HOUGHTON — The location and format of Houghton’s public engagement meeting on the future of the Lakeshore Drive parking deck area have been set.

The meeting will take place from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. Wednesday at the conference room at the Bonfire Restaurant at Continental Fire Company at 408 E. Montezuma Ave.

For the first 20 minutes, urban planner Pat Coleman of North of 45, LLC, will give a Powerpoint presentation, followed by a question-and-answer period. People will then break off into small group exercises to come up with options for the parking deck area. The groups will then make presentations and begin ranking ideas.

“It’s not something where you just come in any time,” said Houghton Clerk Ann Vollrath. “It’s really something where you’ll want to be there when it starts.”

Vollrath compared the event to the first day of the precharrette workshop city officials and stakeholders recently did at Dee Stadium. More public engagement will happen Coleman will base the next session on how far Wednesday’s progresses, Vollrath said.

As many as 100 people are expected to attend. Because of the large crowd, the city is asking attendees to wear masks at the event. Masks will be available for those who do not bring one.

Councilor Mike Needham asked Vollrath to request the Bonfire staff also wear masks for the event.

In July, the council approved starting parallel processes for tearing down the deck and figuring out what will replace it. The deck, built in 1978, has required increasing amounts of maintenance.

In 2019, the city entered into negotiations with Marquette-based The Veridea Group for the potential sale of the property in order to build a mixed-use development. Veridea withdrew from negotiations in January, prompting the city to form a subcommittee to explore the future of the deck. The subcommittee concluded the deck should be torn down, though it did not rule out the idea of a replaement deck.