Downtown Portland, Oregon. Photo by Eric Englund..

Many local governments seek to reverse the trend of urban decline and rejuvenate their downtown districticts and surround neighborhoods. In response to this goal, this list of "top ten" revitalization was synthesized during a series of interviews with West Palm Beach, Fla., Mayor Nancy Graham, and Mark Hill, Assistant Administrator for the City of West Palm Beach; and Diane Dominguez, Planning Director, and Chris Brown, Community Redevelopment Agency Director for the City of Delray Beach, Florida. These cities represent two of the most progressive, aggressive and successful examples of Florida cities reborn.

This list should not be viewed as the "final say." No attempt is made to articulate the details of crafting specific strategies for successfully using these tools. While the ideas are thought to be universally applicable and necessary for rebuilding towns and cities, each city and town must develop its own implementation techniques best suited to the political and physical conditions found there. The intent of the list is to provoke thought about these essential revitalization tools in the minds of all participants in the redevelopment process. Here follow the tools:

1. Develop a very graphic, clear and visually oriented master redevelopment plan with broad-based citizen involvement and support.
Redevelopment is a generations-long journey. Having a detailed road map or game plan is essential for successfully completing such a trip. Adopting a specific course for reaching your destination will solidify and unify citizen support for making the trip. It will make it easier for all to follow and serve as a reminder of the importance of completing the trip. It will point to the benefits at the end of the journey, which should be celebrated. Perhaps no one thing is more important than settling on a master plan for redevelopment. It will be the plan against which all redevelopment proposals will be judged. It will provide safety and certainty for existing residents and new investors. It will speed up approval and construction of good buildings. It will discourage and quickly expose bad ones. It will be a powerful tool for attracting public and private investment, and marketing your city. The master plan must be embraced, protected and nurtured. There must be a long-term and complete commitment to carrying it out. Every tool suggested hereafter must be used in a manner that moves your city one step closer to completing the master plan.

2. Change your zoning and
building codes.
Forget

This historic building in San Bernardino, Calif., was transformed into a restaurant with sidewalk and balcony dining. Photo by Jason Miller.

everything you know and change your codes. Many of the physical things that make cities memorable and cherished by those who visit and dwell there are possibly outlawed by your own codes. Balconies, alleys, front porches, sidewalk dining, on-street parking, awnings and arcades, buildings directly fronting sidewalks, individualized signage, street furniture and entertainment, properly placed street trees and lighting, and the vertical and horizontal mixing of residential and non-residential uses are just a few of the physical features of great cities that might not be allowed under your present codes. Carefully review all of your codes for these prohibitions. It is unlikely that your all-important master plan can be carried out without wholesale changes to your codes.

3. Establish, beautify, soften,
make safe and maintain a
diversity of public spaces.
From

Mears Park in St. Paul, Minn., occupies an entire city block and provides a pleasant spot to eat lunch, enjoy outdoor concerts or simply get a breath of fresh air. Photo by Jason Miller.

A great street in Charleston, South Carolina. Photo by Jason Miller.

quiet outdoor places for reading and thinking, to public places where festivals, celebrations, rallies and other events can occur—great cities have them all. Your public spaces need to occur at strategic locations and should be properly designed for people. Your master plan should instruct you on how to accomplish this.

4. Make great streets.
Remember, 80 percent of the public spaces in your city are probably accounted for in your streets. Your streets are the first thing everyone sees as they travel about your town. It is the venue for first impressions. If your city were being academically tested, streets would count for more than half your grade. Take the time and money to study them and make them wonderful, interesting and enjoyable places to inhabit. Great streets are those that achieve a comfortable balance between the automobile, buildings and the pedestrian, with the scales often tipped in favor of the pedestrian.

5. Preserve your city's culture,
history and good architecture.
Doing

Downtown Lynden, Wash., founded in 1891. Original buildings have been renovated over the years; a new hotel (at right) reflects the city's Dutch heritage. Photo by Jason Miller.

this will go a long way toward grounding your city with healthy, strong roots. It will give your city that sense of "place" or "community" everyone keeps talking about and searching for. Great cities are a symbol of civilization and cooperation. Their buildings are a silent record of their history and culture. The ancient Egyptians and Greeks achieved immortality by leaving us the pyramids and the Parthenon. Great cities are immortal. To destroy cities' historically and culturally important buildings is to rob them of their immortality.

6. Fill your city with buildings.
There is nothing more damaging to the attractiveness of a city than large, abandoned holes in its fabric. These vacant spaces invite crime, strike fear in the hearts of pedestrians and send wrong signals to investors (See Crime Prevention Through Design). Redeveloping cities unfortunately are often full of them, and buildings are often slow to fill in these areas early on in the redevelopment process. If this is a condition in your city, try the next best thing: Plant gardens and hedges; erect a garden wall; commission a mural or two.

7. Build at human scale.
While there are certainly some special districts or streets where tall buildings should be invited, excessive use of them in your city will not make it great; in fact, it may severely slow or stop redevelopment, and exclude many prospective investors. Most great cities of the world are four- to six-story cities. The average building height in Manhattan is only six stories. In addition, 80 percent of the businesses in most cities occupy 5,000 square feet or less. The small investor should be allowed to participate equally in your city's redevelopment and encouraged to build as many buildings and fill as many gaps as possible. If you spend all your time and energy trying to land that "big fish" while letting the small ones go, your city will starve.

8. Build housing in the city.
Cities

Laurel Village townhomes in Minneapolis, Minn., with retail stores on the ground level. Photo by Jason Miller.

need people living in them. In order for this to happen, there must be housing for everyone. A strong pro-housing policy, incentives to make housing attractive for investors to build, and strong local government advocacy for a diversity of housing through a city's codes and actions, are trademarks of great cities.

9. Establish a friendly and identifiable presence and feeling of security on the street.
This does not refer only to police. Everyone on the city payroll who frequents the city streets—from the building inspector to the street sweeper, to your code enforcement officers to your parking attendants—should be uniformed and recognizable as a source of information and safe harbor.

10. Fund and rebuild your
infrastructure.
While

Numerous renovated "villages" line the perimeter of Birmingham, Ala., providing shopping and dining destinations for the surrounding communities. Photo by Jason Miller.

local government incentive packages, such as low-interest loans, grants and technical assistance, are consistently mentioned as an important tool to foster redevelopment, perhaps no one action will more effectively announce to your citizens and investors that you are committed to your city's redevelopment than jumping into the rebuilding process headfirst. Your sidewalks, streets, parks, water and sewer facilities, and public buildings all need sprucing up from time to time. A new public building, properly located and designed, would not hurt the cause either. Unless you put your money where your mouth is and take care of your own property, you cannot expect investors to take you seriously, nor can you expect new investment from existing home and business owners. The value added from this act will far exceed any incentive you can reasonably offer.

Honorable mention While the following tools did not make the Top 10 list, they are worthy of mention: Establish a community redevelopment agency, downtown development agency, and main street program in cooperation with city planning and design staff Hire an urban designer Create a strong marketing program Assist in land assemblage Engage financial institutions and build a relationship to get capital downtown Develop a parking strategy or master plan for parking Be willing to take reasonably calculated risks Rethink "concurrency" so that it works for authentic downtowns and cities

Michael Busha is the Executive Director of the Treasure Coast Regional Planning Council (TCRPC) in Stuart, Florida, an organization to which he has dedicated 17 years. He is the principal author of TCRPC's landmark Strategic Regional Policy Plan for Palm Beach, Martin, St. Lucie and Indian River Counties, whose concepts and principles on urban design, regional planning and downtown redevelopment are gaining acceptance nationally. Busha has been involved in tens of public planning charrettes for TCRPC, which have contributed to making cities such as Fort Pierce, Stuart, Lake Worth and West Palm Beach more desirable places to live and invest in. This "planning in the public process," which was pioneered by TCRPC and others, has been expanded to advance the ideas of downtown redevelopment, economic development, regional attenuation facilities, regional greenways, and how agriculture and urban development can coexist in the countryside. A prolific lecturer, Busha regularly addresses the topics of smart growth, new urbanism and public planning.