Neighborhood Design Center, Inc.

COMMUNITY VISIONING

The first step in a collaborative design process is to identify shared visions and goals. Community visioning workshops use small group discussion formats to engage all participants in dialogue about their visions, hopes, goals, issues and opportunities for their neighborhood. Sharing between groups highlights common visions and goals.

EXPERIENCING YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD’S DESIGN

How does a neighborhood stack up to the shared visions and goals? At the Neighborhood Design Walkabout participants walk around the neighborhood to identify, discuss and photograph the physical assets and opportunities of their community. Through group and on-line interactions, community members portray what makes their neighborhood special, and the best opportunities to shape future growth to achieve shared goals. The bank of images and comments become a community resource.

ESTABLISHING DESIGN PREFERENCES

What types of urban design are right for your community? By viewing, rating and discussing a images of different built environments, participants at the Design Preference Survey identify the neighborhood design elements they view as appropriate or not appropriate for their community. The recorded images help communicate the community’s design preferences to developers and local officials.

MODELING NEIGHBORHOOD DESIGNS

How do community goals, assets and opportunities, and design preferences translate into actual designs? At Model Block Workshops, participants build neighborhood designs by placing blocks on aerial photographs. Information from the designs – such as number of units and square feet of commercial space – is recorded. The information is used to test market feasibility and to measure environmental sustainability.

The NDC offers two types of model workshops. One workshop is geared for urban infill and redevelopment sites. Aerial photographs depict a site – likely selected by community members at one of the workshop above – about the size of a half city block. Financial spreadsheets are used to test the market feasibility of the designs created.

At the other workshop participants use blocks to design neighborhoods. Site maps typically represent 40 or more acres. Information from the designs is used to estimate financial and environmental impacts.

GUIDING SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

How do the designs influence future change and development? Perhaps the most important way designs influence change is through community members with greater capacity to communicate feasible and sustainable design guidelines to developers and local officials. Another tool are design guidelines that describe neighborhood parameters, such as height, scale, placement on the lot, etc. that are most appropriate for the neighborhood.