CAVE SPRINGS, Ark. — The City of Cave Springs invited the community to share their input on the development of a Cave Springs Downtown Master Plan on March 25. Residents were invited to have meaningful, hands-on involvement and share ideas of what they would want to see.
"Cave Springs is no longer a small town," Mayor Randall Noblett said. "We would like to be able to hold on to our atmosphere with the older downtown area and make it a destination point that people want to come to."
The city and consultants are trying to respect the history of Cave Springs but plan for the future. Input from residents included more restaurants, more parks and trails, and suggestions for the Highway 112 bypass project. They want to revitalize their downtown while also make the city a place people want to move to.
"It is a quiet kind of a small town community feel that you're right next door to the larger cities and all the amenities," Noblett said. "It's pretty easy to get people to fall in love with Cave Springs."
The city is doing this with help from a grant given by the Urban Land Institute (ULI) chapter of Northwest Arkansas for small communities to help plan and develop and hire consultants
"We bring together the land use professionals in the area with the goal of creating the best built environment and land use practices in Northwest Arkansas," Megan Brown, director of Signature Programing for ULI Northwest Arkansas. "These small cities in particular, are getting the overflow from the four major cities, and sometimes don't have the planning staff support or the fiscal support or the resources that they need to to address these challenges in a timely manner."
The consultants for the project will take all ideas given from Monday's session and compile them into a rough draft to present to residents on Thursday, March 28.
Watch 5NEWS on YouTube.
Download the 5NEWS app on your smartphone:
Stream 5NEWS 24/7 on the 5+ app: How to watch the 5+ app on your streaming device
To report a typo or grammatical error, please email KFSMDigitalTeam@tegna.com and detail which story you're referring to.