Basic principles for revitalization

There is an article from the St. Helena Star in California, "Revitalizing Main Street," about the improvement program for their community's commercial core. From the article:

The group engaged Bruce Race of Race Studios to facilitate a community workshop in which opinions, and consensus, would be sought. The Chamber and the city agreed to co-sponsor this workshop by contributing $5,000 each. The workshop attracted approximately 45 people, including several city officials, who were divided into working teams by Bruce and his co-facilitator, Cliff Lowe (urban designer, and principal of Cliff Lowe Associates).

Bruce and Cliff led the discussion through a series of topics which led to agreement on planning principles in four areas:

• Preserve the Historic Character of St. Helena
• Create Places to Gather
• Enhance Streetscape and Image
• Manage and Maintain Downtown St. Helena

The Task Force organized itself into two sub-groups, one focused on long range issues (including cooperating with the City General Plan Update process), the other on short term issues.

Without putting in this kind of upfront time and process, you can't build the necessary consensus, support by the various stakeholder groups, and widespread understanding of what you are trying to accomplish in a revitalization program.

I think that in DC, we don't have a widespread understanding of what we are trying to accomplish in neighborhood revitalization efforts. Capitol Hill, see the previous entry on George Didden, is a rare exception.