy Plaza, plans for rebirth

Officials have moved, with some success, to cut down on crime in recent years. And they have taken a few steps toward revitalization: a farmer’s market, a beer garden in the summer, repairs to the fountain in Burnside Park. But Kennedy Plaza is far from the civic hub the city’s boosters envision.

And so it was with some anticipation that a handful of the city’s doers gathered in a small conference room at the city’s Art, Culture + Tourism department on Westminster Street this week to watch a collection of Rhode Island School of Design students roll out their ideas for rebirth.