Heart of Carson City picks up the beat

While its focus has rarely been anywhere else, we're glad to see Carson City's Redevelopment Authority pulling the attention of residents to efforts to enliven downtown for business.

A couple of ideas mentioned last week were a multi-screen movie complex somewhere downtown and bringing a concert series to the Pony Express Pavilion at Mills Park.

Both fit the concept of drawing crowds to the city's core, where they presumably would spend some dollars in the other businesses.

Spurred by the Redevelopment Authority, downtown Carson City has been on a long, slow climb toward respectability for the past half-dozen years. The city, using property tax dollars collected in the redevelopment district, helped make it attractive for private investment.

Although there are still some holes, and surviving as a business can remain a struggle downtown, the strategy largely is working. Restoration of the Ormsby House will mark a major milestone in its rejuvenation, and we look forward to the day the Unlucky Spur becomes something other than an eyesore.

Telegraph Square is providing a great template for the image of downtown, expansion at Garibaldi's restaurant is a positive sign, facelifts on several buildings, addition of the Nevada State Museum's annex, to name a few -- the list of good things happening in recent years is getting to be lengthy.

Concerts at the Pony Express Pavilion, if that comes to pass, would be a reminder that downtown Carson City also turns east along William Street, an area that sometimes gets neglected.

Over the last couple of years, it may have seemed that Carson City's southern, northern and eastern extremities were getting all the action. There's no denying the importance to the city's economy of those shopping centers and developments.

But the heart of the city needs to remain strong and highly visible, for residents and visitors alike. Therein lies both Carson's past and its future.