A team of local Chattanooga developers broke ground Thursday morning on Station 33, a $130 million development on the Southside set to include shops, a food hall, a pedestrian plaza, condos and a hotel.
Living up to their desire to make Station 33 a place for Chattanoogans to play, the developers kicked off the event by leading the large crowd in the hip-heavy, spinning dance to “Apache (Jump on It)” by The Sugarhill Gang.
“Obviously, everything is gonna be different at Station 33,” said Sam Turnipseed, the project’s chief development officer, as he caught his breath from the stage.
The cleared 5-acre plot at the corner of South Broad and 33rd streets once held a Mexican restaurant and a motel, but has sat vacant for years. At the groundbreaking, elected officials and businesspeople stood on the crumbling tile flooring of the restaurant.
Officials praised the project as the first of its kind for the city — a dense, mixed-use development with multiple buildings on a formerly developed plot. Building that kind of project, known as infill development, has long been a goal of local leaders.