Opinion: Vacant lot inspires far-fetched ideas

My favorite section of Spring-field Business Journal’s Daily Update e-newsletter is the SBJ Online Poll. It makes me feel important to answer weighty questions, like I’m a key participant in the hunt for some sort of crucial solution.

Or it could be because I spent a long career in radio where I was legally prohibited from participating in various surveys that measured audience size. Responding to polls without fear of reprisal is a great emancipation, so I tend to dive into them with relish. I may be the one person responsible for keeping places like Gee’s East Wind Restaurant in contention for Best Cashew Chicken, even though they’ve been closed a number of years. The people who review the “Best of” ballots at Springfield News-Leader and 417 Magazine probably think I’m several pins shy of a spare – but that’s OK. I’m just exercising my right to give my opinion.

This week’s SBJ Online Poll snagged me. What should we do with that 1.7-acre site between the Springfield Expo Center and Jordan Valley Car Park? Umm.

If you haven’t driven by to study this site, in the 800 block of St. Louis Street, you should. It’s the proverbial “vacant lot,” and looks so dismal and creepy one could almost imagine tumbleweeds blowing across it the day after Armageddon. It really needs something.

Here’s my Top 10 things to put there:

10. SMSU. A lot of us continue to call Missouri State University SMSU or, it’s abbreviate, SMS. When we do this, we generally choke, stutter and sputter, spending an incredible amount of time trying to correct our mistake. To save time and embarrassment, we should relocate the old Hammons Student Center or Craig Hall to this site and call it Southwest Missouri Sanskrit Union.

9. The world’s largest Starbucks. This would likely become a real tourist trap.

8. Didn’t I read that the old Southwest Regional Stockyards closed? Here’s where a new one can go.

7. The next new location for Skinny Improv. The troupe will soon swell to more than 6,000 wise-cracking members.

6. What we really need is a centrally located UFO Landing and Refueling Site.

5. Askinosie Ice Cream Plant. Chances are that Shawn Askinosie will be looking for a site for his Askinosie Ice Cream Plant to complement Askinosie Chocolate, which will likely open by the next millennium.

4. My kids would like to see a 1.7-acre trampoline built on this site, please.

3. This is a perfect spot for a gigantic ticket-scalping operation or a sawmill.

2. John Q’s Bar-B-Q Commissary and Casino.

1. Monument to survivors of the Great Ice Storm of ’07. Anyone care to donate a generator?

Some, uh, honorable mentions: a drive-in movie theater that can double as a driving range, Springfield Underground Part II, drag strip, worm farm, Gary Ellison Ragtime Theater or, as a cheap fix, a wooden façade of the arena originally designated for the site. In honor of the TV show that will never go away, how about the American Idol Museum? No, the AI Museum belongs in Branson.

Bob May is a sales and marketing consultant and writes for various publications. He can be reached at spiffsdad@aol.com.[[In-content Ad]]