Indio Downtown Specific Plan Adopted

At their April 15 meeting, the Indio City Council unanimously approved the new Downtown Specific Plan. Starting in 2018 with a partial draft plan begun by others, STP worked closely with City staff and the community to clarify the vision for a revitalized and expanded Downtown, and crafted a form-based code with customized development standards and design guidelines for infill commercial, mixed-use and residential development, and for a safe, comfortable, human-scale network of walkable streets and attractive community gathering spaces.  A top priority of the plan – established as part of the recently adopted General Plan Update, for which STP led the urban design vision work from 2017 to 2019 – was “putting Downtown back on the map”, re-establishing strong gateways from Highway 111, Indio Boulevard, and Jackson Street, which bound and provide primary access to the Downtown.  The historic Downtown is part of a larger envisioned City Center that includes the Midtown District to west on “Boulevard 111”, to which old Highway 111 is envisioned to evolve.