Investment Ready Places

There are countless people working today to solve the myriad of complex problems we face in America. Few are as bold, yet practical, as a new initiative from www.street-sense.org called Investment Ready Places. It is one part triage, one part aspiration. It is exactly the kind of thinking we need right now.

For those of you in the Boston area, I'm giving a lecture tonight at MIT. It is open to the public and while we are expecting a full house, please don't be afraid to swing by. If you are already part of the club here, make sure you introduce yourself.

The contributors at Street Sense -- Kevin Lavelle, James Michael, Joseph Nickol and Atul Sharma -- have just released Investment Ready Places: A guide to community building in the New American Frontier. The booklet is a CNU NextGen initiative so I've had a little glimpse under the hood as this was being put together. Still, like many of the things NextGen members are working on, I really didn't fully understand where they were headed with this until it was released last week. It is really powerful stuff.

Start with the very first sentence of the preamble:

The small towns and cities of America are once again becoming the new frontier for development.

For those of us working in these areas, this statement is obviously true, yet it runs counter to the narrative we constantly hear about small and mid-sized towns. Small towns are dying where they are not already dead. Everyone is moving to cities. The rural brain drain. It goes on and on.

And certainly, almost all small towns are bankrupt, if not literally insolvent than functionally. The Ponzi Scheme of Suburban Growth has been particularly vicious to small and mid-sized towns, where a flattening of the development pattern has decimated their most productive areas in the core while adding disproportionately enormous liabilities on the edge. It all shows. Many of these places look like their days are numbered.

That has not stopped this group from seeing the enormous potential many small and mid-sized towns hold. As asserted in the report, Investment Ready Places (IRP) are well positioned to respond to the unique set of challenges we face. These include:

• Demand for mixed-use environments that have transportation options,
• The need for settlement patterns that accommodate a range of income levels and price points, and
• A size and scale that is amenable to retooling.

That third component is key. An Investment Ready Place does not have the same connotation as a "shovel ready" project, either in terms of the immediacy or their ultimate potential (there was a reason those projects were not getting built during normal appropriation cycles). An IRP is a place that is ready for some love. And most importantly, it is ready to love back.

Mid-tier towns and cities are our most dynamic urban settlements and have the largest untapped potential for fostering economic growth. They vary in size from a town of a few thousand people to small cities with a couple hundred thousands residents. They are small enough to be affected by incremental change and large enough to afford opportunities to create substantial impact. They provide us the stimulus of direct action followed by relatively quick, tangible change.

Change is an important part of the IRP equation. We're not talking about places that are ready for that new highway investment, the strip mall or housing subdivision. The report lists six characteristics of Investment Ready Places that need to be in place, or in development, to attract productive investments. 

1. Nourishment for residents,
2. Stable supply of water,
3. Manageable infrastructure,
4. Connected places,
5. Creative knowledge, and
6. Heritage and living culture.

The report explains each characteristic and gives detailed strategies for achieving them. They take a number of plays out of the Strong Towns playbook, including Manageable Infrastructure strategies that direct a city to "build infrastructure proportionate to the ability to finance and maintain it" and "fully capitalize on current infrastructure for development prior to building expanded systems..." This is common sense yet so unorthodox within the current approach.

The best part of the booklet is a checklist at the end that goes through each characteristic and gives community leaders -- and potential investors -- metrics on which to measure the level of community readiness. Pulling no punches, the lowest rating is "look elsewhere". Apolitic as that may be, investment looking elsewhere is exactly what is happening to places that cling to the Old Economy model.

At its core, Investment Ready Places is a call to tap the enormous potential and high-returns that still remain from the traditional development pattern. This is truly a Strong Towns approach. 

More information:

• Investment Ready Place booklet 

• Street Sense website/blog

• Street Sense on Twitter

• Street Sense on Facebook

If you would like more from Chuck Marohn, check out his new book, Thoughts on Building Strong Towns (Volume 1). 

 You can also chat with Chuck and many others about implementing a Strong Towns approach in your community by joining the Strong Towns Network. The Strong Towns Network is a social platform for those working to make their community a strong town.

Comments

[Erik]

This is great stuff! Short, sweet, and well-designed. Living in an area that is continuing down the path of least resistance - it is ripe for renewal if there is a catalyst of change.

I'll say it... having an easy to read and understand playbook all in an eye-catching appearance will turn more heads than another 80-120 page starchy study.

But right now we are set to build 2 new roads to lure in "economic development" and are set to crack open a new TIF District to get us even more "economic development." [sarcasm]

[windsorshane]

Great information, I believe whole heartily that our small towns and cities are ready to become some of the most financially stable and livable places in both the US and Canada. While this article hits that on the head, I'm not sure developers are getting the message quite yet.

[Sophia Katt]

What a timely counterpoint this Sunday NY Times series on Elyria, OH is to this article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/15/us/this-land-elyria-mayor-dreams-of-better-days.html

I really like the Investment Ready booklet at the referenced site, and appreciate that Food Security is the first item on the checklist.

[Lawrence]

My region looked at the Redevelopment Ready concept a couple years ago. But it didn't go anywhere. Why? Looking back, perhaps there wasn't a commitment or recognized need to change. Or perhaps the path forward was not clear enough to build momentum. Or perhaps it was simply victim of the Great Recession. Until now, I hadn't thought much on this question.

As I read the report, I found myself thinking back to my region's experiences and couldn't see how this report moves the needle for us. In fact, I could see officials making a case that my region already meets the characteristics outlined in the report and are deploying the recommended strategies. Arguing those points distracts us from the work at hand. The system has a way of chewing up these reports and spitting them out.

I believe it's up to us to create the future we want. This "future we want" vision is action-oriented. It's focused on incremental change at the grass roots. It starts with people showing up. The majority of Boomers seem happy with the status quo. The majority of the GenX crowd seems indifferent. The Millennials have mostly not yet engaged on these topics because of their youth. How will sentiments in each generational group change? That could guide our future as much as anything.

For those that do show up, a common understanding leads to shared beliefs and eventually to action. As long as we rely on establishment systems to make the decisions for us, reports like these will struggle to find champions and establish legacy.

Good work here for those in the CNU community that have shown up. It's up to us to honor that work with action.