TAM and Tacoma Sign MOA on Streetscape Partnership

On January 5th the City Council heard the first City Manager report of 2012. One item included in the report was a Memorandum of Agreement between the Tacoma Art Museum and the City, regarding TAM plans to develop “crossover” areas in front of the Museum, concurrent with the City’s Pacific Avenue Streetscape project. The MOA clarifies the cooperative arrangement on financial and planning aspects that will be necessary as the projects move forward.

Both TAM and the City will continue to cooperate with each other so that the design of their respective improvements and that of the Streetscape in general, will be compatible and reciprocally well integrated with each other’s improvements and with other public improvements made on Pacific Avenue (7th to 17th), Hood Street and in the general vicinity of the Museum.

The City is due to award construction contracts for Phase 1 of the streetscape this spring (Pacific Avenue between 7th and 17th), with construction forecast to wrap up by the end of 2012. A schedule has not yet been posted for Phase 2, which will include improvements to the Hood Street alignment, Prairie Line Trail and Tollefson Plaza. TAM’s property is situated at the southern most end of Phase 1, with Phase 2 including Tollefson Plaza, directly across the street.

The City’s financial commitment in the MOA will be subject to Council approval, and to the City’s ability to raise grant and other funding to pay for the construction of the crossover improvements, estimated at $400,000. The City will only reimburse improvements that are both constructed in the City right-of-way, and that would ordinarily be paid for by the City directly. These might include sidewalks, curbs, gutters, and of course, the hottest design element of the 2011-12 biennium, rain gardens.

We’re looking forward to seeing the results of this partnership.

Read more on the City’s Pacific Avenue Streetscape project.