A collection of local businesses inside shipping containers and sand volleyball courts that has become a gathering place in Nashville is preparing for a major change as the city continues to grow.
CITYBLOX at oneC1TY will close at the end of 2026 to make way for NOVEL oneC1TY, a new 313-unit residential development planned for the property.
For people who live, work and spend time in the area, the redevelopment is prompting a familiar Nashville question: As the city adds more housing and development, what happens to the places and businesses people already love?
“This is all very local, and Nashville’s losing everything local,” Maddie Dornsife told FOX 17 News.
CITYBLOX has occupied the property for roughly 12 years, creating an unusual collection of small businesses operating out of repurposed shipping containers alongside outdoor gathering areas and sand volleyball courts.
Patrick Aquino said that uniqueness is part of what drew people to the area.
“I think it was so cool that everything was made out of shipping containers,” Aquino said. “And I mean, I really like the sand volleyball too.”
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The four remaining businesses at CITYBLOX are expected to be able to continue operating through the end of 2026. Those businesses are KOKOS Ice Cream, Nosh Desserts, Sandbar and Aloha Fish Company.
One of those businesses, Aloha Fish Company, recently confirmed to customers on Instagram that its time at the current location is coming to an end.
“We are no longer going to be there after the start of next year,” the business said in a video shared with FOX 17 News.
What happens next for the businesses is one of the questions surrounding the redevelopment.
Outside of Koko’s. (FOX 17 News)
Growth raises concerns about what gets pushed out
For Tim Driscoll, who said he has lived in Nashville for 15 years and has frequented the oneC1TY area for several years, the change represents a larger tension he has watched play out as Nashville grows.
“It’s not so much even just the apartment complex, it’s just what can we force out to make room for that has more money behind it,” Driscoll said. “And putting more apartments here is good for somebody. It’s bad for somebody else, too, like these businesses.”
Driscoll also questioned what another large development could mean for people already using the area, raising concerns about parking and the ease of getting around oneC1TY during and after the transition.
The redevelopment itself, however, was not an unexpected change in the long-term plan for the property.
Cambridge Holdings, which developed oneC1TY, said in a statement online, CITYBLOX was created about 12 years ago as a temporary activation of the land while the larger oneC1TY development grew around it.
According to the developer, nearly 20 local startups and businesses have cycled through CITYBLOX during that time, and tenants understood the property would eventually be redeveloped.
Still, after more than a decade, some people who use the space say its temporary designation on paper does not erase the community that developed around it.
“I don’t understand why they have to take away our community aspects in Nashville, because that’s what people in Nashville love,” Owen Mikucki said.
Outside of Nosh, and Koko’s. (FOX 17 News)
What is replacing CITYBLOX?
Crescent Communities plans to develop NOVEL oneC1TY on the property.
Plans call for 313 residential units along with approximately 5,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space and a public plaza.
The developers also say they are exploring ways to preserve elements of CITYBLOX in the new project.
That includes plans to bring sand volleyball back to the property and potentially incorporate other features associated with CITYBLOX into the new development.
The project is expected to be completed in 2029.
For those who have made CITYBLOX part of their routine, however, the next few years leave questions about where the existing businesses will go, what construction will mean for people already living and working around oneC1TY, and whether the character that developed there can survive the property’s next phase.
For Driscoll, that is part of a larger balancing act Nashville continues to face.
“There’s really no end in sight, but it’s kind of a push-pull one way or the other,” Driscoll said. “Somebody’s gotta win, somebody’s gotta lose.”