Planning efforts for Cumberland Avenue began at least as long ago as 1930 when Cumberland Avenue was a part of a Comprehensive City Plan for the City of Knoxville.
Knoxville Mayor Victor Ashe announced the Cumberland Gateway Project in 1991 to which the City of Knoxville, Tennessee Department of Transportation, and UT were to contribute approximately $113,000. The Cumberland Gateway Committee was formed in 1993. UT, Cumberland Avenue businesses, hospital, city, and community members were to follow up and implement suggestions made by a previous mayoral task force to make “the Strip” a more satisfying place—in terms of aesthetics and safety. The main components of the Gateway Project were relocating the utility poles to the alleys to reduce physical clutter, installing new street lights and traffic signals, improving sidewalk conditions by removing physical clutter, widening the sidewalks, creating physical barriers between the road and sidewalk, enhancing the landscaping, and widening and paving the alleys.
The City installed additional crosswalks, cleaned up the Fort Sanders area and Mountcastle Park by cutting back trees, repaired sidewalks, improved lighting, and installed a new sign at the West Volunteer entrance to UT—after which the funds were exhausted. Another group, the Fort Sanders Forum was then formed by the city.
The City hired an urban planning firm in March 2006 using a $270,000 Tennessee Department of Transportation grant to draw a blueprint for a more pedestrian-friendly and commercial-friendly district. In February 2007 the group revealed its plan, which called for the conversion of Cumberland Avenue from a four-lane road to a three-lane road, with one of those designated as a turning lane. The Cumberland Avenue Corridor Plan was adopted by MPC on April 12, 2007, and by City Council on May 8, 2007. The plan had two elements—an Urban Design Plan, which required adoption of a form based code, and a Streetscape Plan.
The Cumberland Avenue Technical Advisory Committee, including essentially the same groups as were involved in the previous Gateway planning, was formed. A Cumberland Avenue project manager position was created in December 2007 by City Council, funded in part by $25,000 contributions from UT and Covenant Health. Construction was scheduled to begin “no later than January 2010.” The estimated cost was $11 million, but the funds had not been identified.
City Council adopted the code in fall 2013. Effective November 15 all Cumberland Avenue buildings were required to be at least two stories and could be as high as eight or ten stories, with the first floor devoted to retail and the upper space devoted to office or residential space.
The Streetscape Plan, also adopted by City Council, required reducing the street from four lanes to three, widening sidewalks, putting utilities underground, and making aesthetic upgrades. Because of the emergence of the City-assisted University Commons commercial area on the former Fulton property, the project was extended to Alcoa Highway. The first phase ($4.2 million) addressed the area from Alcoa Highway to Twenty-Second Street, providing installation of underground utilities, new signals, sidewalks and crosswalks, a new turn lane, and street resurfacing. Phase II ($12.3 million) covered the original project area from Twenty-Second Street to just west of Sixteenth Street, including installation of underground utilities; narrowing of Cumberland from four to three lanes; new sidewalks; new signals; and a zone including street trees, trash and recycling cans, benches, enhanced lighting for pedestrians, new crosswalks, and new medians with plantings.
The City announced in early March 2014 that approvals for Phase I had been received and that bids would be issued promptly. Work was anticipated to begin in June and would take approximately six months. A preconstruction meeting was held for potential contractors on March 18, and bids were due April 3. No bids were received. The project was rebid, and in December 2014 the City announced that the project would be delayed again because the lone bid it received for its $11 million project was $25 million. In February 2015 bids were again taken for the project without the utility component, which the City had allocated to the Knoxville Utility Board (KUB) to seek utility bids separately. In March the City announced it had added $10 million to the $11 million already funded for the project by reallocating funds from the project to widen Washington Pike. Two bids were received on March 17—Southern Constructors bid $16.8 million and Charles Blalock and Sons bid $17.2 million.