The Nashville Department of Transportation replaced several popular benches along Korean Veterans Boulevard with large concrete spheres in recent weeks, citing city beautification efforts. Eight metal benches previously stood on the north side of the six-lane downtown street, which was taped off as an active work site as recently as Friday, Aug. 15. All have been removed at the direction of NDOT, following collaboration with the Nashville Downtown Partnership and downtown Councilmember Jacob Kupin.
“Those benches are a vestige of what Korean Veterans Boulevard could have been and what we hope a future East Bank Boulevard will be,” Kupin tells the Scene. “Early in my term, I advocated for these benches to be moved where they would be more useful and used by everybody. KVB is a cut-through — let’s elevate places like Walk of Fame Park and downtown greenways where we can placemake proactively.”
The benches were occupied throughout the day by people resting, sitting and sleeping, often toting belongings like sleeping bags and blankets. As city workers removed the benches last week, others slept in the KVB median and across the street, where several metal benches remain. Kupin says the site’s dedicated use by unhoused people was a consideration in the decision to remove the benches.
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Advocates have accused the city — specifically NDOT director Diana Alarcon — of targeting places where the city’s growing homeless population is most visible. Nashvillian Manaen Hall called into WPLN's This Is Nashville recently to press Mayor Freddie O’Connell on the city’s decision to remove one of the remaining places where unhoused people congregate in downtown Nashville. Hall points out that the city’s Downtown Code design standards prioritize seating, rather than beautification or public art, and discourage the use of hostile architecture like bollards and spikes. Many cities incorporate design choices like spikes and dividers in public areas to deter public sleeping. "I'm going to have to check with NDOT about what's going on there," O'Connell replied.
The city removed the benches “in partnership with” the Nashville Downtown Partnership, a private business coalition that promotes events and tourism in the urban core. The NDP conducts its own law enforcement efforts that included a high-profile spate of arrests in the fall targeting homeless people sleeping outside. NDOT spokesperson Brendan Scully said he did not know the details about who directed the bench removal or who is managing related beautification efforts.
“The department recently began working with the Nashville Downtown Partnership to add more concrete spheres to Korean Veterans Boulevard as part of a public art and beautification project,” Cortnye Stone, NDOT director of strategic communications, wrote in an Aug. 14 email shared with the Scene. “We’re developing a plan to add an artistic element to the spheres and hope to have more information on next steps soon. We’re committed to ensuring public spaces across the city are accessible, functional, clean, and beautiful.”
The sudden bench removal comes after chaotic camp closures and an embattled Office of Homeless Services have led providers and unhoused people to question the city’s ability to address Nashville’s growing unhoused population. As the city struggles to make headway against its housing shortage, Metro has ramped up efforts to erase visible homelessness, a tension that has consistently frustrated nonprofit groups and homelessness advocates.
