Hannah McKinney, Vice Mayor of Kalamazoo, Michigan, on engaging residents in the development of a Comprehensive Plan for future sustainable development. See more interviews with local leaders here >>
Ryan Coonerty, former Mayor of Santa Cruz, CA and Co-founder of NextSpace, discusses what Santa Cruz is doing to attract the new creative class of residents and businesses. See more video interviews with Local Leaders here >>
Mayor Jonathan LaBonté of Auburn, ME. Image via Facebook.
Mayor Jonathan LaBonté of Auburn, ME is working to help his small city compete economically and grow stronger financially, and he’s using smart growth strategies to achieve both these goals.
Auburn is a city of 23,000 people located 45 minutes north of Portland. LaBonté has served as mayor of the city since 2011, and he’s also a member of Smart Growth America’s Local Leaders Council, a nonpartisan group of municipal officials who share a passion for building great towns, cities, and communities.
Last year the city of Pittsburgh, PA received a $15 million U.S Department of Transportation TIGER IV Grant for the construction of a multi-modal transit center in the city’s East Liberty neighborhood. The transit center will serve as the hub for nearly 1,000 bus arrivals and departures per day.
The board of the Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA) recently adopted a Transit Revitalization District Implementation Plan which calls for future real estate tax revenue to secure bonds to finance infrastructure improvements in East Liberty, furthering the city’s transit oriented development goals.
Improvements for the transit center include a two-level station linking bus rapid transit service with street level bus service as well as realignment and reopening of streets, sidewalks, landscaping, a replacement road bridge, adaptive traffic signals, and a bike and pedestrian access bridge.
Smart Growth America’s Local Leaders Council sat down with Dan Burden, Co-founder and Executive Director of the Walkable and Livable Communities Institute to learn about what makes for a “walkable” neighborhood and what communities can do to become more walkable.
“A walkable neighborhood is a right-scale neighborhood where you can walk, you have good street connectivity…streets that are reasonably quiet and peaceful, that relate to the people living there, shopping there, and enjoying their neighborhood,” says Burden.
A historic photo of the McComb City Hospital Building in McComb, MS. Photo via the Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
One building in McComb, MS, could provide health care facilities for area residents and revitalize downtown at the same time. A federal brownfields grant is helping the small town achieve both these goals possible.
The McComb City Hospital building, originally constructed in 1911, was the area’s only hospital until the 1960’s and when the Southwest Mississippi Regional Medical Center was built in 1969, the McComb hospital closed. Through the late 1980’s the building was reused for a variety of purposes, none of which were able to generate long-term and sustainable use of the property.
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The Fort Lauderdale, Florida, City Commission adopted a Complete Streets policy on October 1, along with a design manual to guide implementation. The city is encouraging better pedestrian, bicycle, and transit accommodations through both the transportation planning and the development review processes. With several demonstration projects already underway, the city will provide further strategic guidance in its Multimodal Connectivity Program, to be released later in the fall. Read more >>
The Massachusetts Department of Transportation (MassDOT) introduced a new Healthy Transportation Policy Directive that will boost the Department’s commitment to Complete Streets. Under the directive, all MassDOT Divisions will review all projects currently in design to ensure they “increase and encourage more pedestrian, bicycle and transit trips.” Any projects that do not do so must have approval from thee Secretary and CEO of Transportation before moving ahead. MassDOT will be able to use guidance from NACTO, including its Urban Bikeway Design Guide, in fulfilling the directive’s intent. “This policy directive is the next step in putting into daily practice our commitment to build a healthy, sustainable transportation system that meets all our customers’ needs,” said MassDOT Secretary Davey. Read more >>
Lincoln, Nebraska Mayor Chris Beutler signed a Complete Streets executive order last month. The order calls for the development of an interdepartmental process to ensure Complete Streets is applied; establishes limited exceptions; and requires annual reports on progress. Read more >>
Many communities are coming to realize smart growth provides substantial economic benefits in addition to creating great neighborhoods. Smart Growth America’s Local Leaders Council recently sat down with Joseph Minicozzi, the principal of Urban3, LLC, a private consulting firm specializing in land value economics, property tax analysis and community design, to discuss how some communities are using smart growth strategies to their economic benefit.
Members of Smart Growth America’s Local Leaders Council in Washington last week.
Elected officials representing diverse communities around the nation gathered in Washington, DC on October 8th for a briefing on the progress and future plans of Smart Growth America’s Local Leaders Council, a nationwide, nonpartisan network of local decision makers with a passion for building great towns, cities, and communities using smart growth strategies.
During the meeting the Council’s Advisory Board reviewed the first-year accomplishments of the program: Over 80 elected and high-level appointed local officials have formally joined the network in the past year, numerous events have been coordinated through the speaker’s bureau, and a new Maryland State Chapter is under development.
Boulder, CO has made a concerted effort over the past 20 years to implement Complete Streets as part of everyday decision making. Photo by Barbara McCann.
This post is the fourth in a twice-monthly series of excerpts from Completing Our Streets: The Transition to Safe and Inclusive Transportation Networks, the new book from Island Press by Barbara McCann, founder of the National Complete Streets Coalition. The book discusses the keys to the movement’s success, and how places and practitioners in the United States are tackling the challenges of putting a new transportation paradigm into daily practice.
All National Complete Streets Coalition Platinum Partners and those who upgrade to the next Partnership level will receive a signed copy of Completing Our Streets. Become a Coalition Partner today!
While adoption of a Complete Streets policy is the first step on a clear path for changing transportation practice, the attempt to marshal political and community support behind a new approach to transportation planning too often flounders once the policy is in place. This is particularly true when the effort has been made primarily from the outside, when advocates or lawmakers have created and adopted a policy with resistance or only lukewarm interest from the transportation agency that has to implement it. The advocates’ euphoria may wear off quickly when absolutely nothing happens inside the department after the policy passes. Or the disillusionment may come more slowly, after many months of working with the agency’s staff and leadership only to find that the changes made are minor or have been blocked by midlevel management.