A proposal to install a "one-way mirror toilet" is among hundreds of ideas that will be discussed at a Wollongong CBD revitalisation think tank in Globe Lane tomorrow.
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The toilet, which would allow users to see out into the middle of Crown Street Mall while going about their business, is the brainchild of a group called "the 1% project Wollongong".
The group has started a Facebook page to share their thoughts ahead of the Shaping Wollongong Ideas-a-thon, which aims to revamp the run-down city centre.
More than 170 people have signed up to be involved, with students, councillors, academics, artists, families and business leaders clamouring to form teams of four to seven people for the revitalisation event.
Organiser Amanda Kunkler, from the Illawarra branch of the Property Council of Australia, said one person would even be participating by correspondence from Canada.
Consultant Kate McMahon, who is part of the Melbourne-based team hired by the property council to run the project, said the response to the event had been overwhelming.
"There was part of me that wasn't surprised because there has been a really strong give-it-a-go attitude," she said.
"I'm originally from Wollongong, so I kind of knew that this was the Gong and if you throw a party everyone will turn up and if you have an idea people get behind it."
Ms McMahon said Globe Lane would be transformed into a hive of activity with teams developing ideas inside the new small bar His Boy Elroy, completing activities in the laneway and running in and out of photobooths to capture their ideas.
"There will be lots of funky seating all over the place and street artists doing wall art - so a bit of a fiesta," she said.
"We wanted to really channel the energy and the feeling that great stuff is already happening here."
The 1% project Wollongong Facebook page has already gained nearly 200 likes, and includes other ideas like growing vines to cover the stark concrete walls of Wollongong Central, allowing outdoor dining space stretching onto the road along Kembla Street and installing bike hire stations around the city.
According to manipulated photographs on the Facebook page, the group also suggests turning daytime car parks into nighttime event spaces as well as a number of public art and gardening projects.
The mysterious group would not provide any team member names when approached by the Mercury yesterday, but said its philosophy was based on a Thomas Edison saying that "genius is 1 per cent inspiration and 99 per cent perspiration".
"We are really excited to see what the other teams come up with on the day we are expecting some good stuff," they told the Mercury via Facebook.
"The 1% project is aimed at stimulating debate around the 1 per cent inspiration for the 99 per cent execution [idea]."
After tomorrow's event, the best five ideas will progress to an "ideas lab", where residents will be able to workshop their proposal with council staff and business owners.
