Gary’s downtown was once the crown jewel of Northwest Indiana. It once sported all the necessities one expects in a downtown: entertainment, shops and stores — the whole nine yards.
Now, through a partnership with the Notre Dame School of Architecture, city officials are hopeful for a return to glory.
The city and the University of Notre Dame’s School of Architecture are working together on a plan that aims to turn Gary’s downtown into a gem again, blending Gary’s rich past with modern urban planning, while using tons of community input. If successful, this initiative could serve as a catalyst for a broader resurgence across the entire city, offering hope for a renewed economic and cultural future.
The city plans to hold a Broadway Summit in the coming weeks to fully lay out the details of the plan. Not everyone is fully behind the plan for downtown development and opposition may swell at the summit.
“For decades, our downtown has fallen into a steep economic slumber. After years of divestment and isolation, we’ve lost historic structures that represented our city’s history and culture,” said Chris Harris, Gary’s director of redevelopment.
Many Gary mayors have promised to revitalize the city, but success has been limited. Mayor Eddie Melton, who came to office earlier this year, said his collaboration with the Notre Dame School of Architecture would make the difference by bringing in experienced experts. Notre Dame is working with three other cities and has helped Kalamazoo, Michigan, secure funding to revitalize its downtown.
“This partnership will equip our community with tools to envision a sustainable plan for development that brings opportunities for businesses and residents to thrive in the heart of downtown,” Melton said when announcing the collaboration.
How Gary fell on hard times
Generations ago, Downtown Gary was a center of commerce in Northwest Indiana. Families from across the region visited Gary to visit Broadway’s thriving shops, stores and the once-famous Palace Theater.
Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls played preseason games in Gary. Whitney Houston performed live here. And — believe it or not — a 14-story Sheraton Hotel once sat behind City Hall.
As industries left Gary in the 1960s and 1970s, so did the vibrancy. What remains now are crumbling buildings and hollowed-out landmarks, symbols of a city that’s seen decades of disinvestment and the vestiges of failed revitalization efforts.
In the 1980s, then-Mayor Richard Hatcher envisioned revitalizing downtown with the Genesis Convention Center, which once hosted the Bulls and concerts from legends like Houston. Today, the convention center sits abandoned at the corner of Fifth and Broadway. The former Sheraton Hotel was finally demolished in 2014 after standing as a symbol of failed redevelopment efforts.
Engagement in the heart of the city
Gary, and cities such as Kalamazoo and South Bend, are partnering with Notre Dame through its “100 Mile Coalition,” a program that works with communities within a 100-mile radius of its South Bend campus and aims to address critical urban issues such as housing shortages, decayed infrastructure, and stagnant economic growth.
The relationship between Gary and Notre Dame began after Carla Morgan, the city’s corporation counsel and a Notre Dame alumna, contacted Marianne Cusato, the director of Notre Dame’s Housing and Community Regeneration Initiative, which runs the 100 Mile Coalition.
In preparation for their work, Cusato and her team at Notre Dame spent weeks immersing themselves in Gary’s past, poring over historic photographs and maps to understand the city’s urban landscape.
Setting up in the Centier Bank Building on Fifth and Broadway, they launched a “Dean’s Charrette,” a series of workshops designed to gather input from local residents. Stations were set up to discuss topics such as architecture, preservation, and neighborhood planning, while close to 200 residents shared their perspectives on significant structures, local challenges, and the future of downtown Gary, which were incorporated into the plan.
They researched historic images and examined vacant land diagrams to identify open spaces. Through early community feedback, Cusato said, they were able to “come at it from multiple angles” to understand the situation from a technical, social and historical point of view.
Feedback from the community led Notre Dame to adjust the plan for the Gary Metro Center.
“We changed the drawings, especially when it was pointed out the special importance of the Gary Metro Center, and we hadn’t had that in our drawings because there was a new transit center coming. A woman had pointed out the importance of it and suggested we propose a Great Migration Museum. We loved that idea, and it got into the plan,” Cusato said.
LaTanya Rodgers of Gary’s Pulaski neighborhood said she is concerned with displacement and that she attended the sessions hoping to find out how she and her community would be affected by the plan.
“We want to make sure it stays a chocolate city,” said Rodgers. “We don’t want to see any Black person that’s been keeping this city going and paying their taxes put out of their homes”
Gary resident Damien Walls walked away from the engagement sessions hopeful while still appreciating that revitalizing Gary’s downtown will be a sizable undertaking.
“It’s a tremendous project. But it’s a good opportunity for the administration because the residents have overstated what they expect from the city,” Walls told Capital B Gary.
“I see the work Notre Dame has done in South Bend and Kalamazoo, Michigan, so I know they know their stuff and are extremely experienced, but the city is still responsible for executing these plans. I love the city of Gary, and I hope it all comes together.”
The plan
Notre Dame’s plan prescribes four activation zones for the downtown. The first centers around the city’s civic and transportation hubs, anchored by Gateway Park and including City Hall and the county courthouse. The intention is to introduce mixed-used development around these structures, a strategy employed by many urban planners to improve accessibility and economic vibrancy. The old 4th Place, which connects Broadway to the U.S. Steel Yard, will be utilized to create a pedestrian-friendly zone amenable for walking.
The Palace Theater at Eighth and Broadway, currently slated for redevelopment as reported by Capital B Gary in June, serves as the anchor for the second zone. Gary’s redevelopment director, Chris Harris, sees this area as a potential spot for entertainment.
“We’re actively working with that developer in an effort to create an entertainment space that’s flexible and accessible to our public, honoring the past of what the Palace provided us, but still being able to offer an opportunity that we can promote and engage the arts and entertainment at that intersection of Eighth Avenue and Broadway,” Harris said.
The other two nodes are geared toward the development of downtown’s residential areas centered around Emerson and Holy Angels, the latter being the headquarters of the Gary Archdiocese, which covers Lake, Porter and LaPorte counties.
Notre Dame’s recommendation is that the city start infill development in areas of these neighborhoods like Eighth Avenue and Van Buren, or Eighth Avenue and Harrison Street, where there is little or no current development.
“The goal is to start where you have an anchor, and you can build around and infill those lots to really activate and create a strong neighborhood, stabilize it, and allow that development to merge into itself from each of the four nodes,” Harris said.
With the degree of focus on downtown, however, some are concerned with development in other sections of the city.
“That corridor from Interstate 65 all the way to Cline should be lined with multipurpose businesses,” said former Gary resident James Bly.
A blueprint to follow
Notre Dame’s Housing and Community Regeneration Initiative has shown an ability to turn cities around.
In June, Kalamazoo, just two hours northeast of Gary, announced it was awarded a $25 million grant through the U.S. Department of Transportation’s Rebuilding American Infrastructure with Sustainability and Equity (RAISE) program, after working with the program.
The RAISE grant was just one slice of roughly $98 million the city has received since completing the same weeklong urban planning session Gary residents participated in last month with the School of Architecture’s Housing and Community Regeneration Initiative.
Kalamazoo Assistant City Manager Rebekah Kik said she placed immense value on the plan created by Notre Dame and credits them for the funds the city has received.
“We’ve been really, really lucky with some of our federal and state funding. We’ve received tens of millions of dollars in some federal funds by using the plan,” Kik told Capital B Gary.
“Having the language and having the plan to basically submit with the grant has made us incredibly successful with those grant applications,” she said. “Being able to say that we did the community engagement, here’s the plan, here’s how we plan on implementing it and here’s what’s going to look like because we have the drawings to go along with it.”
Despite just holding their initial charrette sessions in August 2022, Kik says the city has already carried out 80% of its downtown revitalization plan, redesigning streets, adding walkways, and purchasing decorative lighting for alleyways.
Cusato cautioned against expectations for such a quick turnaround in Gary.
“Gary didn’t get to the place that it’s in overnight, and it’s not going to turn around overnight. We’re now into the ‘OK, how do we make this happen?’ phase, which will take time and will take additional funding for each of the projects,” she told Capital B Gary.
After seeing the Notre Dame plan turn her city’s downtown around, Kik’s advice to Gary residents is to remain hopeful and see it through.
“It’s wonderful to have a vision, and without it, you can’t make those steps forward,” she said. “I would encourage [residents] to have hope and hold on to that vision. Get this plan built and just show everyone how much heart and love you have for your community. Show them how much you can get done when you love your community.”
This story has been updated.
