Adviser says Spokane Valley is a ‘city without a heart’

The Sprague Avenue of the 1950s, ‘60s, ‘70s, ‘80s and even the ‘90s isn’t coming back.

That’s the message an urban design consultant gave Spokane Valley citizens and elected officials Tuesday. Fewer people want to shop along the long corridors where strip malls were successful for years. Instead they’re going to malls and to the intersections of major streets, where retail shops are being clustered in attractive ways, said Michael Freedman, of San Francisco-based Freedman, Tung & Bottomley.

“There is no going back,” he said.

About 50 people attended a Tuesday afternoon presentation by Freedman, who also spoke during the evening’s regular City Council meeting. Freedman came to Spokane Valley with a team of consultants last year, but was invited back to talk more about revitalizing the Sprague corridor.

“It takes awhile for things to sink in,” Mayor Diana Wilhite said.

Freedman said any major changes to the Sprague corridor would require buy-in from citizens, the council and property owners. A scientific study conducted last spring found that residents do favor building a stronger identity in Spokane Valley, as well as a city center. While Sprague was traditionally the city’s main drag, the busy street isn’t exactly the best place for a stroll, a parade and other community events these days.

“You have a newly incorporated city without a heart,” he said. “There’s no logical place where, if the Olympic torch came through town, everybody would know where to go to greet it.”

Freedman said businesses on streets like Sprague are failing across the country, not because of poor decisions by politicians or because people don’t know how to run their companies.

Rather, customers are spending their money and time elsewhere because of changes in the shopping industry, he said.

“The mall is grabbing the retail dollars that used to go to shops on Sprague Avenue,” he said. Shopping centers such as the Wal-Mart complex on Sullivan also are draining money from Sprague, he said.

Freedman had advice for the city, if it wants to revitalize the Sprague corridor.

First, it should identify the best places to cluster businesses. Department stores and malls would be located in designated regional centers.

Town centers would have supermarkets, restaurants and other attractions for city residents. And neighborhood centers would house pharmacies and banks.

Second, the city should hold community workshops to get ideas and support from the public, Freedman said.

To hire a consultant like Freedman to do that work would cost about $250,000.

Tuesday’s presentations cost the city $3,000.

Mayor Diana Wilhite said the city is prepared to take those steps, but didn’t say whether it would be done in-house or through a consultant, and the council hasn’t taken any specific action on that front.

Freedman showed examples of cities that have converted wide roads into “grand boulevards” lined with apartments and duplexes, a suggestion he has for parts of Sprague.

Putting homes on wide streets works when the buildings are large and appealing, so they fit the scale of the road and don’t have a “tenement” feel, and when there’s a buffer, like landscaping, between them and the street, he said.

The city currently is writing its comprehensive land-use plan, a 20-year blueprint for growth required by the Washington state Growth Management Act.

Some of Freedman’s ideas could become part of that plan and some of the general ideas for a city center already are part of a discussion draft.

This spring, the city will present a more formal draft to the public. Refinement will occur throughout the year.

Shelley Runolfson, who owns Fashion Carpets and the building on Sprague that houses it, balked when she heard Freedman’s ideas last year.

But, after returning from a vacation in Florida where some cities are reinventing themselves, she has changed her stance.

“The old way is not working,” she said. “We probably will need to change.”