Bold future for downtown Cairo envisioned by renowned designer

Oliver, a renowned community planner and residential designer, and his team from Lew Oliver Inc., wrapped up three days of information gathering, brainstorming and designing here Thursday with a presentation of their ideas for future planning of Cairo, Oliver’s hometown.

Cairo Mayor Howard Thrower says the first step toward implementing Oliver’s suggestions is to begin with the vacant train depot.

“It will be introduced Monday for council approval to request bids for gutting the depot,” Thrower says.

Just how the depot will be used is yet to be determined. Since it is city owned property, Thrower says the council will have to approve any plans. The depot has been vacant since the Cairo City Police Department moved into its new headquarters in September.

Oliver’s suggestion is to turn the building into a food hall with room for three to four vendors. He suggests turning the parking lot into a grassy green space with an open air performance venue on the western end that could be used for concerts, outdoor movies, or live streamed sporting events.

Oliver shared examples of similar concepts implemented in other communities such as Krog Street Market in Atlanta, St. Roch Market in New Orleans, and The Hub on 30A in Watersound, Florida.

The community, as a whole, was high on Oliver’s list of positives Thursday when he and his team presented their design strategy to local civic and business leaders, most of whom had participated in a Monday morning session with the Oliver team.

“Cairo is truly one of the friendliest towns I’ve been to. Happiness is alive and well here. This is not an abandoned town, this is a vibrant town,” he said. “Thomasville and Tallahassee have a little more polish than we do now, but we’re going to use that to our advantage.”

Oliver presented several ideas for updating downtown buildings, and shared color palette suggestions for buildings based on their architectural design.

Managing downtown like a mall was Oliver’s advice, and he urged the city to hire a retail programmer to help lure businesses to the district that drive foot traffic. He said, ideally, professional offices would be located upstairs from retail or on a secondary street.

He suggested attracting a brew pub to a downtown building where a rooftop area is possible, establishing a wedding venue and even utilizing old train cars as hotel space.

Oliver proposed implementing the plan in stages. He said strict management of the program would provide the predictability that investors crave.

Will McCollum, architect and developer on the team, said rewarding the pedestrian with colorful buildings, greenery, exciting window displays, engaging signage and enthusiastic retailing results in the payback of more people downtown. McCollum praised Cairo’s design of wide sidewalks and upstairs residential spaces.

He said having programs and retailers that offer something throughout the day is healthy for a downtown, such as a bakery and coffee shop for early morning, barbers and hair salons for day trade and restaurants, bars for night traffic. Special events would draw crowds throughout the day.

The team pointed out that Miss Myrt’s is the anchor for downtown with Bishop’s Jewelry, Queen of Arts/Syrup City Nutrition, and Cairo Coffee Company contributing vibrancy to Broad Street.

‘Our goal is to bring people downtown. This is a great way to do it. Relying on retail is an old way, this is new,” Mayor Thrower said later. “The plan is more than I was expecting. I think it’s a great opportunity for Cairo. We intend to move on it as quickly as possible to begin developing a plan of action. . . Lew has done this before and where he has it’s done very well. We’re really fortunate that he did this as a gift from a native of Cairo to the city of Cairo.”