When tourism expert Roger Brooks suggested at recent meeting that downtown Rapid City create a public square with a large fountain, possibly at Sixth and Main streets, Councilwoman Karen Gundersen Olson thought the proposal sounded familiar.

Not long ago, she had seen just such a design created by Sam Chapman, a North Dakota State University landscape architecture student from Rapid City. "There's some logic that more than one person would think of that," she said.

Indeed, there are a lot of similarities, and some key differences, between Roger Brooks' and Sam Chapman's ideas for downtown Rapid City.

Chapman's elaborate drawings outline three downtown plazas - at Seventh and Quincy, at Sixth and Main and at Sixth and Omaha streets - tied together by similarly landscaped streets running north to south through the middle of downtown Rapid City. His plan would also lower Omaha street to allow a ground-level pedestrian bridge across to Memorial Park.

"My idea was to tie the whole city (center) together," Chapman said in a telephone interview from San Francisco.

He graduated from NDSU in 2006 with a double major in landscape architecture and environmental design. He works for EDAW, an international landscape architecture, planning and urban design firm.

From a pedestrian standpoint, Chapman said, Memorial Park is effectively detached from downtown Rapid City.

They are separated by Omaha Street, a six- to eight-lane road with almost no pedestrian-friendly crossings. "Omaha Street is a disaster," he said.

Gunderson Olson agrees that Omaha Street could be more pedestrian friendly. She said city officials are looking at several ideas to bridge the downtown and the park. But she is skeptical that Omaha Street could be lowered to allow a ground-level bridge.

Roger Brooks also noted the Omaha Street divide. He called it the Great Wall of China.

Brooks and his company, Destination Development, were hired by the Rapid City Convention & Visitors Bureau and several area businesses to help the city come up with a brand identity that would separate it from other Midwestern and Western cities trying to attract tourists.

Brooks' proposal, which is still being finalized, calls for building a Rapid City brand around a downtown arts-and-entertainment district.

At the center of the district, he suggested, a town square with a large, flashy fountain would draw locals and tourists alike.

His $52,000 project would include logos, advertising themes, street signs and other ways to bring the arts-and-entertainment brand into the public consciousness.

Sam Chapman did his project without pay. A 2000 graduate of Stevens High School, he was looking for a senior thesis project in the NDSU landscape architecture program. His mother, Rapid City Public Library Director Greta Chapman, suggested downtown Rapid City.

Beginning in September 2005, Chapman measured buildings, drew plans, met with city officials and talked to downtown business owners. He finished the project in May 2006.

The Sun Plaza

Chapman calls the plaza at Sixth and Main streets the heart of his project. It stands at the crossroads of Rapid City, and it would be natural gathering place. And like Brooks, Chapman believes the plaza would be a good place for a summer farmers market.

"It really stared out with the idea of Rapid City as a diverse city with lots of culture," he said. His reading about Lakota culture convinced him that it would be a mistake to rip off Lakota cultural symbols and art designs. So he came up with a more universal design scheme based on the sun, with elements of wind and water.

The water, however, would be a meandering stream that runs the length of the square, rather than a lighted fountain.

The water feature would serve three purposes. The sound of running water would block out the traffic noise from Main Street. It would take storm-water runoff from downtown and let it percolate into the soil.

The park would be filled with aspen trees to provide a seasonal variety of colors, highlight the sound of wind and give the park a light and airy feel. Aspens would also allow a clear view from outside the park. "If you close it off too much, you get unwanted activity," he said.

Like Brooks, Chapman proposes adding a third floor to the existing parking structure to recap the parking places that would be lost to the plaza.

However, he disagrees with Brooks' suggestion that existing buildings on the block could be torn out to make a larger park. Chapman insisted the parking lot area is large enough - and the downtown architecture is too important to tear down.

Chapman described two other features of his plan:

Fifth Street Plaza

It's actually on Seventh Street, but this plaza would stand between Dahl Arts Center and the Rapid City Public Library.

The one-block section of Seventh Street would be closed to automobile traffic. Chapman said his research showed that most of the automobiles on that street are headed to the library, the Dahl or First United Methodist Church. It wouldn't disrupt vehicle traffic to close it, Chapman said.

The plaza would be centered by a large outdoor amphitheater. He said the Dahl could stage music, plays and other events. The library and the church could also use the public space.

Pedestrian Overpass

The intersection of Sixth and Omaha would look a lot like a plaza. Chapman would build a pedestrian-friendly area with trees, benches, sidewalks and a pedestrian bridge that would connect downtown to the city bike-path system that threads through Memorial Park.

Vehicle traffic would be restricted to one lane, turning right.

Omaha Street was newly rebuilt in the past five years, and it is unlikely the Department of Transportation would come back to redesign it so soon.

Chapman's senior thesis was vetted by his professors and colleagues at NDSU during the process. His primary thesis critic, professor Catherine Wiley, had many questions and concerns.

"The more we debated, the better the design got," he said.

In the end, Chapman's project won the Dennis C. Colliton Memorial Award as the class's best design thesis.

At the time, city officials, including Karen Gundersen Olson, reviewed the project and found promise as well as problems.

Gunderson Olson said last week that Chapman's proposal, like the Roger Brooks proposal, is a good way to advance the dialog about downtown Rapid City.

"I'm still looking for the perfect idea," Gunderson Olson said.

"But I think the more ideas we have on the table, the more likely we are to come up with something that is unique to Rapid City and really does serve the purposes that we have."

Contact Dan Daly at 394-8421 or dan.daly@rapidcityjournal.com