A shipping container district is currently being constructed along Little Rock’s West Ninth Street, the beginning of a month-long throwback that aims to honor the entrepreneurial past of the historic street.
The shipping container district is part of Beyond the Divide: Reconnecting W. 9th Street to the Hearts of Little Rock. The area served as a cultural and business hub for Little Rock’s Black community around the early to mid-20th century, until the construction of Interstate 630 displaced the community.
The 22 shipping containers will perch in the green space across the street from The Hall, a concert venue. The containers will serve as temporary homes for Black-owned businesses from April 1 through April 30, and possibly beyond. The containers will allow for up to 20 or more small businesses to operate there and will eventually be painted by local artists, students from the Little Rock School District and community members.
Six more containers will be placed along West Ninth Street as part of a road diet design by the Little Rock Public Works Department to slim the road down so that drivers go slower, making the area safer for pedestrians.
Hugg & Hall Mobile Storage is working on this part of the project, providing the shipping containers and placing them in the appropriate places. Arkansas Graphics owns the land where the shipping containers will remain until around Juneteenth.
Ernest Banks, an architect from studioMAIN who serves as the project lead and designer, said the containers may remain past Juneteenth, depending on public feedback.
“A lot of these containers will be either painted or will have really fun West Ninth Street graphics applied to them to really make it a more lively and fun place for people to experience. So we’re really excited, this is the very beginning of kind of what the modern Black entrepreneurial experience on West Ninth Street could be, similar to what it was in the past,” Banks said.
Vendor applications are still open, but only through Friday, Mar. 6. Depending on how many applications are received, this deadline may be extended.
Vendors chosen to set up shop in the shipping containers will be notified by Friday, Mar. 13.
The Beyond the Divide project’s goal is to show Little Rock residents what it would look like to reconnect Ninth Street, where Black entrepreneurship and life thrived prior to being destroyed in the city’s urban renewal initiatives.
Smart Growth America, a national nonprofit whose mission is to build livable, healthy and strong communities, awarded the city a $45,000 Community Connectors grant in late September to reinvigorate West Ninth Street.
Banks has previously said that he imagines West Ninth Street transforming into a culture-rich, colorful and vibrant street.
In January, project supporters gathered in front of the Arkansas Flag and Banner building, a historic building that once housed the Dreamland Ballroom to paint the street with the Dreamland Ballroom’s diamond logo. Famous and iconic Black musicians such as Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Etta James and many more performed there in its heyday.
Banks said that throughout March and April there will be community days where people can come out and help paint shipping containers, and that in April more road murals like the aforementioned one will be painted as well.
Banks also said that 12 history pavilions will be built along the street where buildings and establishments used to exist, such as Red’s Pool Hall. Visitors to these pavilions will be able to sit and read about the sites’ history.
