Biscayne Green Should Stay Downtown

Biscayne Green Should Stay Downtown
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Activating Downtown is one of the golden tickets to Miami's growth into the twenty-first century. If Biscayne Green is any idea of what can occur in the area, hope exists for our most important corridor. Biscayne Green proved successful.

We need local culture Downtown and we need it bad.

The corridor is going through a rough transition. We lost many of our cultural venues to real estate development: Grand Central, Tobacco Road, Will Call, The Stage, and Elwood's, to name a few recent closings, not to mention all the small businesses and restaurants that closed. Still, cranes litter the skyline erecting more condos into the heavens promising housing ninety percent of us will never be able to afford.

Then there's Biscayne Green, an experiment in what Downtown could look like: an urban oasis of culture, camaraderie and community engagement. Authentic, cozy, cool. Free yet good for local businesses. Perfectly nestled in the heart of the corridor.

Looks like an artist rendering during the day at the puppy brunch. Then into the night watching Amy Winehouse documentary with Miami's iconic dancing girl on the building behind.

Unfortunately, the pop-up park went away at the end of January after hosting almost thirty different events. The big question is what comes next?

Does Miami make something like Biscayne Green permanent? Can the corridor afford to sacrifice parking lots for an ongoing activation? Where do you put it? Maybe across the street into Bayfront Park? Maybe a few blocks up into Museum Park? And then there's the counterpoint. Did they spend too much money on this? Did they really need three parking lots? Why create a park across the street from a park?

These are questions for political and business elites.

The corridor definitely needs a space for locals.

Sure, Downtown Miami has tons of events, but they often feel contrived or marketed towards tourists. Fluff. All part of the brochure. Locals know it.

Biscayne Green was one-hundred percent geared towards locals and you could feel it.

Hopefully it comes back in some shape or form.

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