With the kickoff of the Regal Celebration of Lights last month, Alstom’s Holidays on Ice rink on Market Square up and running, and the WIVK/Fowlers Christmas Parade drawing the usual throng to downtown, it is—as the song goes—(insert corporate sponsor ...

A couple of years back, I found a full book of blank parking tickets on the sidewalk. My dark side said to keep it and dole out various citations of my own design to vehicles I deemed deserving. I fantasized ...

Some of our robots are going to retire next month. Back in September, the News Sentinel reported that—due to a screw-up on the part of FedEx—Redflex, the company that operates the much-maligned red-light cameras around town, lost its contract. It ...

It’s that season again. Fall is in the air, it’s football time in Tennessee, and it’s that special month when the city and county issue their annual property tax statements. Both arrived in my mailbox on the same day a ...

A few months back, I wrote a piece about what area I considered to be my neighborhood—what I regard as downtown proper. In that column, I touched on another term: community. But I didn’t give it its fair due. The ...

A few weeks back, I noticed an AT&T truck parked on the sidewalk outside the Crystal Building on Union Avenue with the obligatory orange cones flanking it. It was occupying nearly the entire width of the walk, leaving barely enough ...

Years ago, behind a plate glass window on Gay Street, a lanky cowboy astride a bucking horse was neatly tucked away. The near life-sized bronze statue by Frederic Remington entitled “The Bronco Buster” is among his most famous. And as ...

Shot of Urban by Michael Haynes: The City of Knoxville is on a roll these days toward reconnecting and, in some ways, expanding our center city. The South Knoxville Waterfront Action Plan, the Cumberland Avenue Corridor Plan, and the Downtown ...

Shot of Urban by Michael Haynes: I hear that one a lot. There are quite a few topics, among folks who live or spend a significant amount of time downtown, that come up over and over again. Many of them ...

Shot of Urban by Michael Haynes: I was talking with a friend of mine the other day who is considering moving downtown. Like a lot of my neighbors and neighbors-to-be, his life has changed. Priorities, like a house large enough ...

Shot of Urban by Michael Haynes: When I first was approached about doing this column, it was couched as a view of downtown from the perspective of someone who lives here—someone from the neighborhood. There’s plenty of commentary on our ...

Shot of Urban by Michael Haynes: On our way to Krutch Park the other day, the dogs and I passed two couples studying the map at the trolley stop on Union Avenue. On the way back, they were still lingering ...

Michael Haynes observes the high drama and low comedy of street parking.

Shot of Urban by Michael Haynes The last few years have brought a lot of life back to downtown. Some of us remember the first Sundown in the City as something we needed to “get out and support” for the ...

Shot of Urban: Some things don’t belong on the sidewalk. Litter, sleeping drunks, and dog poop, for example. Then there are things that do. You expect them. Mailboxes, benches, and newspaper boxes are part of that. They make life better. ...