Revitalizing Macon's Historic Neighborhoods

Underwood said one of the best decisions he’s made since assuming the Mercer presidency in 2006 was to nominate Sarah Gerwig-Moore, a Macon native and 1997 College of Liberal Arts graduate, to co-chair the College Hill Corridor Commission, a task force formed in 2007 by the City of Macon and Mercer to coordinate revitalization efforts in the target area.

“We couldn’t have better leadership,” he said. She took a $250,000 Knight Foundation planning grant and worked with hundreds of people in the community to develop “an exciting, compelling master plan.”

Gerwig-Moore clearly recalls the moment her involvement began. She was in an aisle at Publix when Underwood called her on her cell phone to ask how she liked her neighborhood.

Although she had grown up in Macon and attended Mercer, Gerwig-Moore candidly admits that she swore she would never come back. She was living in Atlanta when a faculty position opened up at Mercer’s law school.

“I came back for the job in spite of it being in Macon. When President Underwood asked if I would co-chair the commission, a press conference was scheduled in two days. I thought a lot of people must have turned him down,” said Gerwig-Moore with a laugh.

But, Underwood was looking for a young faculty member in a neighborhood near Mercer. Gerwig- Moore and her two sons live in Huguenin Heights, and her oldest, Dean, attends Alexander II Elementary School on College Street.

She spent the entire summer of 2007 reading about new urbanism and sustainable neighborhoods and thought about the amenities of other places where she had lived that would attract people to live in an urban community.

Gerwig-Moore said she learned a lot from Kevin DuBose, former director of economic and community development for the City of Macon, who co-chaired the commission with her at that time, and Mercer Senior Vice Provost Peter Brown who, as head of Mercer’s Center for Community Development, had been actively involved in the Beall’s Hill redevelopment. She discussed ideas with New Town Macon, the Intown and Beall’s Hill Neighborhood Associations and did a lot of listening.

The vision that Gerwig-Moore helped develop in the master plan includes attracting more residents to nearby neighborhoods, filling empty retail spots with the right kinds of businesses, improving Tattnall Square Park as a centerpiece of College Hill, adding shade trees and historic lighting along streets, burying utility lines, enhancing walkability and slowing traffic to make it safer for cyclists and pedestrians.

The next key step for success, said Gerwig-Moore, will be to hire an executive director for the College Hill Alliance — the entity that will coordinate work in the College Hill Corridor — who sees the value and vision and has the tools to carry on what we’re doing. Another key step will be holding onto partnerships, developing a volunteer base and engaging more students in the work of the Corridor.

“I am most excited about the portion of the Knight grant that will fund ideas of our community members because we have relied extensively on their ideas to get us to this point, and their continued involvement will be vital to our future successes,” said Mercer law student and College Hill Corridor Commission member Matt Wetherington. He is one of four former undergraduate students who in 2006-07 took a senior capstone class, taught by Dr. Brown, that focused on Macon’s economic development efforts. They studied ways to connect the University to the city in order to attract and retain young, college-educated professionals. The efforts of Wetherington and the other three students led to the formation of the College Hill Corridor Commission by the City of Macon and Mercer.

The number one priority in the master plan, Gerwig-Moore said, is upgrading Tattnall Square Park, located directly across the street from the oldest buildings on Mercer’s campus. Created in 1850, the square has an important role as civic space and as a symbol for the surrounding community. The design approach is to recognize and intensify the best of what the square has to offer. To ensure connectivity through the park, an improved path system will be created and new sidewalks and streetscapes will be added along the square’s perimeter.

The master plan also calls for the creation of a formal plaza entrance at College and Oglethorpe Streets with new trees and landscaping, benches, lighting, signage and public art. Other changes will include redesigning the parking so it takes up less green space, extending the natural areas of the park, improving the street curbs, encouraging the continued use of the park for outdoor movies and neighborhood events and improving the recreational uses.

“Tattnall Square can be one of the most special parks in Georgia and can help us market the homes in the area,” Underwood said. “This area ought to be widely perceived as the best place to live in Middle Georgia, where you never see a sale sign on a house.”

Gerwig-Moore said the other two top priorities will be creating bike lanes along the corridor and adding street trees. The lush landscape that once defined the corridor a century ago has diminished. Goals are to re-plant and reseed the corridor to bring back the “City within a Park” ideal. Other plan recommendations include creation of a College Hill Corridor Business Improvement District, converting vacant storefront space into artist live/work space until the retail market improves, and expanding recycling and composting.

The College Hill Corridor Commission also will continue to host fun, free events such as a scavenger hunt for incoming Mercer freshmen, a back-to-school concert, outdoor summer movies and family-oriented “Second Sunday” brunches in the park with live music.

“We have a long way to go, but there’s a real energy and excitement here. People want to see change happen and want to be a part of it,” Gerwig-Moore said.

“Only the community can make it happen,” said Beverly Blake, Knight Foundation program director for Macon, Milledgeville and Columbus. “If you look at any vibrant city, it has been driven by the private sector,” said Blake, who has served as a vital resource in the planning efforts.

Craig Byron, a 34-year-old Mercer biology professor who lives with his wife and two young children in a two-story circa 1920s house in Beall’s Hill, hopes the College Hill Corridor project will spark more awareness of the benefits of living in his neighborhood. The Byrons also hope to see a grocery store open and more pedestrian-oriented areas and bike lanes created in the corridor.

When he and his family moved to Macon three years ago for his first faculty assignment, Dr. Byron wanted to live where he could walk or bike to work.

“Beall’s Hill is a great historic neighborhood next to campus, and the additional enticement was Mercer’s down payment assistance program,” Dr. Byron said. “It was an opportunity we couldn’t pass up.” Dr. Byron said another plus was the proximity of Alexander II magnet math and science elementary school, a National School of Excellence, just a few blocks from their house.

The Byrons sold their second car and Craig Byron comes home for lunch. “It allows us a certain lifestyle that you can’t get in the suburbs,” said Dr. Byron, who helped start a Beall’s Hill neighborhood association and serves as its president.

“Mercer and a broad coalition of key institutional players earned their stripes with the Beall’s Hill revitalization project,” Dr. Brown said. “Now they’ve got a good run coming up with the College Hill Corridor plan.”

“Other cities have done so much with less than what we have to work with in Macon,” Underwood said. “If Macon is to succeed long term, downtown and historic neighborhoods have to lead the way.”

The award-winning Tattnall Place, a mixed-income housing development in Beall’s Hill, replaced the 60-year-old Oglethorpe Homes
— Macon’s first public housing project — in 2006.