AEROTROPOLIS

PROJECT DESCRIPTION:
Memphis is the largest city in Tennessee and the seat of Shelby County. It is located in the southwest corner of the state, bordered by Arkansas and Mississippi, and overlooks the Mississippi River. The city is known as “America’s Distribution Center,” serving business interests throughout the northeast, southeast and southwest regions of the United States. The population is nearly 650,000.

Although Memphis is known around the world for its amenities, global enterprises, cultural assets and contributions to medicine and music, the Memphis International Airport is no doubt the city’s crème de la crème in air travel and serves more than 10 million passengers a year. The Airport, a world-class facility, is now considered to be an “Aerotropolis,” the only one of its kind in North America.

So what is the Memphis Aerotropolis? The phrase was coined in 2006 by Dr. John Kasarda, a professor at the University of North Carolina. The Memphis Aerotropolis can be described as the airport-integrated urban land form where the impact and development attraction of the airport extends out as far as 25 miles into East Arkansas and North Mississippi and 50 square miles directly around the airport. This is the primary study area, often referred to as Airport City.

Despite the critical importance of the Airport City study area, development in the area has occurred in a spontaneous and haphazard pattern, producing in some areas results that detract from its economic efficiency, aesthetic appeal, and social and environmental sustainability. Because there has been a lack of coordinated strategic, community, transportation planning and reinvestment in the study area, middle-class flight, crime and blight have increased significantly.

In order to reverse this trend, a coordinated plan of action – the Aerotropolis Master Plan -- is being developed and can be utilized for future development and reinvestment that will transform Memphis into a competitive, logistics and distribution center of commerce that will benefit the entire Mid-South Region.

The Master Plan is being developed with input from community leaders and business owners in the study area. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and the City of Memphis Division of Planning and Development have partnered through the FY 2010 HUD Community Challenge Grants Program to fund the Master Plan.

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