HISTORIC PRESERVATION

Mobile, Alabama

The Avenue Heritage District Plan

“The Avenue” was the key spine of Mobile’s Black Downtown between the late-19th and mid-20th centuries. Reaching its peak during the 1950s, the unintended economic harm of desegregation and widespread demolition as part of the federal Urban Renewal program caused the area to severely decline. The Walker Collaborative (TWC) was hired to lead a diverse team of seven subconsultant firms to prepare a plan to preserve and revitalize the area, and to create a heritage tourism destination.

SEE MORE PROJECTS

One objective was to leverage the national publicity of Mobile’s Africatown, which was established in 1865 by enslaved people brought to the area in 1860 on the recently-discovered slave ship Clotilda.

Recommendations included:

• Designation of a core “Gateway Area,” a broader “District,” and peripheral sites.

• Development of an Interpretive Center as the main anchor of the Gateway Area.

• Redesign and redevelopment of the segment of MLK Avenue within the Gateway Area.

• Rehabilitation of key buildings such as the ILA Hall and the Ace Theatre.

• Infill retail development at specific small sites that are part of existing developments.

• Creative interpretation, public art, branding, and promotion of the District.

“A Celebrated Main Street is Reimagined and Reinvigorated”

PLANNING, American Planning Association • Spring 2025

A Mobile, Alabama, plan offers lessons for fostering growth in downtown areas that once served as the economic, social, and cultural hubs for African American communities. Eric Finley, a Mobile native with deep family roots, loves his community and he tells anyone who will listen. In fact, as tour director of the Dora Franklin Finley African-American Heritage Trail (Dora is Eric’s late cousin), that is his job. He proudly tells visitors that the first Mardi Gras ever held in today’s U.S. occurred in Mobile in 1703, 15 years before New Orleans was even founded…