Megan Davis
McDonald County Press
A handful of hopeful Anderson residents gathered in the New-Mac Electric building on Tuesday to provide feedback to architectural students on a visioning study of the town.
At a meeting last month, students from Drury University's Hammons School of Architecture sat down with residents -- termed citizen scholars -- and fostered friendly discussion about the town's strengths, weaknesses and potential through a light-hearted card game.
Individually, residents consistently ranked the same items as top priority:
• Recruiting small businesses and young professionals to relocate to the community;
• Establishing a local/regional pedestrian and cyclist trail network;
• Creating a community that youth will wish to stay in and return to.
Each architectural student took these concerns, as well as others, and created a visioning board displaying what they believe are the most important aspects of the town to emphasize or improve on and various ways to do so.
Every citizen scholar was provided with green and red stickers as well as a stack of Post-It notes. They were instructed to place a green dot directly on concepts they liked, red dots on those they didn't like, and notes anywhere they had a question or comment about an idea.
The students would then take this feedback and use it to more closely align their visionings with the citizen scholars. Residents then teamed up in pairs and spent 10 minutes at each display with the student who rendered it, asking questions and making suggestions.
At night's end it was apparent by the brightly colored circles gracing the boards which ideas had potential and which were deemed inappropriate. Receiving the most positive feedback were subjects such as identifying and filling gaps in the economy, restoring Main Street and beautifying Cedar Street, creating a centralized event center between towns and tapping into regional markets with interstate commerce.
A suggested round-a-bout that would slow traffic at the beginning and end of Main Street was not as well received.
The floor was then opened for a question-and-answer session where citizen scholars provided the students with input on their ideas.
Local business owner Gary Wasson noted that he really liked the focus on beautifying Town Hole Park because it has long been an overlooked amenity.
"We use it, we just don't share it. That's what we need to change," said Eric Cochran. "If we build it, they will come."
Ken Schutten , president of the Anderson Betterment Club, advocated the idea of some type of gateway to mark the path through town.
"If you're not from here, you don't know how to get to town or Town Hole," he explained.
Business owner Crystal Sheranan liked the idea of a wind turbine farm in the area. She suggested making it a visual attraction as well, by painting the blades or making them decoratively shaped.
Students will now return to campus where they will confer, debate, revise and ultimately combine perspectives into one vision that will then be presented at a meeting on Nov. 3 for further and final feedback from residents.
General News on 10/08/2015