Ms. Shirley Franklin was elected Mayor of the City of Atlanta and served two terms from 2002 to 2009. Franklin’s record of civic involvement spans over three decades, including digital advocacy for underserved communities, the arts, homelessness and higher education. She also serves as the Chairman of the Board of Directors and Chief Executive Officer of Purpose Built Communities, a national holistic community revitalization organization and President of Clarke-Franklin and Associates, Inc.
Sustainability
Sub Topics: Sustainability
Ellen Dunham Jones Master Talk
Ellen Dunham-Jones is a professor of architecture and urban design at the Georgia Institute of Technology, where she coordinates the MS/Urban Design degree. An authority on sustainable suburban redevelopment, she is co-author of Retrofitting Suburbia; Urban Design Solutions for Redesigning Suburbs (Wiley: 2009, 2011, 2013). The award-winning book’s documentation of successful retrofits of aging suburban property types into healthier, more sustainable places has received significant attention.
NIMBYs, Elites & Socialists, Oh My!: How Downtown Organizations are Navigating New Political Turbulence
In many cities and downtowns our newfound success is leading to high housing costs, spiraling labor rates and the rapid gentrification of neighborhoods. Without interventions to promote affordable housing, stabilize neighborhoods, workforce training, public education and other social equity measures, many cities are at risk of losing what makes them authentic, and arguably the DNA for their economic vitality. Downtown organizations have a role in this debate and can help shape local policies.
Holding Back the Tides of Time: How We Deal With Changing Retail Mixes
There is an ever-widening array of policy tools that cities in California and beyond have already implemented or are considering in an effort to regulate retail mixes and slow tenant displacement in rapidly-gentrifying or already-gentrified business districts. With some of these, enough time has even elapsed that we can now start to analyze outcomes.
Mode Split
Seattle is notorious for bad traffic. For the business community, this fact presented an obstacle for job growth. The Downtown Transportation Alliance formed Commute Seattle, a transportation management association incorporated within and managed by the Downtown Seattle Association, which collaborates with businesses to enable them to achieve community transportation objectives.
Vision Cedar Rapids Downtown Framework Plan
In 2007, the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance commissioned the first Vision Cedar Rapids Downtown Framework Plan to mold a clear, unified vision for downtown, which directly informed the planning efforts in the immediate aftermath of the 2008 flood event. With the framework for flood recovery in place, the plan was updated in 2017 to launch to an even bigger and broader plan for the future.
Top Issues Council: Inclusive Places
Despite a remarkable urban revival over the past few decades, wealth and income disparities have widened inexorably in city centers, including both within and between metropolitan regions. Some place managers are asking themselves if their work has unintentionally fostered increasingly homogenized and exclusive urban districts. This report explores the challenges and opportunities in prioritizing inclusion and equity in the urban place management field.
Growth Without Gridlock – Making the Case for Mobility Investments
To combat gridlock the first step is to improve and promote transportation alternatives to single occupancy vehicles. The presentation outlines transportation improvement strategies and plans from Palo Alto, San Jose, and Oakland.
Urban Agriculture in Your Downtown
Urban farms are a beautiful and practical use of urban space, providing a number of benefits.
Resilience on the Street – Preparing for the Unexpected
Communities around the United States have been rocked by unthinkable disasters, realizing only after the fact that an Emergency Operation Plan may have helped mitigate losses. This presentation walks through the immediate and rippling economic and social effects of active threat situations.
Innovation Districts 2.0: Lessons Learned from Early Adopters and Future Action
Dozens of cities have designated specific neighborhoods as “innovation districts.” These districts have three essential components: anchor institutions, entrepreneurs and amenities. While some pieces of a district may emerge organically, activating a district to benefit the entire city requires purposeful action and leadership.
Trash Talks: Approaches for a Waste-Free Public Realm
The cleanliness of a neighborhood’s streets and sidewalks is one of the most visible metrics by which urban place management organizations are evaluated. BIDs get firsthand experience with the impacts of too much trash on budgets, pedestrian activity, and business retention. Practitioners will share learnings on moving towards a sustainable and waste-free public realm by partnering with property owners and businesses and implementing innovative solutions.
The Opioid Epidemic: Is There a Solution For Your City?
Many cities wonder what they can do to help combat the opioid and addiction epidemic affecting their communities. This free webinar, presented by Futures of Palm Beach, will provide statistics on what’s working and what is not. It will open your mind to cutting-edge solutions and treatment resources, and empower IDA members with new tools, knowledge, and verbiage surrounding heroin use, addiction and addiction treatment.
Bridging the Gap – Blending Social and Business Agendas in Your BIA or BID District
Diversity creates excitement, vibrancy, and economic resilience, and can be the heart of a successful urban center offering a place to combat discrimination and social isolation. BIA’s can play an active role in ensuring commercial districts are inclusive places for all people. This panel provides examples from three BIA’s on how to create welcoming urban centers for all.
Fasten Your Seatbelt: What the Coming Mobility Revolution Means for Your Downtown
Smart mobility technology that promises to make transportation more accessible, inclusive, and equitable could dramatically transform our downtowns. But how? What are the larger implications of the rise of autonomous vehicles? Stantec’s Urban Places smart mobility experts will explore autonomy’s implications for downtown development and get you up to speed on this paradigm shift and how to adapt.