Big Ideas to Fix Downtown Santa Barbara, Both Now and in the Long-Term

It’s been all about State Street at City Hall recently. In the past week, the public got a look at the $800,000 consulting firm’s big State Street Master Plan, while the City Council took a look at what could be done immediately to address problems with the downtown promenade.

During last week’s State Street Advisory Committee meeting, city planners and representatives from MIG, Inc. presented the latest “Create State” vision for downtown, which State Street Master Planner Tess Harris said was the culmination of previous input from the committee and feedback from the community during public comments.

State Street’s Big Future

The main takeaway from the Create State concept was the development team’s plan to break State Street into three distinct districts: the Arts District (from Sola to Carrillo), the Civic Core (Carrillo to Ortega, including De la Guerra Plaza and Paseo Nuevo), and Old Town (stretching from Ortega all the way to the Highway 101 undercrossing, connecting downtown and the Funk Zone/waterfront).