The city is weighing limited private development on five parcels it owns around the Georgia State Railroad Museum and Savannah History Museum, the area it now calls the Railroad District. Consultant RCLCO recommends a parking garage and 125 to 150 apartments on the visitor-center lots, a micro food hall and restaurant inside the historic Train Shed and Head House, and an 80-to-100-room hotel, while restoring the derelict roundhouse, Oil House and Wheelhouse for museum, retail and event use.
Lease and hotel revenue would go back into maintaining the Coastal Heritage Society's aging structures. At a city open house, residents backed affordable housing on the West Boundary and Louisville Road corner and museum uses at the roundhouse. This is a study and a set of recommendations, not funded or approved construction.
Why it matters
It could turn a cluster of deteriorating rail-yard buildings into a mixed-income district that helps pay to preserve Savannah's national-landmark railroad complex.
Sources and documents4 sources
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