Grow Your Soul: Share

Praises to Soul Fish Cafe and their very progressive attitude about parking.



Sharing helps optimize parking in Cooper-Young. This creates less pressure on everyone to have a proprietary parking lot. Less pressure is good for the district's other businesses and good for its space and architecture. The neighborhood texture is less likely to disappear in a cloud of parking-lot expired destruction. More density, energy and people -- customers -- in Cooper-Young, giving Soul Fish an attraction beyond its good food.

Contrast their sharing with the report of this Letter to the CA Editor:

I went to the Memphis Italian Festival on Friday, but as I pulled in to the Eastgate shopping center to park, as I have in past years, security guards ran me out. Have you ever seen this parking lot more than a quarter filled? I haven't, and over a three-day period, how much does it cost the shopping center's owners to pay for all that security, just to protect an empty parking lot?

Courtesy via the ever helpful Google, about quarter full might be right.


So they paid security guards, shunned patrons of a good cause and ignored those patrons' casual business (e.g., for this young man's employer, halfway between the Italian Festival and the parking lot), so they could stake a claim to their half-used asphalt heat sink.

Soul Fish's progressive welcome should be the vanguard for civic parking policy. "One business, one parking lot" development rips the texture and energy out of Memphis' districts and neighborhoods.

Organic Art with Crape Myrtles

Walking through Cooper-Young last Saturday, I noticed that these 2 crape myrtles


each had hollow bases.

As you can see and I discovered, each "tree" is actually multiple myrtles planted around the stump of a departed tree (not a crape myrtle). They were then wound together so that they would grow together, leaving the hollow base above the stump, and below the wound "tree".


Pretty cool, if you ask me.

I love the result, and I love the creative possibilities.

Bonus link: strange green art.

Memphis Events in April

Here are some Memphis events you might enjoy this month:

Thursday, April 3: Sierra Club First Thursday Meetup at Otherlands. The Sierra Club also keeps a calendar and RSS feed of environmental events and alerts.

Thursday, April 3: Cooper-Young First Thursday Night Out. This is not just taking place at the corner of Cooper and Young. Many of the participating businesses are on Central. I hope this will become a huge monthly event.

Since they happen on the same night in the same neighborhood, you can go to the Sierra Club meetup first, then walk over to the Cooper-Young events (a block and a half away). Foot-powered connections are always the best.

Friday, April 4th - Sunday, April 6th: Dream Reborn Conference by Green For All organization. The conference is actually sold out, but there may still be a chance to volunteer.

Saturday, April 5: Old Forest Hike, led by the very active activists of Citizens to Protect Overton Park.

Friday, April 11th: a screening of Third Ward TX, a film about community building and art building in Houston. Details.

Saturday, April 12th: April Rock n' Romp.

Saturday April 19th: Old Forest Hike, led by the activists of Citizens to Protect Overton Park.

Saturday, April 19th: Wolf River Harbor Earth Day Cleanup, on the Memphis Riverfront, led by the Sierra Club.

Friday, April 25th: The Second Memphis Zombie Walk which starts on Beale Street and limps toward South Main's Last Friday Trolley Night.

Saint Francis of Cooper-Young

Walking past my favorite Memphis garden last Saturday, I noticed that Saint Francis, who had previously been beheaded, by sinners or Memphis garden gnomes,


has been reheaded.



Just in time for Spring.

Family Art Tomorrow Night

Family Art Night at Peabody Elementary

I wanted to touch base with you about Peabody's Family Art Night. Again, the date is set for March 11, 2008 @ 6:00pm. The event will be held at Peabody Elementary which is located at 2086 Young Ave. in the Cooper-Young community.

Family Art Night was started last year, as a vision by me to promote Arts in the schools. As you may know, when budget cuts come along, the Arts are oftentimes the first to go. Also, some people view the Arts as simply a creative past-time and do not understand the value it has in impacting a student's learning. My aim was to show that despite these woes, discipline-based art education was still attainable in the classroom. I worked to show teachers how to integrate art into the regular curriculum. Also, I strived to show parents the importance of art when it comes their child's education, and I wanted everyone to walk away with an awareness and appreciation of the Arts.

Furthermore, Family Art Night consists of stationed-based activities for the students; a Meet-and-Greet with local artists and art organizations; and special performances. All in all, it is a night where the Arts come alive!

Many people, both students and parents, commented on how they thoroughly enjoyed the event and looked forward to it again.

This year, the theme for the event will be "Passport to the Arts", which coincides with Peabody's International Studies Program and we have added a "traveling artists" component whereas artists will create artwork and the New Ballet Ensemble School dancers will show various ballet techniques.

Artfully yours,
Regina Boyd
"Every child is an artist..." -Pablo Picasso

I met Regina and heard about this great event at the CODA Conference last fall.

Mixing Neighborhoods: Cooper-Young and the Fairgrounds

How will the Fairgrounds development mix with adjacent neighborhoods?

As the Fairgrounds, it was a place of special events, once-a-year, once-a-month events with no residents. Other than Fairview School, it had no regular daily users. Plus, its sea of surface parking took away the visual, spatial joy of walking even though it has some great buildings. Only during the Fair, when magic carnies built a City out of parking lots, was a walking, physical connection restored.

The main entrances show the physical traces of the Fairgrounds separateness. None are aligned with the grid of streets from the neighborhoods surrounding. On Southern, the Coliseum entrance dead ends into the railroad, on Central into the CBU parking lot, on East Parkway into Cooper Young homes. I don't think there is an entrance on Hollywood. Chain link fences define most of its perimeter.

Will the new Fairgrounds maintain its historic separation, or will it intentionally and physically make a stronger connection with adjacent neighborhoods, becoming more porous? While I wouldn't want it to be sliced and diced rationally, obliviously, by Memphis' auto grid, I think a greater physical connection would make the development better and stronger for both itself and neighbors.

A good place to start connecting would be the eastern terminus (soon to be connectus) of Cooper-Young's Young Street. It dead ends at East Parkway into the Fairgrounds fence that separated the free world from Libertyland. A walker coming from Cooper-Young has to take a left to the north and walk 100 yards to get to the Fairgrounds entrance.

Raise the dead end into a live gateway. Surround the gateway with tree- and Pippin-height multi-use buildings that attract use and provide energy and market. The way of the gate doesn't have to be a street, but could be, maybe should be, a pedestrian path. The gateway should provide a visual draw for those walking or driving down Young, or stopped at the light on East Parkway, via the design and height of the buildings and gateway, framing the the Zippin Pippin in the background. Something visible to a walker from as far as Young and McLean would be great, if not impossible.

The new and the old can meet and grow at East Parkway.

Learning from Carnies

Lessons from the Mid-South Fair and Cooper-Young Festival about creating energy in permanent places:

• Not just walkable -- walk required.

• Strong and fun visuals, coming from everything and everywhere.


• Strong and pleasant smells coming from restaurants and vendors.


• Use variety.

• People variety.


• Cost variety.


• Loss leaders -- something you can do and see without spending money or lots of it.

• Lots of kids stuff, including animals, playgrounds, art, spaces, etc. Doesn't mean you can't have "adult" stuff, but kids should be encouraged.


• Lots of micro-to-small structures and spaces.


• Lots of micro-to-small businesses.


• Closeness of people.

• Fun.

• Lighting that encourages fun.


• Anything that encourages all of the above.

Lessons to avoid:

• People drive from all over Memphis to support the Fair and Festivals. A permanent place cannot consistently depend on people coming from all over the metropolitan area to support its energy. I just don't think you can sustain that drive-up market permanently (see Overton Square).
  


• Depending on a wider, drive-up market will create parking pressures and attendant mindsets, which will undo the places (see Overton Square).

How do you create energy without requiring half that half the city drive up?

1. start with a small place. Make it smaller if possible.


2. Encourage a density of activity, and expand from there.


3. have many festivals and interlocking events per year. Think of ways to make a separate event part of the larger community. With interlocking events, the participants should walk, walk, walk! The more walking connections created between events in your neighborhood the more energy and the more people will want to live in your neighborhood. Which will help...
   

4. encourage greater residential density and variety, immediately around the neighborhood commercial centers, especially in the empty lots. Memphis has lots and lots of empty lots. You won't get density and closeness if you tear down standing structures and leave empty space.

The Riches of Cooper-Young: Cause 1

The fewer boundaries there are that separate citizens, the better, because creativity thrives when people encounter one another from different parts of society...

Steven J. Tepper,
on the conditions under which creativity flourishes,
on Smart City Radio

Variety of housing cost is part of the reason Cooper-Young has become a viral, creative, rich Memphis neighborhood. It trends towards Memphis affordable. It blends socially and economically with nearby neighborhoods. No one is out of place in Cooper-Young.


And part of the reason that South Main is not-so-vital is its lack of that variety. (One suggested solution.)

YAGOMD: An Artist-in-Residence Residence

I love this house. A midtown bungalow/row-house hybrid.

We could give it an exotic Memphis name and make it into the nominal residence for Memphis artists-in-residence.

They can have salons in the backyard.

And from the tranquility and safety of the balcony, they can watch a breadth of Memphis life up and down Young Street.

SkateLife Memphis: My Cooper-Young Delusion

Skatelife Memphis is working to build a skate park in Memphis. I propose a location in Cooper-Young.

It's not the Cooper-Young neighborhood itself, but a specific urban space

that motivates the delusion. It's just south of the intersection of Central and Cooper.

The primary spaces (A and B) aren't even side by side. They are separated at ground level by Cooper. The formerly abandoned railbed (henceforth known as the skatebed) and the Cooper-Young art trestle (A+B) will join them together.

It will contain this east of Cooper space (whose ramp and pronounced topography gave me the idea in the first place)


joined by the elevated skatebed and art trestle, over Cooper, ...


to this space

(and possibly other spaces (?)) west of Cooper.

I don't know what the status is of space A. The building adjoining may be in active use. Also, the owners of Sully Vans on Cooper may have purchased the rail bed closest to them (there are vans parked on the skatebed in the Google Earth image.)

Space B, west of Cooper, is for sale.


This and the other lots west of Cooper have lots of trees along the skatebed to the south. These could provide some strong cooling shade in the summer and fall.

So why do I call this a delusion?

1. SkateLife Memphis has already decided on Mud Island as their preferred location.
2. I'm not even a skateboarder, skater or skatist!

No matter, all matter -- we still need showmanship of place.

And I love the vision of people rolling back and forth across the trestle, up with the art.

House of Mews Updates

Update uno: The House of Mews has a letter on their home page explaining what they need for the move. They are also very gracious to the folks kicking them out, which is nice.

Here it is:

January 17, 2007

Dear Friends of Mews,

WE NEED YOU NOW MORE DESPERATELY THAN EVER BEFORE……………..

Our new landlords have notified us that we are to vacate our building by March 2007. We are the last in line of all the tenants to be vacated. Our landlord was good enough to let us know that eventually it would be our turn, but that for the time being (the last 2 years) we were welcome to stay as “ we were considered an asset to the community". The property owners have plans for all of the buildings they own to the north of ours, which include serious upgrading and new tenants who can afford much higher lease rates. As a businesswoman, I understand return on investment on one's property is key. Nevertheless, it saddens me, as we have been a part of the Cooper Young Community for well past 11 years and will be forever grateful for the kindness of the community and our supporters, including the owners of our space.....where well over 7,000 homeless cats have been cared for and adopted and people from all over the world have visited.

Now for the really tough part......we MUST move by March 2007! Here, we once again ask for the support of our "Friends of Mews". You have already given us much.....you send us money, you volunteer and work hard in our store, you bring in & donate tons of supplies to alleviate our burdens and make life easier. We hope you will want to help us again. We NEED YOU. The House of Mews has not survived because of one person alone, but by many who have been dedicated over the years. Here's how you might help:

1. Are you a realtor who knows a possible space, a storefront with windows, a small older home
in a commercial area for lease, possibly for sale?.
2. Are you someone who would consider being our landlord, buy a small space in a commercial area as an
investment and let us pay the mortgage payments as rent?
3. Can you sign up to foster or adopt ONE or TWO Kitties during our transition?
4. Are you willing to help paint, tile or decorate with us?
5. Can you help us move, or help us clear our building in some small way?
6. Can you help get the word out to your friends and family that we are looking for help QUICKLY?
7. CAN YOU DONATE $ to help keep us going during this transition?

We must start anew, a smaller space, about 1500 s.f....we are ready to size down, the current space has been a huge workload of 3000 s.f. which I must care for by myself when I don't have enough volunteers.......we have already lowered our number of kitties from 170 to just under 100. We pray for a nice little space without any huge remodeling expense and nice big windows for the kitties to lay in the sun and look out the windows just as they have for 11 years here on Cooper....that and hopefully a place where many people walk/drive/visit so we are seen and our homeless kitties can be adopted. Without this, we might as well close our store..............location is still the most important ingredient for success. We know beggars can't be choosers, but then, we don't want to be thought of as beggars, unless of course,that works!
We thank you for helping in whatever way works best for you, please contact me immediately if you can assist us. Time is of the essence, as we will all be magicians if we can pull this one off!

Sincerely,

Elain Harvey
Founder & Managing Director
Direct Access # (901) 489-7938 Email: houseofmew@aol.com

Update dos: on this thread at the Goner Message Board, member Alisa reports that "Burke's is not moving into the House of Mews. It's moving into the end of the row across the Tsunami parking lot. Apparently, overhead is much lower...which makes sense." It sounds like the same row of shops, but not that particular space. Which is good for Burke's, since you don't want to be the one kicking the kitties out. But does that mean then that the HOM eviction is a speculative eviction?

Big Stinking Mistake in Cooper-Young

If you want to see the embodiment of loss leader, it's the House of Mews in Cooper-Young. A very unique non-profit that has been there for at least 10 years, they're a huge part of that neighborhood's feel and its success. I know quite a few people who make a trip to the House of Mews a regular part of their trips to Cooper-Young, and dine at Cooper-Young just so they can stop by there afterwards. And when I say "stop by", I don't mean get in their car and stop by. I mean walk up and walk in.

And now the House is getting booted so some landlord (could it be the same landlord who has pioneered the growth of empty storefronts and massive unused parking lots in Overton Square?) can triple the rent: from $1000 to $3000 month. 300%. Not a nice profit. A mega-stinking-profit.

This is the 2000's version of The Center for Southern Folklore being booted from Beale Street to make room for Wet Willie's Daquiri Bar, or Burkle's Bakery in Overton Square being booted for something (I don't know what it was, but it's long gone and there is no tenant there now.) And I realize the tenant that's moving in is not Wet Willie's -- it's Burke's Bookstore.

Beware, Cooper-Young! With decisions like this coming from people like that, Wet Willie's and over-priced, underoccupied storefronts may not be far behind.

Don't blame the cats. This crap is man-made.