The Tower District emerged in the early 1900’s as a streetcar suburb of the rapidly growing Fresno two miles north of the City. The neighborhood became a nice mix of middle class and working class residents centered on the Olive Ave Commercial District. The neighborhood’s namesake, Tower Theatre was designed in the Streamline Moderne style in the late 1930s.
While the neighborhood struggled at times during the post World War II years, it never declined into complete abandonment and disrepair. In the late 80s the Tower District showed signs of new life, which helped galvanize residents to create a Tower District Specific Plan which was adopted by city ordinance in 1991. This helped spawn new investment in the neighborhood’s resident stock and zero in on revitalizing the neighborhood’s well built Olive Street, which eventually became the City’s leading nightlife destination. The Tower District also contains attractive commercial clusters on the mixed-use Van Ness Ave. Yet its secondary commercial street, Belmont, is rather auto centric and uninspiring.
I already consider the Tower District to be a quality urban district but for it to be great it needs a couple crucial pieces (i.e. a supermarket, better walkable schools, and more park space). More density and mixed use development along Olive, Van Ness, and especially Belmont would also go a long way to urbanizing the district. A quality mixed-use district along Belmont would create an important walkable hub in the district southern edge and help create a walkable node between Dwtn and Olive Street.
Click here to view my Tower District Album on Flickr
URBAN STRENGTHS:
* Sidewalks are consistently good. ADA curbs are pretty consistent along Olive St but spotty on other streets.
* Solid public transit and convenient access to Dwtn only 2 miles away across all modes.
* Several bike lanes run thru the district.
* Great connectivity with small blocks and gridded street network.
* Solid diversity indicators.
* Excellent historic housing stock. Nice mix of duplexes, larger SF homes, smaller bungalows, and larger apartment bldgs.
* High level of safety in Tower District.
* Solid tree canopy.
* Good urban form and streetscaping along Olive Street throughout most of the district. Not great along Belmont.
* One of Fresno’s most popular urban districts.
* Great cultural amenities here including an excellent array of food & beverage bizs. Also plenty of art galleries, two local performing arts theaters (one of them in the historic Tower Theatre), several night clubs, & live music venues, and quality cultural amenities at neighboring Fresno City College.
* Good retail amenities including a health food store, several drug stores, a dollar store, several boutiques/clothing stores, a couple gift stores, a couple bookstores & record shops, plenty of furniture/ antique stores, tons of dessert stores, several gyms, a local post office, several churches, a couple medical offices, and a hardware store near by.
URBAN WEAKNESSES:
* Decent density but not great for an urban district.
* Mixed school ratings. Fresno HS is rated poorly while the smaller Design Science HS is rated very highly. A couple elementary schools in the district but generally rated poorly.
* Parks within Tower District are limited to the Ted Willis Community but Fresno’s best urban park and Zoo is located just a couple blocks west of the neighborhood.
* Tower District is missing a supermarket, banks, a public library, department stores, and a major hospital
Evaluating our Urban Communities [with a focus on America] 