The Face of Med City

As Daniel Connolly's Sunday CA piece Building a Medical City concludes, the Medical Center definitely gives "an opportunity here to completely change the face of the city".

Right now the Medical Center's face looks like this:


Will a change look like this?


The Medical Center overlay gives hope that it won't. But is the overlay enough, especially if juiced organizations and individuals cling (and build) to the same 50-year old anti-urban vision of Memphis, i.e., a scatter of disconnected places, the many gaps filled with car trips and desperate PR?

For those clinging, and those who've let go, the article has an illustration that imagines differently, of a new face, of a vibrant street life without the scars of surface parking -- happymedcity.


It's a cartoon, but it can be a guide. Everything we build in the Medical District should be imagined, built and judged to the happymedcity standard.