Last Saturday, August 10th, we held our latest Society of Urban Perambulators (SoUP) event in Clarksville’s new downtown development. The event had around 30 attendees, all of which deserve a big thanks for participating and checking out this unique development with us. Folks came from eleven different zip codes around the Louisville area! Additionally, this tour was only possible with help from Cory and Kyle Hoehn (Cornerstone Group), Tim Steele (Denton Floyd), and Dr. Neal Turpin (Town of Clarksville), so a massive thanks to them as well.
Clarksville is currently in the midst of constructing a new downtown block-by-block. So far, there are 3 major development projects complete with at least 3 others in the works. This is in addition to new city infrastructure such as the new multi-modal Main Street, Riverside Drive redesign, and the building of a new street grid. This tour gave us an opportunity to see what has been completed so far, and learn about what is to come.
We got things started at Coffee Crossing in Jeffersonville, which is located along a charming mixed-use corridor. From there, we took an extended walk to the Cornerstone Group offices where we met President Kyle Hoehn. He showed everyone a model of their property downtown along with some drawings/renderings of future plans.
Kyle then guided us to their first property: Bolt & Tie. This was also the first building constructed along the new Main Street. It was designed as a work-live space with first floor retail and offices located below apartments. The offices are small and cheap to allow for small businesses to afford what may be their first office space. The first floor spaces were sleek, with a significant amount of amenities for residents and those renting offices.
After being shown around some of these features on the first floor, our group was taken to the clubhouse and rooftop shared space that both offered an amazing view of Louisville’s skyline. In these spaces, Kyle shared that Cornerstone plans to build 2 more buildings along the east side of Main street in the coming years and took some questions related to Bolt & Tie and Clarksville in general.
From Bolt & Tie, we were guided to the second building owned by Cornerstone along Main Street. Despite the downtown still being very early in development, there were quite a few pedestrians and cyclists navigating the new main street corridor. This second Cornerstone building contains Goodbounce, a pickleball facility, and several gym facilities.
After Goodbounce, we walked across the street to one of the parklets integrated into Main Street where Dr. Neal Turpin, Clarksville’s Planning Director, discussed the future of the downtown. He shared that walkability is at the forefront of downtown’s design, and gave some details on future projects. These projects include additional mixed-use buildings similar to those currently there, downtown grid expansions, and a convention center that is currently planned to contain an Amtrak station on the second floor. This station would be served by up to two routes which are currently being investigated by the Federal Railroad Administration.
After taking questions, we walked back down Main Street to Current 812. We met with Tim Steele of Denton Floyd, who gave us a tour of the recently completed property. Current 812 is mixed-use, like Bolt & Tie, with first floor retail spaces and third and fourth floor bar and restaurant spaces. The building also contains townhomes on the west side that are accessible from the street.
After leaving the lobby, we were brought to the main terrace space. This space contains a pool, seating, and cooking spaces. The area is reminiscent of a resort with its amenities, some were asking if they had day passes for the pool. It almost felt like some people wanted to stay. This space also has a stellar view of downtown Louisville.
The group then got to take a look at one of the one bedroom units, which had a doorfront directly on the terrace. All 30 of us managed to fit into the unit while Tim described costs, short term rentals, and other unit sizes (1, 2, and 4 bedrooms).
Lastly, the group got to see the clubhouse space and sky terrace on the top floor. Our guide took some questions before the perambulators left the building. Current 812 was our last official stop, after this, we wrapped things up with food and drinks at Upland Jeffersonville.
The Society of Urban Perambulators is a program by the Urban Design Studio at the University of Louisville. The events are free and open to the public. There is a SoUP Facebook Group if you are interested in joining the more than 240 people on there, or you can email our director, Patrick Piuma (patrick.piuma@louisville.edu) to be added to the SoUP list.
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