SOUTH PORTLAND – South Portland is inviting the public to weigh in with ideas for redeveloping the 31.5-acre Mill Creek Shopping District, made up of 33 lots nestled between the Casco Bay Bridge, the Greenbelt Trail, Mill Creek Park and the historic Knightville area.

The public workshop will be held from 6:30-8:30 p.m. on Thursday, May 9, at South Portland’s Planning and Development Office at 496 Ocean St.

“This center was designed for a time when highly auto-oriented shopping centers were considered the best use of space,” said city Planning Director Tex Haeuser. “Today, people are increasingly interested in being able to walk to a variety of shops – from their car or even from their home.

“We believe that over time, Mill Creek has the potential to become a vibrant mixed-use center that can attract everyone from students to workers to retired people,” said Haeuser.

The visioning session is an outgrowth of several recent initiatives aimed at reinvigorating the downtown area, including a 2008 planning effort and the city’s new comprehensive plan, adopted last year. More recently, the city has worked with Sustain Southern Maine, a partnership of 41 municipalities, schools, nonprofits and planning agencies led by the Greater Portland Council of Governments.

In October 2010, that group won a $1.6 million Sustainable Communities Planning Grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Under the motto “By choice not by chance,” Sustain Southern Maine has been busy since trying to help a swath of the state from Brunswick to Kittery find ways to “absorb significant shares of most kinds of growth” through the next 25 years. Projections foresee Mill Creek taking on 10 percent of the growth South Portland is expected to experience by 2035. That means finding a way to accommodate up to 175,000 square feet of additional commercial space, and 350 jobs, as well as 240 housing units, in what is now a sea of parking lots surrounding several retail islands, with virtually no residential use

Sustain Southern Maine has held two brainstorming sessions so far in South Portland since December with business leaders, property owners and residents of the Mill Creek/Knightville district. The May 9 meeting will give the public a chance to review ideas generated at those meetings, as well as to share their own.

“This is the most important time to get feedback from the community,” said Haeuser. “We want to hear as many views as possible.”