A proposed arts district and transit hub in Marina remains stuck in park.

Like many development dreams on the former Fort Ord, it is aspirational: create an arts district that combines studios, galleries for artists and designers, and possibly an interactive art and learning center.

But the concept, which is part of the Dunes Specific Plan the city of Marina approved in 2005, still languishes 12 years later, and instead of a vibrant arts colony there are only aging military warehouses.

The same can be said of a row of warehouses immediately west of the contemplated district, which is east off Highway 1 and just south of the soon-to-open Department of Defense/Veterans Affairs clinic on 8th Street. That row of warehouses is on two parcels of former Fort Ord land owned by the Transportation Agency for Monterey County and Monterey-Salinas Transit, respectively. The original vision for their land was that it would become some sort of transit-oriented development.

To date, neither TAMC nor MST has any concrete plans for what their parcels – TAMC’s is about 12 acres and MST’s is about five – might become, but like other parts of the sprawling 420-acre Dunes project area, the city of Marina is trying to get things moving.

Through the Arts Council for Monterey County, the city applied for a $60,000 federal grant that would be used to help plan the district and create a more detailed vision. Marina City Manager Layne Long says the city expects to hear back within a few months.

“The Dunes Specific Plan hashed out the concept, and we’re trying to flesh that out,” he says. “To visualize, this is what your possibilities are.”

For TAMC and MST, however, doing something with their properties remains on the back burner.

“We were kind of on hold, because of the economy,” says TAMC Executive Director Debbie Hale, adding the agency hopes to turn the property into some form of mixed-used development that would bring in revenue for transportation-related projects. But she hopes the vision for the area is cohesive. “It’s probably time to start reinitiating discussions.”

Lisa Rheinheimer, MST’s director of planning and marketing, says her agency has “a lot on [its] plate right now,” and that things will start to happen more quickly if Marina gets its grant.

“There are a lot of questions,” she says, “and really there are no answers yet.”

Among them is when, or if, Dunes developer Marina Community Partners will build The Promenade, a proposed mixed-use street north of the arts district that could build momentum for economic development in the surrounding areas.

Right now, it’s just an empty patch of dirt.