Imagine driving to a University of Evansville basketball game in a purple and orange glow. Or enjoying a green hue on a St. Patrick’s Day trip into Downtown. Evansville soon will join other cities with vivid illumination at Downtown entrance points. New lighting is planned beneath Lloyd Expressway overpasses at Fulton Avenue, First Avenue, Main Street, and Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard.
The lights can be set for any purpose, from red and green for Christmas to pink for breast cancer awareness. They can be “any kind of color scheme we want,” says Joshua Armstrong, president of the Downtown Economic Improvement District.
“The impetus for the project was asking, how can we beautify and create connections under a barrier in our city, the Lloyd Expressway,” Armstrong says, “and when doing that, how do we work through the constraints of the structure itself and add the amenity of light where none currently exists.”
The planned lighting “will create a safe environment for motorists and pedestrians, add evening intrigue, and make it a more attractive place,” he says.
The project’s timeline depends on approvals of funding and a contract. In November, the “Bright Nights in Southwest Indiana” project was granted $125,000 from the state’s Regional Economic and Acceleration Development Initiative program, or READI, for short.
Other funding will come from City of Evansville sources. The city’s Redevelopment Commission soon will release a request for proposals to install the new lighting and its required infrastructure.
