The Future

The Opportunity Zone

Phase II

In the fall of 2023, RedZone Memphis completed phase one of its community development project.  Enitled the Skyview Project because the property on which the new Opportunity Zone community resource center sits is the former site of the Skyview Drive-in, we opened the doors to the students and the community in mid-October.  Skyview Drive-ins opened for business across the country in July of 1949.  As a prominent structure and gathering place for Memphis’s teenage population during the 50’s and 60’s, the “Bloomer Pink” entertainment center was off limits to most of the residents of Orange Mound due to racial segregation and discrimination.

Left abandoned and torn down somewhere in the early 70’s, the parcel of land laid fallow for more than 40 years and had become a contributor to the blight in the community.   Before becoming the home of Skyview Drive-Inn, 2855 Park Avenue was used by the government to house prisoners of war and it later became a sweet potato field where neighborhood kids earned spending money picking potatoes during the summer.   The new Opportunity Zone is on the northern border of the Melrose High School (which was built on part of the land).

The Opportunity Zone is a major part of our vision to reclaim, and redeem, the property, repurposing it to be a part of the reformation and transformation process in the Orange Mound community. It is our mission to develop a “promise neighborhood” by providing a multi-use community resource center designed to holistically impact children, families, and the greater Memphis community.