SALISBURY, Md. - The Downtown Salisbury parking lot may be full of cars right now, but it will not be the case for long.
Unity Square is a sprawling, open air outdoor space that will welcome seating, greenery, sculptures and even a splash pad to the downtown.
Mayor Jake Day says this will be the new heart of Salisbury's downtown.
"That will be a large gathering space, a city square, a town square that will have everything from a splash pad to climbing, some things for kids, to sculptures. Some really incredible pieces of art that have already been commissioned," he said.
The City Council voted this week to approve allocating the final piece of the over 3 million dollars in funding for the project.
Alexia Dill at Lilac Clothing Company is excited for the project, but is concerned about the impact on parking.
"There's already complications down here and people asking where to park and the street parking's kind of frustrating because there's limited to no parking," she said.
"But if it brings people back together especially after COVID I think it will be a positive," Dill continued.
But the Mayor says that will not be a concern as substantially more parking will soon be on the way.
"Parking is a utility like sewer, like water, it's necessary but no one visits a place for the glory of its parking lots," he said.
After Unity Square is completed at some point in 2023, the much larger project to complete the other end of the downtown parking lot will get underway.
That project includes residential housing and a 450 car parking garage.