By the way, if any Nashvillian, or anyone even remotely interested in Nashville's urban development scene has not seen the website for the Nashville Civic Design Center I
HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend you do so. It is such an unbelievably incredible resource to have for the city. Loads of valuable information can be found there. Not even Chicago (that I know of) has something like this just open to the public. You can find all kinds of history, meeting minutes, renderings, figure ground plans etc. etc. etc. etc. there.
Here is the website:
www.civicdesigncenter.org
Talking about the Civic Design Center (which is a physical place downtown), and that website, just put a thought into my head. When I was in Shanghai I went to this absolutely astounding place there called the Shanghai Urban Planning Exhibition Hall. It is such an unbelievable public resource. Essentially it is a huge and incredibly modern interactive museum about the past, present, and future of urban development in the city of Shanghai. I truly believe that if every city had a place like that it would make the entire community truly interested in their community again. Here are a few photos I found on the internet:
Outside shot of the building
A small portion, yes a SMALL portion, of the MASSIVE to scale model of the ENTIRE CITY OF SHANGHAI, which is accurate down to the detail:
A very small picture of one of the history exhibits
These couple of photos cannot even come close to exhibiting how amazing this place is. I stayed there for hours upon hours just exploring all the information. Just think if Nashville had a place like this, where the public could come, and for a small fee, explore the past, present, and future of the city. It would become a tourist destination that would be fun for everyone no matter how old and how interested in urban planning a person is, and make them more interested and in touch with their community as a result.