Batter up in The Bottom

I have a small business in Shockoe Bottom in a little building that I hope someday will overlook right field of a new state-of-the-art ballpark. But right now, it's around the corner from a weed-laden, macadam lot where a historic slave shack has been parked on a trailer for as long as I can remember. Down the street are boarded-up buildings, the remnants of where the Lovings used to do business, and a bunch of lots where MCV researchers and nurses battle for parking.

I work in perhaps the most historic section of Richmond, but let's face it, Shockoe Bottom today is an embarrassment. While we have seen signs of life here and there -- LuLu's and Papa Ningo's come to mind -- the progress has been slow and fleeting.

On one of the neighborhood's most prominent corners -- 18th and East Franklin -- a two-story brick building has been vacant for years, and someone has painted it bright blue, as if to highlight the fact. To me, it is a neon symbol for a district that desperately needs our attention.

Shockoe Bottom has the potential to become one of the great neighborhoods of Richmond. We can take due pride in Carytown and the Fan, in Shockoe Slip and Church Hill, and there is much to celebrate in the resurgence of development along the canal.

But the core of Shockoe Bottom -- the "hole in the donut" from Main Street to Broad, from the train tracks to the base of Church Hill -- is festering in neglect. It needs fixing, not a Band-Aid that patches a building here or a lot there, but a wholesale solution, a major project that will address the Bottom's challenges in a comprehensive way.

The Shockoe Center can be that solution.

For the sake of disclosure, I have no affiliation with Highwood Properties or the developers behind the proposal to build a ballpark, hotel, residences, and retail space.

I was part of a small group of businessmen who sought to bring baseball downtown several years ago. At the time, we had envisioned a ballpark along the banks of the James in the shadow of the Federal Reserve Building on the site where MeadWestvaco is now building its corporate headquarters.

But was this the best venue? To find out, we retained a consultant, a national authority on such matters, and charged him with evaluating various downtown locations. He analyzed 30 different sites, and his conclusion: Not only was Shockoe Bottom the premier locale for a downtown ballpark in Richmond, it is the best site anywhere in the country.

If he is right, why has this Boulevard versus the Bottom debate been languishing for all these years, especially in light of what so many other cities have determined -- that downtown baseball spurs economic development, provides a catalyst for urban renewal, and creates an anchor for family-friendly entertainment?

In cities much the same size as Richmond -- Toledo and Louisville, Memphis and Oklahoma City -- downtown ballparks have become the fulcrum for private investment and destinations for fun.

The city fathers in Charlotte commissioned a consultant to study the prospect of moving the ballpark downtown.

They concluded that "it is a mistake to build ballparks in suburban sites surrounded by large swaths of asphalt parking. These so-called 'Destination Venues' do little to trigger economic development and are disconnected from the neighborhood life of a community.

"People essentially just drive to the venue, park in the lot, see the games or events, get in their car and go home. They spend no time on the streets, in the neighborhood or in the downtown area. For a ballpark to be successfully embraced by a community and provide opportunities for economic development, it needs to be as close to the urban center as possible."

If I have learned anything in my dozen years here, it is that Richmond is averse to change.

Baseball has been on the Boulevard for more than four decades, and it's easy to default to what we know. But as you consider the merits of the Boulevard vs. the Bottom, ask yourself from where the money for a new Boulevard-based ballpark would come.

Despite overtures from the city's previous administration, no developer ever stepped forward with a plan for the Boulevard that rivals the Shockoe Center proposal. (In fact, in almost a quarter century on the Boulevard, The Diamond never attracted any real economic development around it.)

Without such ancillary private sector development, the cost of a new ballpark on the Boulevard -- likely $45-$60 million -- would have to be funded directly by taxpayers.

Let's be honest here, is there any possibility at all, especially in this economic climate when we have seen the shuttering of some of our major corporate citizens, that the City of Richmond and the counties of Chesterfield, Hanover, and Henrico are going to write a check from the general funds for $10 million to $15 million each?

The bottom line is this: If we want professional baseball in Richmond (and on Opening Day this year, we will likely be the largest city in America without it), we should embrace the Shockoe Center proposal. It not only will provide a needed catalyst for resurrecting life in the Bottom but return baseball to a proud region that wholeheartedly deserves it.

And OK, yeah, I might even catch an occasional ball over the right field wall.

Josh Dare is a principal with The Hodges Partnership, a Richmond-based public relations firm, and a former member of the Richmond Ballpark Initiative. Contact him at josh@hodgespart.com.