Richmond Mayor Dwight C. Jones and his economic development staff laid out a new vision for Shockoe Bottom and the Main Street Station Tuesday, proposing a major overhaul of the decrepit train shed behind the station and a focus on Shockoe as Richmond’s creative hub.

But what does the plan mean for small businesses, both in the Bottom and elsewhere in the city?

Jeannie Welliver, project development manager for the city’s office of economic development, walked reporters and area “stakeholders” through the plan in a Tuesday afternoon press conference at the train shed, which like the station, was built in 1901. The city plans to begin a $28 million remodeling project on the shed in June 2012, opening a regional tourism and visitor’s center there by 2014. The ground floor will also be connected with the main lobby of the station, and Franklin Street will be re-opened under the structure (the street currently stops at 17th Street and resumes at 15th Street, on the other side of the shed).

The train shed is the long building visible at the far left of this photo of Shockoe Bottom. Main Street is at the very bottom of the photo, while Franklin Street runs left to right across the middle of the photo.

Perhaps the biggest news for small businesses was an announcement by Venture Forum President Craig Forbes that his group is working with the city to locate a new, innovation-focused incubator/accelerator in the Bottom. Forbes said the site will be announced in the coming months.

The center, which Forbes has been working on for almost a year will focus on what the forum views as four growth industries for Richmond: bio-sciences and technology, information technology, supply-side logistics and creatives services, which includes marketing.

The accelerator, he said, will be armed with resources for businesses as well as capital for lending.

The long-term goal, Forbes said, is that companies will graduate from the incubator and then lease new office space in Shockoe Bottom, continuing to feed the area’s development and growth.

Welliver said the city wants to leverage its existing assets, both physical and intangible including the perception that Shockoe Slip and the Bottom are the center of Richmond’s creative energy. The area’s population continues to swell, with hundreds of new apartment and condominium units opening in the past two years. More are still under construction at several sites around the bottom.

“Retail follows rooftops,” she said. “A great example is the new ABC store on Main Street, which is doing very well and above projections.”

Peter Chapman, the city’s deputy chief administrative officer, said the economic development department will hire a new staffer dedicated to retail recruitment. Among the new hire’s first tasks will be landing regional and national retailers and placing them in new developments in the bottom. The most likely sites for new development are a variety of vacant parcels along 18th and 19th Streets between Franklin Street and Broad Street.

Welliver acknowledged that the revitalization plan will only succeed if the area becomes cleaner and safer — and if people across the region believe that to be the case. The plan comes less than a month after a young man was shot and killed outside Have a Nice Day Café; it was the third killing in the Bottom in 18 months. All occurred during the early hours of the morning around closing time for the night clubs that draw hundreds to the Bottom each weekend night.

The city stepped up its police presence after two murders in May 2010. Officers now block off streets to funnel traffic, and street-cleaning trucks drive club patrons off the streets with water hoses after last call. The latest murder prompted additional measures, including the use of a police dog trained to search for weapons.

That’s not enough for Mac McCormack, owner of McCormack’s Irish Pub on 18th Street, one block east of Main Street Station. McCormack started a Facebook page two weeks ago aimed at forcing the closure of Have a Nice Day. The bar owner said he started the page after not getting answers he wanted from the mayor and top law enforcement officials during a meeting at Main Street Station.

The city has installed a heavy police presence in Shockoe Bottom after three late-night murders in 18 months. But some business owners say police tactics are driving away customers.

McCormack and other business owners say the police tactics are turning away customers. Tammy Hawley, the mayor’s press secretary, released a statement after McCormack set up the Facebook page. Hawley said the city is considering “all options to improve conditions in the area” but did not offer further details.

Safety isn’t the only challenge; Welliver said others are a prior lack of leadership by the city when it came to development and land-use policies, poor parking and traffic flow and the lack of dedicated funding sources for both economic development and infrastructure projects. The new plan, she said, is designed to meet all of those challenges.

At this time last year, this city and area merchants were thinking about expanding and repositioning the 17th Street Farmers’ Market to serve as an open civic plaza. Welliver said changes aimed at strengthening and growing market will be part of the plan.

Forbes, the Venture Forum president, said both the city and outside groups are going full-speed ahead on the project.

“There are a lot of naysayers in Richmond, and you can nitpick anything to death,” he said. “I’m here to say that we’re going to get this done.”

One of Main Street Station's darkest days came Oct. 7, 1983, when the building was gutted by a fire. The building suffered from another fire in 1976, as well as from hurricane-related flooding in 1969 and 1972.