Mayor Kincannon, 6th District City Council member Gwen McKenzie, City staff and construction project partners cut a ribbon on May 10, 2022, celebrating completion of a $5.5 million investment that improved access to and connectivity within the underdeveloped North Knoxville commercial corridor.



In summer 2020, work began on the City's I-275 Business Park Access Improvements Project, which was 80 percent federal funded.

The upgrades and street infrastructure redesign amounted to a major overhaul, and the intent was to open up the roughly 60-acre corridor to encourage new business investment, which will create jobs.

Now, the work is mostly finished. Crews with Jones Brothers Contractors built a 1,100-foot-long extension of Blackstock Avenue, connecting West Fifth Avenue and Bernard Avenue. 

A 1,600-foot-long section of Marion Street between Bernard and Baxter avenues was improved, along with a 650-foot-long section of Baxter, between I-275 and the railroad tracks by Second Creek. 

Marion was realigned from Dameron Avenue to Baxter Avenue, and the intersections of Fifth Avenue and Blackstock Avenue, Marion Street and Bernard Avenue, and Marion Street and Baxter Avenue were also upgraded.

The new Marion Street features two 11-foot-wide lanes, with stormwater infrastructure, 5-foot-wide sidewalks and a 10-foot multipurpose trail from West Fifth Avenue to Bernard Avenue.

City officials noted that this corridor has numerous vacant tracts and is strategically located next to an interstate and close to the heart of downtown. 

It’s been underdeveloped for decades, largely due to the previous poor street connectivity. The original street pattern wasn’t conducive to through traffic, and it was difficult previously for commercial trucks to get in and out of the corridor. 

The straightened, connected and widened streets create modernized access to the commercially-zoned properties bounded by Second Creek, I-275, Baxter Avenue and Fifth Avenue.