“Harrison Square is just a piece of the puzzle — a big, expensive piece, but something that, if handled right, can be leveraged to help local businesses establish a presence downtown. “It’s simply an opportunity for us to do the match-making and do the kind of granular kind of work you need to do to get good entrepreneurs, local and unique entrepreneurial kinds of businesses into our downtown street fronts, to make the case for downtown as the region’s premier office center,” he says.
“You have fantastic amenities downtown. You’ve got places where singles can live, a tremendous ball park you can walk to, a great bike system… Those are the kind of things that can help Fort Wayne elevate its position as a competitor in the global market place everybody is so concerned about.”
However, Harrison Square and its imminent opening is serving as a sort of motivator for the Downtown Improvement District and other organizations in town. Davis says there are a number of things Fort Wayne could do to improve downtown — some of them simple (see the sidebar), others that will require a little more thought and planning, but are far from impossible.”
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