After years of delays, and ongoing lawsuits, officials with the city of Fresno say they are finally going to turn the Fulton mall back into a street. The question of what to do with the aging pedestrian walking area in the center of downtown Fresno has been a sore spot in the city for years. City and business leaders say all signs point to the project breaking ground as soon as this fall.
A piano player picks out a tune on the piano in the corner of the popular downtown bar Peeve’s.
The restaurant has only been open on the Fulton Mall for about a year and a half but its owner Craig Scharton says it is just the first example of the change that could be coming to the fifty year old pedestrian mall if it is converted into a street.
“Night time entertainment. Food. People that care about things like local farmers and local food products. Local music. Local art. You know the stuff that people enjoy in other successful urban areas,” Scharton said.
Where many people now see buildings on the mall vacant, boarded up, and run down Scharton sees the potential for new life once the street is reinstalled.
It will have two-way traffic and wide sidewalks to accommodate the malls rich collection of art and fountains.
He is dismissive of the continued opposition to the project.
“There is a difference between emotional decision-making and rational decision-making. There is no argument that supports a revitalized pedestrian mall,” Scharton said.
But not everyone agrees.
Two blocks from the bar music blares from a bicycle in the center of the six-block pedestrian walking mall.
It’s where I met Doug Richert standing by a statue of a woman washing clothes.
“This is a Renoir. Actually there are six existing copies of this and this is the only one that is available for the public to come up and touch,” Richert said.
Richert is part of a group committed to stopping the Fulton mall project from ever becoming reality called the Downtown Fresno Coalition.
He says changing the walking mall to a street would forever ruin one of the unique features of the city and potentially result in the loss of artwork and fountains that now line the mall…
“I believe it is something that is worth saving. Not just for Fresnans of today but Fresnans of tomorrow. And if we don’t save it is going to be something that is lost forever,” Richert said.
Richert says the city is trying to steamroll opposition and is violating its own ordinances, preempting ongoing lawsuits, and risking losing sizable federal money intended to fund the project.
In documents used to earn federal grants, city leaders projected a groundbreaking by the end of this month, a goal they are sure to miss.
Fresno City Manager Bruce Rudd says regardless of that goal the city has answered all the questions around the project and is ready to find a construction company to begin work.
“There is no concern over losing grants, we just have to show we are making progress and we have been able to satisfy the federal government with that aspect. (And as far as you are concerned this is happening? After all the years of talk Fulton Street is on its way?) It is on its way, it is definitely going to happen,” Rudd said.
But the project is still facing state and federal lawsuits claiming the city is downplaying the environmental impact.
Those suits could take six months or more to resolve according to lawyers involved.
Supporters of starting the project as soon as possible say millions of dollars in development are waiting in the wings watching for an actual groundbreaking.
One of those developers is Terrance Frazier, who has big bucks tied up in potential renovation and new construction on the south end of the mall, near Chukchansi Park.
He says developers from larger cities like L.A. and San Francisco have already invested millions of dollars buying up property in anticipation of the project.
“Every indicator has shown it is going to happen. Most people think it is going to take ten years. I disagree. I think it is going to take 36 months. It could be 24 to 36 months and that downtown could be changed dramatically,” Frazier said.
Frazier says if for any reason the project doesn’t happen, then he and other developers will put the brakes on their projects.
But some people are using the mall as it is, one of them is Ernie Perez.
I found him one a sunny Tuesday morning hanging with a group friends who ride tricked out cruise bicycles outside a coffee shop.
He says he has conflicting feelings; that he believes it could help the mall but that he worries it is being oversold and won’t deliver on all the promises supporters make…
“Every plan that they come up with has a lot of destruction. People are scared to come down here and I don’t think making a parking space right in front of a store is going to make people feel better,” Perez said.
Fresno’s Mayor Ashley Swearengin, one of the projects most ardent supporters, says she expects a groundbreaking this year with the potential that the new street could open before she leaves office next year.
