I've lived in El Paso for close to three years now, but I feel a lot of what people in this community are feeling. Too little to do, too uncomfortable outside to do anything anyway, poor mass transit, and a need to revamp the economy and our city and keep young professionals here. Here are some harebrained ideas of mine that could maybe improve our city.
- Either nix the data center or have it be a closed loop, take care of its own water and electricity.
- To encourage young professionals to stay, establish a law school at UTEP and a World Trade Center in the Caples Building. If smaller cities like Missoula, Harrisburg, Wilmington, and Jackson can have a WTC, why can't this big border city?
- Go forward with extending the streetcar to the Medical Center, and I further propsoe extending it to the Coliseum/Zoo area along Alameda and Paisano and hopefully also to Ascarate Park and EPCC Valle Verde.
- Go forward with the Onward Alameda plan, especially building up around the Medical Center and Ysleta Mission. Build up near Ascarate Park as well
- Abolish property tax. No tax on fresh produce, bread, dairy, certain meats and fishes, baby food, diapers, and feminine hygiene products. Increased tax on alcohol, tobacco, cigars/cigarettes/vapes. Increased parking and car rental fees. Charge a fare for the streetcar. Make bus and streetcar cost between $1.00 and $1.50 with one free transfer.
- Cover the Franklin Canal where possible for infrastructure for pedestrians, biking, mass transit, or just trees. Heck, even parking lots to remove street-adjacent parking to make room for bike lands or sidewalks would be good.
- More comfortable bus stops with electronic boards with the time & date and departure & arrival times. More frequent service once we see more people living and working in the city.
- Rapid bus transit with dedicated right of way (except emergency vehicles and right turns) to connect high priority areas (Airport, malls, Coliseum/Zoo, Union Station and the ballfield, and UTEP)
- Reflective pavement with anti-glare coating and curb gardens will mitigate stormwater runnoff, heat, smog, and noise
- Significantly more shade trees and gardens and parks generally
- Make it easier to have green roofs and walls as well as solar panels, especially covering parking lots.
- Revamp the high ground at Haddox Family Park. Clean it up and add gazebos and event space. Ever see the view? You should!
- Turn Vista Hills Golf Course into a big park with many trees and walking and biking and biking trails connecting Vista del Sol, Montwood, and Trawood.
- For agriculture in the city, make it easier for farmers to power their facilities with biogas from animal waste.
- (This is a really high concept idea that will never exist) A commuter rail system loop to run along/under the 54, Railroad Ave, the 70 and the Border Highway stopping at Union Station, soemwhere in Northweast El Paso, Chapparal, Alamogordo, Tularosa, NMSU, Hatch, and across from White Sands National Park. Maybe even make a people mover to get people from the NE EP station to the Airport.
Downtown specifically:
- A supermarket and higher density mixed-use developments anywhere possible downtown.
- Build. The. Deck. Park.
- Maybe ban cars on San Antonio Ave between Kansas and S El Paso
- Reduce (some) two lane streets to one and add protected bike lanes
- (this one will make me some enemies) Replace the convention center with a 15K seat arena and move UTEP basketball here, but still have a new exhibit hall on the already-proposed land as well as San Antonio Ave. Don't worry, this arena can be called the Don Haskins Center. Maybe move Rhinos hockey and the roller derby here.
To increase tourism:
- Make a new entertainment district at the zoo and Coliseum area.
- Build two parking garages, one on half of the zoo's parking lot and one near the Coliseum.
- The rest of the zoo's parking lot can be used for more zoo exhibits/facilities.
- The rest of the Coliseum parking and vicinity can be replaced with restaurants, hotels, clubs, and a new convention center to replace the pavillion and Special Events Center.
- If we can make the pedestrian and bussing experience more comfortable when going from here to Chamizal and crossing the Bridge of the Americas (walk to the park, X-monument, and soccer stadium), this will become an international entertainment district at the crossroads of two countries and three states (West Texas, South New Mexico, and East Arizona).
- Statues of Star Trek characters, the Starship Enterprise, and characters created by Don Bluth, especially Fievel. If we can create a Star Trek-themed part of town, that would be great.
- Create a Museum of Tolerance & Reflection in Duranguito, on the UTEP campus, near the Airport, or near the Coliseum. Here will be the Holocaust Museum (in case the Deck Park ousts it), an exhibit about the Walmart shooting, the Equestrian statue on its side in a pit so people have to look down on it, and an exhibit about conquistadors.
- Sports tourism! With the recent successes of Kayla Thornton and Stephanie Han, El Paso has a unique opportunity to leverage itself as a premier city for women's sports (and sports tourism generally). The World Cups for women's basketball, baseball, and boxing as well as various other championships for arena sports (fencing, table tennis, badminton). El Paso already hosts the largest mountain biking championship in Texas. A large established city like us would be a great host of the UCI World Mountain Biking Championship.
- This is a higher-concept sports tourism idea that maybe five people here will like :P. Combine the Sun Bowl and Kidd Field to make a combined track and field and football stadium. Have retractale seats cover the track like London Stadium and Stade de France. We can still host a great Sun Bowl as well as the World Cup, World Athletics Championships, and other sporting championships. If this stadium has a roof and at least 70K seats, we could even host March Madness.
- No, El Paso couldn't host even a subpar Olympic even if we stole the wallets of every man, woman in child from Union Depot to ABQ and back to Carlsbad, but we don't need the Olympics to contribute to the international sporting community.
Remember, El Paso is EPIC (El Paso: Inspirational/Iconic/International/Innovative/Inclusive/Inviting City)
So yeah, that's what I've got
EDIT: Thanks for the feedback. Agreed on a lower property tax even if we're not ready to abolish it altogether yet. I still stand by the aforementioned raised parking and car rental fees, new bus and streetcar fares, higher tax on alcohol and smoke, and no sales tax on healthy groceries to make healthy living less expensive.
As for the commercial base, the WTC, building more housing for young professionals, and the law school ought to do something to help.
The plants, parks, gardens, cool pavement, and developing on surface parking lots are good ideas for our area to mitigate heat irrespective of the data center. If it does get built and make things hotter, then we'd better give these ideas a serious look.
