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Maplehurst: the end may be nigh
Posted By katie allison granju
In case you aren’t familiar with it, Maplehurst is one of Knoxville’s hidden gems of an urban neighborhood, tucked away between the UT campus and downtown, with gorgeous water views and beautiful old buildings. I have a special fondness for it because my husband was living there - in a really cool apartment - when we met.
But like too much of historic Knoxville, particularly in and around UT, Maplehurts is threatened by seemingly thoughtless, plan-less development, as explained in this feature by Rick Greene in Knoxville Voice.
Maplehurst, or at least what’s left of it, remains one of Knoxville’s most unique residential neighborhoods, though it’s idyllic heyday as a bohemian artists’ enclave is becoming an ever-fading memory for some former and current residents.
They fear a development company is allowing properties to languish amid delayed plans for the construction of luxury condominiums that have been in limbo for seven years. At least one project has been abandoned altogether and another slated for construction earlier this year now won’t see ground broken until 2009….
Gameday, which has similar developments near university campuses in Athens, Ga., Tuscaloosa, Ala., Auburn, Ala. and Tallahassee, Fla., backed out of its involvement in 2006 with The Gameday Center condominiums, a renovated apartment building at 1004 Gameday Way. Originally marketed as the Phillip Fulmer Building, developers originally envisioned the Gameday Center as a partnership between Gameday and the University of Tennessee, but the university opted out of the agreement. The building remains mostly unoccupied, leaving behind several angry owners upset by Gameday’s lack of commitment to the property. Gameday’s Web site still bears UT Athletic Director Mike Hamilton’s endorsement of the project, as well as a link to enter an outdated contest to win an autographed football or helmet from Fulmer.
Meanwhile, Gameday sold its Maplehurst Court properties, as well as the Phillip Fulmer building, in 2006 to Atlanta-based Mountain River Associates. Gameday’s former properties are currently managed by Place Properties, also based in Atlanta.
The exact nature of the relationship between Gameday Centers and Mountain River Associates is unclear. City property listings show that Mountain River Associates and Gameday both share the same Atlanta address, and no telephone listings exist for either Mountain River’s Atlanta or Auburn, Ala., offices. Attempts by Knoxville Voice to reach both Mountain River Associates and Gameday were unsuccessful.
Place Property’s on-site business manager Cathie Bleyler says the she is not sure why Gameday decided to sell its properties in Maplehurst to Mountain River Associates.
“[Former Gameday CEO Gary Spillers] is no longer with them, so I have a feeling that they have some internal situations that need to be taken care of,” Bleyler speculates. Though Spillers was terminated from Gameday in November 2006, a recent article in the News Sentinel reported that Spillers has a “small ownership interest” in Mountain River Associates.
Maplehurst’s collection of Spanish, tudor and colonial designs remains one of Knoxville’s most distinctive residential neighborhoods and still attracts a diverse mix of artistically minded residents, though the number of residents living in the neighborhood has drastically decreased since Gameday’s involvement.
Artist Cynthia Markert first moved to Maplehurst’s Swann Building in 1981, a six-story former hotel at the cul-de-sac on Maplehurst Court owned by Kristopher Kendrick. Markert left Knoxville to live in Washington, D.C., for eight years but was eventually drawn back to the neighborhood’s combination of offbeat appeal and affordability.
“It’s fantastic,” says Markert. “It’s so weird that poor people can live here. In other cities, it would have been developed.”
She has witnessed first-hand the effect Gameday’s involvement has had on the neighborhood that she has called home for so many years. “Gameday came in, and they just stocked the place up with, to me, a little too much testosterone,” she says. “It’s like it was kegs of beer and parties all the time and fights outside.”
Buildings purchased by developers remain in disrepair and, as a result, are in dire need of attention. Photos by Josh Wolff / Knoxville VoiceSeveral Gameday properties in Maplehurst now sit empty, suffering from neglect and, at times, left easily accessible to trespassers. “I think the real intention is to let everything get [blighted] and to justify them mowing them down and put up nice condos for rich people,” she says.
Dec 22nd, 2007
