Mercer University in Macon, Ga., will construct a new building for its medical school overlooking the Ocmulgee River in the city's downtown, the first step in a major redevelopment of the area.

The Macon-Bibb County Urban Development Authority (UDA) approved selling 11 parcels at 815 Riverside Dr., between Spring and Second streets, to the university on Feb. 27, 2025.

The sale price of the deal municipal officials signed with Mercer was $1.9 million, approximately half the property's appraised value, according to Georgia Public Broadcasting (GPB).

"Developing a riverfront home for the Mercer University School of Medicine seizes a unique opportunity to construct a stunning new facility designed to meet the needs of a growing student population with 21st century technology at an important gateway into Macon," Mercer President William D. Underwood said in a news release obtained by The Den, the school's online news and features site.

Mercer's medical school has increased dramatically since it first opened in 1982, more than doubling the number of M.D. students from 96 to 240 and adding Ph.D. and master's-level programs. It was established to help provide more doctors for medically underserved areas of Georgia.

The university has noted that more than 60 percent of its graduates practice in the Peach State and more than 80 percent of them are serving in rural areas or where medical care is scarce.

"More and better instructional and research space is required to accommodate a growing number of students, scientists, technicians and graduate students, as well as more advanced equipment and technology," said School of Medicine Dean Jean R. Sumner.

Trying to replace the existing facility on the main campus would be difficult due to space limitations, Underwood said, but relocating the medical school downtown will create an opportunity to have a transformative impact on the broader Macon community.

"It will attract related residential, retail and hotel development to what will become a vibrant and attractive new entry point into downtown Macon," he said. "The overall impact on … Macon will be transformational in building on the highly successful revitalization efforts of the past decade."

Macon-Bibb County Mayor Lester Miller said the project will complement his plans for a new conference center and hotel on the old Hilton/Ramada site at the corner of First and Walnut streets, and the East Bank development on the other side of the river. The high-rise hotel was demolished New Year's Day, 2025.

"Our city along the Ocmulgee River and First Street is about to undergo a major transformation," he said.

Mercer Medical School Could Be Catalyst for New Macon

For more than 40 years, Macon leaders had dreamed about a major development being built on the river's shore.

Local leaders began assembling the Riverside Drive parcels in the early 1990s in a partnership with the city of Macon, Bibb County, the Peyton Anderson Foundation, NewTown Macon and the UDA, according to the agency.

And the newest effort to revitalize Macon's downtown riverfront is not the first of its kind this century.

For several years, Mercer Chancellor Kirby Godsey's "Renaissance on the River" corporation held an option with the UDA on 7 acres at Riverside Drive that stretched from near New Street to Second Street.

Godsey prepared an ambitious plan to include 200 condominiums, a boutique hotel, retail and 240,000 sq. ft. of medical or office space. The $90 million project was to break ground in 2014 and be finished by the end of 2016.

However, he pulled out of the land deal with the city after learning the soil was contaminated with residue from lead, coal and oil from years of housing an Atlanta Gas Light/Georgia Power plant.

Up until 2011, the land was on the state's hazardous site inventory list and had some environmental restrictions on residences on the property.

Macon's Central City Apartments site on Walnut Street near Carolyn Crayton Park had similar issues that were mitigated before construction on those homes began. In that project, cement-like barriers were laid underground and construction could not dig deeper than 2 ft., GPB reported.

Approximately 14 years ago, Macon-Bibb County took over the property for similar remediation before turning it over to the UDA for economic development purposes.

Late in 2024, Godsey transferred his option to the Corporation of Mercer University, which had been scouting downtown locations for a new medical school.

The Knight Foundation had earlier granted Mercer $5 million toward relocating the medical school downtown, followed by the Peyton Anderson Foundation announcing last September that it was making its "largest grant award to date" with $10 million in funding for Mercer's new facility.

University's Plans Get Quick ‘Yes' From UDA

The UDA's members spent only approximately 10 minutes in executive session on Feb. 27, 2025, before approving the property sale to Mercer University.

"That's the quickest meeting ever," said UDA Chair Jan Beeland.

"And maybe one of the most satisfying ever," added Ryan Griffin, a UDA board member. "It's a great day."

In another action coming out of the day's executive session, the local development board also took steps to help alleviate the food desert created in the wake of the closing of the Pio Nono Avenue Kroger in 2018.

UDA approved buying the old Piggly Wiggly grocery store at 3107 Napier Ave. with the intent of luring a new supermarket to the neighborhood near the Hillcrest Boulevard Nu-Way.

"The goal is to do something that alleviates the food desert in the area," UDA Executive Director Alex Morrison told GPB. "We're buying it with the hope to incentivize or otherwise generate the development — whether it's a grocery or something else.

"It is our goal to continue reactivating unused spaces of our urban core, providing people with additional living space, opportunities for continued education and more," Morrison added.

In 2021, Macon-Bibb County appropriated $1 million in American Rescue Plan Act funds to mitigate the negative effects of COVID-19 and address its local food deserts.

The county transferred that money to the UDA last fall for projects such as purchasing the vacant Piggly Wiggly store. Details of that property's purchase were not immediately available.