Forecast: More Places to Work and Play Downtown

The study says downtown towers generally were not built with adequate parking until recent decades. Credit Nina Cardona, WPLN.

A new study predicts more growth in downtown Nashville, especially when it comes to retail and office space. But it comes with the caveat: parking must improve.

The Metropolitan Development and Housing Agency commissioned the forecast for the city’s downtown.

Over the next four years, the report projects demand for about 400-thousand square feet of new office space, 35-hundred new apartments and condos and just over 4-thousand hotel rooms. At the same time, it says the city could support more than 500-thousand square feet devoted to downtown shopping, eating and entertainment-ideally grouped into distinct commercial neighborhoods, and possibly even including a movie theater.

But that’s if the average Middle Tennessean thinks he can find a place to leave his car. The study repeatedly points out that limited parking downtown is a stumbling block to development.