Hendrix, city discuss planning for future

Representatives of Hendrix College and city of Conway officials met at the Hendrix Wellness and Athletic Center on Tuesday with Andres Duany, Hendrix's master planner, to discuss further collaboration as the two entities grow toward one another.

The city and Hendrix collaborated together on Front Street, continuing revitalization projects from downtown that concluded with a student townhouse project complete with streetlights and sidewalks. The group assembled Tuesday discussed working toward similar goals on Markham Street.

Mayor Tab Townsell said Markham has "the bones of a great street" for redevelopment and commented that, because of its width, it has the potential to be pedestrian and bicycle friendly.

Mark Scott, media relations director for Hendrix, said, "We see how well the city and Hendrix worked together on Front Street and how wonderful a program that is and how more of our students are connected to downtown and how much of a win-win that is for both (the college and the city)."

This was the first chance to compare notes on redevelopment, although, as he noted in a prepared statement, "City officials have been studying ways to enhance Markham Street from the downtown area north to Mill Street (toward Hendrix College), while Hendrix has been studying enhancement opportunities south on Markham Street to Mill Street, making the collaboration a natural event."

Scott added, "I think in 10 years, 20 years from now, you'll see it a lot more connected than it is now, even. That's why we wanted to keep the dialogue open."

Duany, founding principal of Duany Platter-Zyberk and Company (DPZ), has been Hendrix's master planner since 1995. He shared several planning insights with the group.

He said of downtown, "It's a really sharp, successful looking place, and eight years ago, it wasn't."

He recommended adding more pedestrian-friendly structures to downtown, such as store fronts, over time. He said if a stretch is pedestrian-friendly, people will walk for miles and spend a lot of time in the town.

"Your downtown has some key structures that are not pedestrian friendly," such as parking lots and blank walls, he said.

Not every street can be an excellent street, he noted, and trying to make them all excellent will make them all end up mediocre, he said.

"Fifty percent of your streets are going to be bad. Just allocate them," he said.

Townsell said of the meeting, "I felt like it went well. It was very productive. It shows the track that we've been thinking on is very much something the DPZ design firm would look favorably upon in connecting downtown and Hendrix, and it gave us some ideas, too. He (Duany) mainly reinforced some of the ideas we've been talking about. He gave us some practical considerations. I think we're going to have a great area of connectivity on a great stretch of redevelopment and that's exciting."

Duany's concepts also led to Hendrix's construction of the WAC and The Village at Hendrix. The developer is TND Partners (Traditional Neighborhood Development) of Durham, N.C. Bob Chapman, managing director of TND, was present Tuesday.

Hendrix will hold a groundbreaking at 10:30 a.m. Wednesday for the first house in The Village at Hendrix.

(Staff writer Rachel Parker Dickerson can be reached by e-mail at rachel.dickerson@thecabin.net or by phone at 505-1277. Send us your news at www.thecabin.net/submit)