The City of Knoxville will hold a public meeting to discuss plans for the new downtown dog park at 5:30 p.m. on Wednesday, October 1.

The meeting will be in the main gallery of the Emporium Building at 100 S. Gay Street.

The dog park will be located on a section of green space at the southeast corner of the intersection of Summit Hill and Central Avenue. The city hosted a public meeting in November to give downtown residents an opportunity to help brainstorm how the park should be developed. Since then, the city has been working with the East Tennessee Community Design Center to develop a conceptual design concept. 

"We're excited to show off the draft design and see what people think," said Madeleine Weil, Deputy Director of Policy & Communications.

The city began exploring the idea of creating the park because of the growing number of downtown residents who have dogs and wanted a nearby location where they could take them off the leash. PetSafe (an affiliate of Radio Systems Corporation, which is headquartered in Knoxville) is providing funding for the downtown dog park as one of their efforts to make Knoxville and Knox County the most pet-friendly community in the country.