Shoulders: This is the greatest chance for Downtown to be successful Bloomington

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. An hour into maybe one of the most keenly-watched public meetings in Evansville's history, Indiana University's board of trustees made it official: They want the university to build its new Evansville medical school in Downtown Evansville.

The meeting was held live at IU's Bloomington campus, and broadcast live both at an Evansville gathering and online. It also generated interest from Twitter and Facebook users.

At the meeting, IU President Michael McRobbie said the university's medical school and students, along with other involved parties, expressed a strong preference for Downtown over three other proposed sites.

The Downtown site covers almost six square blocks. The site's boundaries include Locust, Cherry, Southeast Fourth and Southeast Sixth streets.

The chosen site will add to a "quickly developing downtown" Evansville, McRobbie noted, and the Downtown site will be walkable for students and offer easy access to area hospitals where students will do training.

Estimated cost of the Downtown project is $69.5 million. As part of its proposal, the city is offering TIF district incentives of $35 million, said IU Vice President of Capital Planning and Facilities Tom Morrison.

In some ways the afternoon vote was a formality: Trustees heard details of all four proposals in a morning committee meeting, and during that meeting McRobbie recommended that the board select the Downtown Evansville site.

The development team on this project is Skanska/U.S. HealthRealty, and four members of this team traveled to Bloomington for the meeting.

"We're just happy to be a part of this project," said Downtown project team member A.C. Braun, business developer at Industrial Contractors Skanska.

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UPDATE: IU trustees pick Downtown Evansville site for new med school | VIDEO