KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Knoxville City Council voted on Tuesday to take the next steps on a project to improve areas of Washington Pike.
The Washington Pike Roadway Project extends from I-640 to Murphy Road, near New harvest Park and a shopping center. City council approved a resolution that pays $695,400 for Johnson, Mirmiran and Thompson, Inc. to provide right-of-way acquisition, relocation, appraisal, appraisal review and other services for the project.
By the end of the project, the city hopes to widen the road and build a shared use path, or sidewalk with landscape buffers, on both sides of the road. The city needs to acquire right-of-way and easements as part of the project. According to documents from the city, the project is federally funded and will need to be done within guidelines by TDOT Local Programs.
The city also approved a request to add an honorary name to a previously unnamed road stretching from Blackstock Avenue to Ramsey Street. The honorary name, "Asylum Avenue District," is an homage to the original location of the Tennessee School for the Deaf. The school's original name included the term "asylum."
"[It's] being proposed to receive the Honorary designation 'Asylum District' since this is an area that would have been very near the original designated Asylum Avenue and would have been an area with folks like being associated in some way to the old Asylum," the application for the name said.
A building that once hosted "The International" and "The Concourse" is centered in the the location of the "Asylum Avenue District." It was bought in 2022 by a developer who said he hopes to gradually build up the area, hosting entertainment and artists.