Scott Zerbe refuses to move his Forbes Avenue jewelry store aside for a new Downtown. I'd have to start over somewhere. This place is established.
People know where to go.
But the futures of Alvin's Jewelry and dozens of other small businesses at the heart of the Golden Triangle are now in the hands of Mayor Murphy and a Chicago company called Urban Retail Properties. Together, they want to inject new life into the city by demolishing buildings along Fifth and Forbes avenues and replacing them with block after block of street-level retail, restaurants and movie theaters. The businesses that remain as part of the project would be temporarily relocated, with the agreement that they move back into refurbished or new space. The buildings on Market Square may be spared from the wrecking ball, Murphy said, but the rest of the district could be razed, according to Mulugetta Birru, executive director of the Urban Redevelopment Authority. To keep the historical value of certain properties, some facades would be saved and incorporated into the new development, Birru said.