Getting results: making sure implementation is at the heart of revitalization planning

Scott Schimmel, of the Market Square District Association, and proprietor of Bliss Home + Art (check out the great website, for the store that was picked as the best new store in the area by the local alternative newspaper) in Knoxville writes:

I really enjoyed reading this report. I have suggested that it be a "must read" for our board members. Is there a 2003-2004 report? Also, we are at the point where we would like to hire an executive director. Did you have your Strategic Neighborhood Action Plan and/or Strategic Development Plan completed prior to November 2002 (when you hired your first Ex Dir.)? Did your Office of Planning provide their services free of charge?

Richard writes:

The H Street SDP was comparable to the plan for downtown Knoxville done by Crandall-Arambula, just done by a different firm (HOK). The SDP, like the C-A study, was paid for by the city and was commissioned before H Street Main Street existed, but the contract was let after HSMS was created, and HSMS was intimately involved in the process, had representation on the steering committee, etc. The "final report" came out in February 2003. This was adopted as a "Small Area Plan" by the City Council in summer 2003. An H Street inter-agency working group of city officials includes the HSMS executive director.

(Right now, the Zoning Commission is considering a "Neighborhood Commercial" District zoning overlay to help translate the recommendations of the SDP into zoning policies. You can look at the proposal here: Proposed: H Street Zoning Overlay. For general neighborhood district zoning overlay provisions, they are under chapter 13 of the zoning code, which is online at http://www.dcoz.dc.gov/.)

The SNAP plan was finished before the SDP was started (although the RFP development for the SDP started long before) and before HSMS was createdl, and was part of a new at the time city-wide neighborhood planning process initiated by the city. I don't know what the plan is for revisiting these plans, but there are 39 planning clusters. Since it takes so much staff time, these aren't an annual event, in fact it's now going on four years.

Minneapolis has a much deeper neighborhood-based planning process, but that isn't really gonna help you, unless you are interested in theory... The SNAP plan process actually brought together the various stakeholders that ended up creating the H Street Main Street group.

Now that I know more about urban planning, I would say that a big limitation in the H Street SDP is that it doesn't have much in the way of an implementation strategy and action plan and as a result, I can see stuff not happening the way we would all like it to.

The Crandall-Arambula website has some nice one-page documents on how to do solid vision-planning that doesn't just end up on a shelf. The piece on downtown plans states that:

Plans must include:
• A “big picture” concept diagram
• A “capacity framework” illustrating full development potential
• Land use and circulation frameworks
• Graphic project illustrations
• An implementation strategy with catalyst projects and priorities (emphasis added)
• Regulatory documents

The C-A document on Implementation states:

Successful strategies must include six basic components:
• Action Items

1. Catalyst projects (public and private) that have the potential to stimulate
   substantial private investment
2. Specific codes and development standards needed to implement the strategy*
3. Design guidelines* that shape development in terms of the community’s values

• Catalyst Project Locations
• Action Priorities
• Responsibilities
• Investment Ratios
• Schedule

(* In fairness to the DC process, these two steps are in process, and actually a catalyst project is being proposed by the National Capital Revitalization Corporation, the nonprofit city-controlled development organization, and if the renderings are to be believed it could actually be a quality designed project, unlike the 8-10 other projects involving city and federal funds on the H Street corridor that have been built over the years. There is still a ways to go on the soft side of the commercial revitalization of H Street, and that's the subject of another post. Because of the past history of DC-government-funded projects in the neighborhood, time will tell if quality work will truly be done using local public investment monies. But I am unaware of a specific implementation strategy having been developed and distributed publicly.)

An example of a "Revitalization Plan" with solid implementation planning would be the plan for the City of Hyattsville, MD (done by EDAW). I think the downtown plan for the City of Normal Illinois (home of Illinois State University) is pretty good too, including their retail development strategy--called the "retail plan"/"Retail component analysis for the renewal of downtown, Normal, Illinois." (Also check out the photos of the models for one of the catalyst projects, the Children's Discovery Museum, which is probably built out by now.)

In my opinion, while a gross-grained market study was conducted for the H Street SDP (and it's an excellent analysis), a document comparable to the Normal Illinois "Retail Plan" providing more detailed direction on where to focus resources, what the Main Street model calls a "positioning statement" was never developed. (The retail consultants on the H Street study, Street Sense, wanted extra money to do such a plan, whereas I never understood why it wasn't done as part of the SDP.)

The book Marketing an Image for Main Street, from the National Main Street Center, discusses general image development as well as the importance of conducting a market study that can help your commercial district develop its positioning strategy. One of the case studies in the book is Boulder Colorado. In doing research on their customer base, they discovered that a significant proportion of their customers are residents of the Denver MSA and they go to Boulder because of its uniqueness. They also discovered new potential to attract tourists-visitors, etc. (The process of conducting a market study is covered in more detail in Step-by-Step Market Analysis.)

After the SDP, the DC Department of Transportation initiated the H Street Streetscape and Transportation Study started in the summer of 2003 (part of the pre-HSMS activities of the group that came together to create HSMS included writing a successful proposal for streetscape improvements in Fall 2001, this ended up being lumped into the scope of work for the bigger Transportation Study, so we never got that money...) The "final report" came out in Feb. 2004 and has been endorsed by City Council. I don't know where it is in terms of design and engineering, but it will be implemented over a period of a few years (it's $30 million and the full amount hasn't been budgeted). This study was paid for out of transportation planning funds from ddot.

I wrote in another blog entry that in my opinion, it is essential that sidewalk cleaning services roll out no later than when streetscape improvements kick in (H Street is particularly dirty, in part because of its key role as a transit corridor--bus stops seem to be big litter generators). I think this is one of the unheralded reasons why the streetscape improvements for the Barracks Row Main Street have been so successful. If 8th Street SE wasn't cleaned every day, I think people would still have a great deal of reticence about going over there (but I know some people disagree with me about this).

Anyway, the annual report that you read was mostly written by Kevin Palmer, although I and others contributed to it. Since neither Kevin nor myself are involved with HSMS anymore, I don't know where they are with writing another one.

As for hiring an executive director, a good place for some guidance is Organizing a Downtown Revitalization Program using the Main Street Approach from the State of Washington (DC uses a version of this manual).

The cultural tourism folk offer great resources too (the Center for Historic Preservation at Middle Tennessee State University is a national leader in this area). The Tourism Development Handbook is an excellent resource--just replace the word "tourism" with the word "destination" and you have a book that is universal in its application.

Try to get UTK's architecture program to do a student studio class on Market Square for the term project. I was particularly impressed with the work of architecture students at Catholic University in a couple neighborhoods in DC, including H Street (it's really interesting, a little more daring and path-breaking than the HOK stuff). (Similarly, UTK has a tourism studies program. GWU has one and they did a very interesting project in Brookland--adjacent to Catholic University--last Spring.)

More resources include Jay Turner. He is the director of the North Park Main Street program in San Diego. It's a Main Street program that is funded through TIF, so it's actually a BID. The Main Street annual meeting is in Baltimore May 8-11th. The Kentucky Main Street program which is the first statewide program, started before the National Main Street program even rolled out beyond the three pilot sites (their presentation at the National Trust for Historic Preservation conference was fabulous and is worth purchasing). And I know that Franklin, Tennessee has a well-regarded Main Street program that is featured in the book Main Street Success Stories.