NASHVILLE, Tenn. - The riverfront property where Nashville's former thermal energy plant once stood has been set to open Thursday with a new park, and amphitheater.
Mayor Karl Dean has been scheduled to cut the ribbon for the new Riverfront Park and Ascend Amphitheater at 11 a.m. Thursday.
The land where the project was built has been in limbo for the last 13 years. The former thermal power generating plant on the site was destroyed by a fire on May 23, 2002.
"It was my second shift as downtown district. So, I was brand new down here," said Chief Mike Franklin with the Nashville Fire Department.
Franklin was one of the first firefighters on the scene of the thermal plant fire that Thursday night.
"The fire just swept across. There could have been an accelerant in the garbage we didn't know about. It could have just been the right mixture of garbage that day," the Chief said. "We just couldn't put enough water to put that garbage out."
The fire went to four alarms, and 100 firefighters responded to the scene.
"We pumped water, from this hydrant down here behind us on 1st Avenue, for three solid days," Chief Franklin explained.
The burning garbage smoldered for the next seven days.
The energy generated by burning trash at the plant was used to cool and heat many of the buildings in downtown Nashville. It took four days for the air conditioning to start working again inside many of those building.
At the time Nashville was about to transition away from burning trash to produce energy. That plant was set to transition to using natural gas in October of 2002. It was back in operation only one business day after the fire, and continued to operate as a gas-fired facility, producing steam and chilled water as before.
By December of 2003 a new plant opened, and provided energy to the downtown area.
After the plant closed, demolition on the site began. On July 26, 2004 crews gathered on the property to implode the tall smokestack left standing.
Hundreds of people came out to watch the implosion early on a Sunday morning.
There were several plans for the property. In the mid-2000's the plan was to move the Nashville Sounds to the site. The various plans fell through, and the Dean administration eventually won approval to build a new park and amphitheater.
