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HUNTSVILLE, Alabama — Mayor Tommy Battle wants your ideas for making downtown Huntsville more fun.

On Friday, Battle announced plans for an upcoming “Downtown Ideas Summit” to hear what new restaurants, stores and other activities people would like to see in the city center.

The event is scheduled for 6 p.m. July 21 at the Big Spring Partners office on the courthouse square. Big Spring Partners is a nonprofit group focused on downtown revitalization.

“It’s time that we turned our efforts toward the heart of our city,” Battle said. “We’re looking for ideas for downtown: what to do, where to go .. and how to make our downtown a better place.”

You can submit your ideas through an interactive map on the city’s website, huntsvilleal.gov/downtownideas/, or via a new Facebook page, “Bright Ideas: Downtown Huntsville.”

The city also plans to place a chalkboard on various downtown street corners over the next few weeks where passersby can write their suggestions.

About two-dozen ideas have already been submitted, including a new downtown baseball park next to the Von Braun Center, an indoor farmer’s market on Dallas Avenue and more street musicians.

Earlier this year, the mayor’s office hosted a summit on retail growth that generated about 1,000 ideas from the public. Battle said the city’s economic development team is using that information to court in-demand stores and restaurants such as Trader Joe’s and Cheesecake Factory.

“When you can say, ‘You have a ready-made market here in Huntsville,’ it really helps,” he said

Four summer interns in the mayor’s office – Jessica Carlton, Ted Gillespie, Ryan McArthur and Kyle Tipton — are overseeing the downtown ideas effort.

Jazzing up downtown has been a top priority for Battle and was also high on the radar of his predecessor, Loretta Spencer.

There are still more empty storefronts downtown than city leaders would like, but 2011 has brought a surge of redevelopment activity.

A new SpringHill Suites opened behind the VBC about a month ago, and Chef James Boyce’s latest eatery, James Steakhouse, is now up and running in the former Chophouse location.

Next month, husband-and-wife developers Charlie and Sasha Sealy are expected to begin converting the old Belk department store on Washington Street into 75 loft apartments.

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