Greater City Providence
195-land-aerial-ridot

ProJo: Land of opportunity: Route 195 panel close to seeking developers’ proposals

195-land-aerial-ridot

Aerial image of the 195 redevelopment area from RIDOT

The “meds and eds” complex that Rhode Island’s political leaders envisioned when they formed the commission in 2011 may not be what’s in store for the prime real estate, commission Chairman Colin P. Kane and Executive Director Jan A. Brodie say.

The market will dictate what goes onto the land, they say.

They talk about “live, work and play” uses — residential development, restaurants, laboratories and hotels — that would attract employees for jobs in biotechnology, food science, design and other fields.

Nice to see them steering the discussion away from “meds and eds” as some sort of secret sauce that is gonna save Rhode Island.

Jef Nickerson

Jef is Greater City Providence's co-founder, editor, and publisher. He grew up on Cape Cod and lived in Boston; Portland, Maine; and New York before settling in Providence. In addition to urbanism, Jef is interested in art, design, and ice cream. Please feel free to contact Jef if you have any question or comments about Greater City Providence.

3 comments

  • Interesting. I still think both Brown and JWU will pounce on the property. I would make one request that they build a few large parking structures that way you can build on what was once those horrid parking lots.

  • I’ll go along with supporting the request for even more garage space if and only if enough parking spaces are removed throughout the city and upon its streets to make up at least 75% of the new structured parking. (Ideally, exactly 100%.)

    Centralized municipal parking garages would help go a long way towards illustrating exactly how much excess parking the city is drowning in when you put it all together in one place (and strategically located municipal garages anchoring strong transit and wide pedestrian promenades could help entice people to start transitioning from “parking at the front door” to “parking a mile or two away”); but the point is lost if the garages are majority-additional parking spaces.

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