Hundreds of residents turned out Wednesday, to input into a visioning exercise aimed at planning the next phase of the development of Downtown Orlando.
Called ‘Project DTO – Advancing Downtown Orlando’ and composed of about 100 volunteers appointed by Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer, the outcomes of the visioning process is one of three components to be delivered. The other two elements are a DTO Marketing Strategy and a new Downtown Orlando Community Redevelopment Area Plan, expected to be completed by March 2015.
“Today’s event is part of the visioning process where we are opening up to the public to come and express their ideas,” said Thomas Chatmon, Jr., Executive Director of the Downtown Redevelopment Board and Community Redevelopment Agency, the entity that spearheads Project DTO – Advancing Downtown Orlando. The ideas and opinions of the public would then be reviewed, further research undertaken, before incorporated into recommendations by Project DTO.
Observing that large swaths of the urban African American population have complained about being left out of the visioning and planning process, Dyer said, already there is a comprehensive Parramore Plan underway which will input into the work being done under Project DTO.
“We have a specific Parramore Task Force which is coming up with a Master Plan and Development Plan for Parramore and this will feed into Project DTO,” he said.
Asked what might be the one thing he would like to see downtown, Dyer had this to say:
“We really want to have our community stakeholders guide us to having the best urban environment anywhere in America,” Dyer said. “We have done a great job over the last 10 years with some of the built infrastructure – the Arts Center, grocery store, movie theatre….and now we are looking at quality of life issues, but I won’t want to pre-empt what their great ideas are going to be.”
For more information on Project DTO-Advancing Downtown Orlando and to share your ideas go to: projectdto.com
