This is going to be a sweetheart of a month for visitors and Fort Smith area businesses.

Hotels and restaurants will likely reap the biggest benefits from state high school basketball tournaments being held in Fort Smith and Greenwood.

But let's hope some of the out of towners who haven't been here in awhile take a little time between games to check out some of Fort Smith's new and upcoming downtown attractions. I think they will be surprised.

Within the past year, about $42 million worth of new public buildings, parks and improvements in downtown Fort Smith have been completed, or soon will be. Our busy, new convention center accounts for $33 million of that total, and the new River Park pavilions and grounds another $6 million.

As a friend from Fayetteville said recently as we drove by the new River Park amphitheater, "I didn't know all this was here. I guess I need to get down here a little more often."

The new River Park and its pavilions are getting more and more use as area residents become aware of the availability of the new structures for weddings, meetings, reunions, parties, concerts, fundraising events, and more.

Other downtown improvements nearing completion are the Fort Smith Trolley extension project and construction of a landscaped, public parking lot across from Pendergraft Park (a $750,000 gift to the city from the Ross Pendergraft family), both on Garrison Avenue.

On my way to work each day the last few months I've been watching the parking lot emerge from a huge excavation hole. It has been an interesting process. The attractive pole lamps that will light the lot went up last week and the brick walkways and planters are now in place. The idea is to create an upscale-looking parking area that blends nicely with its lovely neighbor across the Avenue (Pendergraft Park), instead of an unsightly, bare, concrete slab. The lot will provide 176 additional downtown parking spaces.

The trolley track expansion will advance the Garrison Avenue end of the track from the Varsity Grill parking lot onto the Avenue and west to Pendergraft Park – the distance of about a block. The track runs parallel with Garrison and takes up the space of about a dozen parking spaces.

Eventually, the track will continue west from Pendergraft Park toward the Arkansas River bridge then turn east under the bridge and end at the River Park Pavilion. This track extension should serve as a pleasant convenience for folks using the new parking lot while attending events in Harry E. Kelley Park and the River Park amphiteater and pavilions. Although it's only a few blocks to walk from Garrison Avenue to the park areas along the Arkansas River, being able to ride the trolley when you'd rather not walk will be a nice option.

In addition to all of the new and ongoing public works downtown, a couple of new restaurants have recently opened, too. Rolando Cuzco's at the west end of the Avenue, opened last month and chef Rolando's blend of South and North American flavors seem to be attracting a steady flow of customers.

Bollin's Dining Emporium, at 427 Garrison, has reopened under new management – much to the delight of downtowners who missed the restaurant's homestyle-cooking while Bollin's was briefly closed. The Bollin's location has served Fort Smith as a popular restaurant since the 1880s, and was once the landmark eatery, Constantino's.

Even if our out of town visitors to the state basketball tounaments don't get out of the gym much, they will still be getting a daily good look at one of the premier events buildings in the state – the recently opened Stubblefield Center at the University of Arkansas - Fort Smith. And hopefully they will even take a little time to check out the whole UAFS campus, and especially its brand new campus center. The entire campus is one of the brightest jewels in Fort Smith's continued growth and development.

Linda Seubold, editor of Entertainment Fort Smith Magazine, can be reached at lindaseubold@efortsmith.com. Read her archived columns and articles online.

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