Cleveland's proposed Medical Mart: Neomodernism meets Soviet chic.
It seems the medical trade center bug is spreading like the swine flu these days. Hyperbole aside, you have to wonder how much demand there is for one right here in Nashville—as is being proposed by Dallas-based Market Center Management—when similar projects have been brewing in Cleveland and New York City for years. Though it apparently has the site and the funding, Cleveland's embattled Medical Mart project has been the target of considerable criticism. Besides general doubt about financial viability, the fact that the city wants to combine Medical Mart with a new convention center raises concerns that the mart itself will compete with national convention organizers and discourage them from coming to Cleveland. Nashville Medical Trade Center, which Market Center Management says could open as early as 2010 (yeah, right), is unrelated to Nashville's proposed convention center and is a privately funded project. And at 1.5 million square feet, it would be larger than the 1.2-million-square-foot Music City Center, if it ever gets built. Questions abound: If the Nashville Medical Trade Center has significant exhibit hall space that could be rented out for other trade shows, how would that affect a new downtown convention center? What incentives will the developers expect from the city? Assuming the New York and/or Cleveland projects ever come to fruition, how much demand is there for one-stop shopping for medical supplies, furnishings and technology? If the demand doesn't meet the capacity, which seems likely, won't all three centers and their occupants be forced to undercut each other?
