Cordish Cos. Field Waterside Questions From City Council

At today's regular session meeting for the Norfolk City Council, the Cordish Companies reviewed their plan and answered questions on their proposal for Waterside.  This proposal was recommended about a month ago to City Council by City Manager Marcus Jones.  

Tune in at the 17:00 mark of the video for a general Waterside overview given by the consultants (followed by a Q&A) and then 1:25:30 for the proposal by Cordish (followed by a Q&A).  Get comfortable, because it's a long one.

The $30 million plan (mostly privately-funded) involves using the existing structure and knocking out portions the front and rear walls and replacing them with glass.  This would open up a view of the Elizabeth River from Waterside Drive.  The entertainment venue would include about a dozen new chain restaurants, a marketplace selling items unique to the Hampton Roads area, and an entertainment venue. The location would be reopened as "Waterside Live."

One of the key take-aways from this video is that City Council is looking at developing the entire waterfront all the way to Harbor Park.  It is refreshing to see that they're thinking big picture and see Waterside as the first step in this.

UPDATE:  The Virginia Pilot ran a story on this meeting basically saying that after listening to Cordish, City Council may be more prepared to move forward on this in the more immediate future.