MYRTLE BEACH, SC (WBTW) – Visitors to downtown Myrtle Beach could soon be greeted by new electronic billboards and signs.
City leaders want to turn more than 400 acres into a new Broadway Entertainment District.
It would run from Oak Street, to destinations across Highway 17, from 21st Avenue North to 29th Avenue North.
It’s part of bigger push the city wants to make for a more pedestrian friendly downtown.
“What we’d like to do is make Myrtle Beach more walkable and more rideable,” said Carol Coleman, the director of planning for the city.
Coleman says the plan to create an entertainment district is part of that bigger push.
“We’d like to create a walkable route to get to one side of Grissom to the other; so where the city has venues on one side, then people would be able to walk to Broadway at the Beach and see whats there,” said Coleman.
Coleman says visitors in town for an event at the Convention Center may not know about attractions nearby.
“It’ll help people find the places they want to go to and by creating this district it will make it more sign friendly,” she said.
“For the tourists its definitely needed they want to walk through the city of Myrtle Beach and see what we have to offer,” said Christina Lazarus, the marketing director at Broadway Grand Prix. which would be part of the new entertainment center.
“Its going to be huge for us, because all Broadway is doing is bringing in families and we’re a family theme park,” said Lazarus.
Burroughs & Chapin is currently spending more than $50 million on renovations to Broadway at the Beach and the city saw an opportunity to team up with them.
“We thought this is a great opportunity to create one single entertainment district and identify all of these different venues that could benefit from this,” said Coleman.
The plan to create a Broadway Entertainment District comes in two parts, the first is would allow the city to create overlay districts to brand areas with common elements.
“Such as historic or cultural or anything else,” explained Coleman.
Then it’s establishing the entertainment district itself, which would encompass Broadway at the Beach, the Convention Center, a proposed amphitheater as well as the Pelicans stadium, Grand Prix Racing and the Hollywood Wax Museum.
New signs both traditional and digital would be place to designate the area and point visitors towards all the different destinations.
The city planning commission will review the plan before it goes back to city council for further action, which should happen in April.
