April 2, 2023

If you’ve got nothing but time and at least a passing interest in urban planning, have I got a map for you.

It’s the result of weeks of online public input into the proposed Riverline District, and I readily will admit I ran out of time once I started digging into all the comments left on it.

On one hand, this is citizen-powered democracy at its best. Ask for input in the public sector and sometimes you shall receive – but not always.

In this case, feedback is anything but lacking for the approximately 10 acres east of downtown adjacent to Nelson Park. Ideas abound. Cautionary clues exist. And I’m glad I’m not the one tasked with making sense of it all.

If you want to take a look for yourself, here’s a link.

I don’t remember ever seeing such a convergence and divergence of input around a potential development. I attended multiple such meetings for The Steel District, for instance, but much of that area involved private development. While I think there was an appreciation for being asked to provide input, there also was a recognition that the market would drive much of the ultimate investment.

Maybe the Falls Park master plan provided a clue of what was to come with the Riverline District as I remember the consultants running that plan were amazed at the volume of feedback from Sioux Falls citizens.

Engagement is a great thing … but now it’s probably time to set expectations, and that’s true both for the large group attempting to guide this effort as well as for the citizens hoping to see something materialize there.

Here are a few of my big takeaways:

Based on the comments, there is a clear reluctance from many who participated in this exercise to support a large-scale publicly funded sports venue. To be clear, I did not read all the comments and I have not seen the results of the survey that went with this, which might give a broader look at the sentiment. But each time I saw someone mention a stadium, the number of negative reactions far exceeded the number of positives.

There could be multiple reasons behind this – fear over cost, a lack of information about tenant options for a potential stadium, maybe concerns around access – but it’s important for those leading this process to not dismiss what to me was a pretty clear message, albeit an unscientific one.

There seemed to be a mix of reactions to some sort of indoor athletic amenity. I saw some comments about indoor recreation and some advocates for indoor…