Citizens Club discusses Springfield’s dysfunctional downtown

Dozens of Springfield residents, including government officials and concerned business owners, attended the Citizens Club of Springfield’s Sept. 26 meeting about a decades-old issue – the state of downtown Springfield. The meeting was moved from its typical location upstairs at the Hoogland Center for the Arts to the main floor LRS Theatre to accommodate the larger-than-usual crowd.

A panel made up of Jay Shanle, communications director for Downtown Springfield Inc.; Michael Higgins, owner of Maldaner’s Restaurant; Judy Tighe, executive director of Jacksonville Main Street; Amy Rasing, director of the city of Springfield’s Office of Planning and Economic Development; and Ward 5 Ald. Lakeisha Purchase shared their perspectives on how to address some of the challenges downtown and then took questions from the audience.

Shanle started off the panel presentations by encouraging attendees to focus on the future of downtown, rather than its history.

“I believe when we do discuss downtown, we often look at it through a lens of the past, what downtown was, what it used to be – the state offices is one of the big ones that comes up. And obviously they’re not here in the numbers that they were before,” he said.

“So for me, when I talk about downtown and how we define it, I want to look at the current state of downtown,” Shanle said, noting that he believes downtown is best defined as an arts, culture and entertainment district.

Several panel members indicated the city should seek to increase the number of people who live downtown and have defined structural projects that communities are made well aware of through routine public notices. Rasing, the OPED director, said one solution is more mixed-use real estate – typically where businesses fill in the first floor of a property and upper levels are residential units.

“We have to look at the fact that we don’t have all of our government offices downtown that lead to people eating and shopping downtown on their lunch hours, things like that,” she said. “We need to get people downtown, so does that mean some – as we’re doing in many cases – mixed-use buildings where someone has a business as well as there’s residential (units) within that building. There might be something new that (the) building hasn’t had before so we need to be creative; we need to look at that.”

Despite no concrete updates on downtown housing developments, Rasing said the city is exploring more mixed-use buildings. She also instructed people interested in receiving updates directly from the city to sign up for the city’s weekly newsletter here or by visiting springfield.il.us.

Rasing said an unnamed state or federal government agency will have around 200 workers filling the former AT&T call center and administrative office at 529 S. Seventh St., sharing a parking lot with Obed & Isaac’s.

Alderwoman Purchase said the city and any groups invested in revitalizing downtown Springfield just need to look at the master plan published last year.

“We have something on paper and we are going to work on it, not creating another plan. I don’t want to see another plan,” she said. “We need to go look for the plans that are already on the shelf and bring them out and look at them and see what did we miss, what do we need to address?”

Purchase and Shanle, of DSI, said that the city will eventually roll out another parking meter cover, this time purple, to indicate that a spot or lot is indeed free to use.

Shanle said the “Public Private Purple Parking Program” will designate certain meters and parking lots owned by government agencies or state organizations as free to park during certain hours, such as evenings or weekends.

Elizabeth Wake, owner of The Wakery, which closed its brick-and-mortar location on Adams Street last month, told the panel that parking downtown is ample but signage is a problem.

“When people tell me that parking is an issue downtown, I know that it isn’t because I did my master’s thesis on city-owned parking in downtown Springfield,” she said. “Parking is not an issue downtown, but the signage, the awareness of where to park, when to park, how long you can park – why do we still have meters up if no one is being charged at the meters? Why is there not signage up (so) that people know that they don’t have to pay?”

Shanle noted that “it’s not just going to be a slap up a couple purple signs and, you know, call it a day” when it comes to addressing small business concerns.

Higgins said that parking should not be a chief concern for business owners or patrons in the heart of Springfield. “There’s plenty of parking downtown. It might not be within two parking spots of your store, but maybe people can walk,” he said. “Do you have a problem walking in Paris? No, because there’s plenty of stuff to see and look at.”

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Editor’s note: A previous version of this story referenced Rasing’s comments incorrectly about the 529 S. Seventh St. building. A state or federal government agency will occupy the building, though it is not clear which level of government.

This article appears in September 25-October 1, 2025.