Latest from Opinion
Latest Opinion articles from Jacksonville, FL
Food Trucks Coming to Jacksonville Beach?
Despite their countrywide popularity and tendency to stimulate economic development, for years food trucks have not been welcome at the beaches. With your help, this situation may be on the verge of changing in Jacksonville Beach. Additional bills in Neptune Beach and Atlantic Beach may also be on...
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The Mobility Fee Compromise: Winners & Losers
On Tuesday night, the Jacksonville City Council approved a modified version of Councilman Clark's bill that called for a three year, 100% waiver of mobility fees in an effort to stimulate the continued construction of unsustainable new development at the expense of the taxpayer. Today, Metro Jacksonville's...
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Micro-lofts Fill Demand for Downtown Living
Micro-lofts are a part of a very interesting urban housing trend trend catching on in other major cities. Downtown Vision's Katherine Hardwick wonders if Is Downtown Jacksonville ripe for micro-lofts?
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What if Jacksonville Suddenly Woke Up? Part I
Some say, Jacksonville is a diamond that wants to remain coal. What would it be like if Jacksonville were a city that didn't hate itself... led by people who acknowledged its achievements? Here are a few things that possibly would have happened in New York, Rome, London Paris, Seattle, or San Francisco...
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Demolition by Reckless Policy
It took years to do it, but Springfield finally stopped the wholesale demolition of historic properties. It has been 1 year, 4 months and 25 days without losing a house to a bulldozer. And so the 100 or so condemned structures in the neighborhood stood a chance of surviving -- even given the economic...
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The Urban Facelift Project: The Bostwick Building
Downtown Vision's Blog revisits the Bostwick discussion with this excellent design exploration from our friends over at Content Design Group showcasing one option for adaptive reuse:
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10 Qualities of a Great Waterfront Destination
Since there is so much local energy and desire to bring life back to downtown Jacksonville, it only makes sense that we share Project for Public Spaces' recommendations for creating a great waterfront destination.
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What the Mobility Fee can do for Downtown Jacksonville
According to the recently released JAX 2025 survey, a better downtown is at the top of the wish list of its 14,016 respondents. However, Councilman Richard Clark's proposed three year moratorium of the mobility fee could stunt the redevelopment of downtown Jacksonville and leave the average taxpayer...
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A matter of principals and principles
There is one question that I dread receiving as an educator. "Why don't you look into becoming an administrator?" Thankfully, I am usually not sipping from the coffee that provides me with the sweet nectar of wakefulness for the day as I would surely be spitting it out in a random state of incredulity. Why...
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Why I teach and why I fight
I am a teacher because I want your children to succeed. This is why I maintain a transparent grading process for students and their families to completely understand how I arrived at my grades and how we can work to remedy these grades if indeed we are all trying to make a good faith effort to improve...
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