Twenty-First Century (2000-2014)
Downtown Makes a Comeback
One of the biggest successes of the 2000s was the re-location of Fort Wayne’s minor league baseball team, the Wizards (now called the TinCaps), from Memorial Field in a relatively suburban area to a brand new facility in the downtown area named Parkview Field. The momentum for a new stadium had been fueled by a public-private partnership between the City and the team, and its construction has helped revitalize a section of downtown that also includes the state-of-the-art Allen County Public Library nearby [25].
The main library is just one block away and underwent major renovations in the mid-2000s, expanding from 240,000 square feet to 367,000 square feet [4, p. 146]. In 2000, the expansion of the main library had been mentioned as one of the critical elements in the City’s Economic Development Action Plan for the continued improvement of downtown Fort Wayne and the entire Northeast Indiana region [17, p. 10]. In September 2013, it was announced that a new major headquarters for Ash Brokerage and an accompanying residential tower would be built in the downtown area, representing almost $71 million in new investment [11]. A rendering of the proposed development can be seen at the bottom right. This initiative, along with other successful downtown projects, have reoriented Fort Wayne away from a potential status as a declining Rust Belt city, toward a more positive status as a successful place to do business in a variety of industry sectors. New Economic and Political Realities
Today, the Fort Wayne regional economy is defined by a mix of new manufacturing and service-based facilities. The two largest employers in the region are the Parkview Health and Lutheran Health hospital networks, while three of the six largest employers (General Motors, Steel Dynamics Inc., and BFGoodrich) are based in the manufacturing sector [32]. During the 2000s, the City and County governments also appear to be more cooperative than in past decades, demonstrated by their cooperation in the creation of their first-ever joint comprehensive plan called “Plan-it Allen!” in 2007; the plan combined recommendations for topics such as future land use and services across both the City and the County [34].
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