Harbor Town, Memphis
Harbor Town is an upscale, new urbanist style neighborhood in Memphis, Tennessee. Harbor Town sits atop 132 acres on a sandbar known as Mud Island. The neighborhood emphasizes the human, not the automobile and interaction between neighbors is encouraged. It was the collaborative effort of Memphis native and downtown developer Henry Turley, RTKL of Baltimore, Looney, Ricks and Kiss architectural firm from Memphis and consultant, Tony Bologna. They made a simple book that plainly told "do this and don't do that"- development guidelines that would grow Harbor town into the kind of community now known as New Urbanism. Today, Harbor Town is dense and walkable, offering traditional row houses, contemporary homes, apartments, shops, restaurants, schools, parks and a marina. It is much studied by city planners from all over the world. Today the trees are mature, the cars are tucked away into alleys behind houses, the river beckons and the downtown core is a stones throw away.
Geography
Harbor Town is located just northwest of Downtown Memphis, Tennessee on Mud Island along the Mississippi River.
Businesses
Harbor Town is home to the upscale, European-style 28 room boutique hotel called the River Inn which houses the much acclaimed romantic restaurant, Paulette's, a year-round rooftop bar and restaurant overlooking the Mississippi River called "Terrace', and a casual neighborhood bar and grill named 'Tugs'. Also on the island is an upscale, pantry style grocery store, Miss Cordelia's, which is similar to a Trader Joe's or Whole Foods, but on a smaller scale. There is a full service spa, a dry cleaners, a wonderful coffee shop called "The Eclectic", a women's clothing store called "The Ivory closet", the "Nail Bar" which offers a glass of wine with a mani-pedi,' 'Happy Days' dry cleaning, a pizza restaurant known as 'Movie and Pizza', a full service doctors office called 'The Harbor of Heath' with an adjoining gym. A Montessori school is located in Harbor Town where children can go until age 13. There is a foreign language emersion day care center were children learn Spanish. There is a marina with slips that can be both owned and rented.
Mississippi River Flood of 2011
In May 2011, Harbor Town was closed to everyone except for residents for a short period of time due to the Mississippi River being well over 10 feet above flood stage. This provided an evacuation route in the event Mud Island had to be evacuated, especially since Mud Island Drive (the road to the north of Harbor Town) was flooded and left only one other road accessible. Some homes along the Wolf River Harbor did have to be evacuated due to the flood but no major damage was reported.
Notable residents
Among Harbor Town's current and former residents are politicians Harold Ford, Jr., Harold Ford,Sr., Lewis Unglesby, and Myron Lowery. There are many former and current Memphis Grizzlies players and coaches, including Shane Battier, Brian Cardinal, Jake Tsakalaidis, Dahntay Jones and past Grizzlies Head Coaches Marc Iavaroni, Hubie Brown and Mike Fratello. Also, either present or past residents include Wayne Jackson of the musical and sessions group The Memphis Horns, French opera singer, Marie Stephane Bernard and Local entrprenuer Dean Jernigan.
See also
References
External links
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Coordinates: 35°10′17″N 90°03′05″W / 35.1714°N 90.0514°W