A GREAT PLACE ribbon is our appreciation for great places and the people making them.
This page is a hub for showcasing placemakers and places from our national roadtrip along with their "superpowers," so you can see the league of excellent placemakers working around the country.
Epicenter
Green River, Utah Superpowers: Rural & Proud Placemaking, Art & Housing, Apolitical Placemaking, Lomg game, Architects on staff, Super grant writing, Artist residency, Americorps relationship |
The Holleran Group and Sisters of Color
Denver, Colorado (Park Hill and Loretto Heights Neighborhoods) Superpowers: Integrated POC bottom-up development, cooperative "promotora model"-based multi-tenant, multi-service nonprofit hub with job training, housing, arts, education and food empowerment. |
Zeppelin Development
Denver, Colorado (RiNo Neighborhood) Superpowers: Extereme mixes of uses and scales, adaptive reuse, campus-thinking, utilizing materials unconventionally, LEED and sustainable practices. |
Downtown Grand Junction
Grand Junction, Colorado (Downtown) Superpowers: TIF-funded DDA, BID and Cultural District overlay working seamlessly with the City's departments over 30 years. Now booming, GJ's operation is a model for small downtowns. |
Old North St. Louis Restoration Group
St. Louis, Missouri (Old North Neighborhood) Superowers: City of neighborhoods mentality, Extreme ownership/neighborhood stewardship, distributive leadership, neighborhood restoration CDC, Asset-Based Community Development with everyone contributing their highest talents |
Old North St Louis/ St Louis Place Chess Club
St. Louis, Missouri (Old North Neighborhood) Superpowers: Regular community-scale programming, Friendly Competition, Inviting Others to Play |
Sunflower+ project
St. Louis, Missouri (Old North Neighborhood) Superpowers: Visionary and Professional Artist, Land Lab partnership with Washu, Stacking Activities (Richard gets his exercise while mowing 2.2 miles of vacant lot) WATCH A VIDEO |
South Grand Community Improvement District
St. Louis, Missouri (Tower Park Neighborhood) Superpowers: Super Rachel - a world class director/jack-of-all-trades, right-sized CID (7 linear blocks), everyone gets along with no drama, sales tax district, Great Streets grant from the COG, density (28k residents and strongest bus route in state), community event space controlled by the CID, Community Pride an full engagement |
Retrofitting of Carmel Suburb into Walkable Urbanism
The City of Carmel, IN Superpowers: Visionary Mayor for 20 years promoting Livable Cities ideals (aesthetics, public space, density, embracing arts and culture) using TIFs to bury parking and build structures that allow developers to build mixed-spaces people want to be and that generate as much as 3000% more tax revenue for the City. |
Felege Hiywot Center
Indianapolis, IN (Sheldon Street) Superpowers: Raising the neighborhood children into the caretakers of the neighborhood, citizen science, utilizing gardens and food as a welcome mat, unshakable faith in what's right and treating the person in front of you, changing hearts to change minds, being visible, compelling storytelling, it's not about the money |
Westwood Works
Cincinatti, Ohio (Westwood Neighborhood) Superpowers: Neighbors taking extreme ownership of their neighborhood and the good things in it, High-level non-profit management and community outreach experience, neighbor-led redesign of Gamble Park, storefront vacancy popups that turned into in-neighborhood business ownership, urban fabric is its own seperate township giving an old town feel, breaking down the divide between volunteers and attendees and grouping people by interests instead of abilities, citywide neighbor organization called Homebase has been helpful and helped stimulate $1.5mil ARPA funds towards neighborhood intiatitives. |
Epic Small
Delaware, Ohio (working all over Ohio) Superpowers: Talented principle has a strong arts background and aesthetic talents, is an excellent communicator, desires to connect the built enviornment with the actual environment, has deeply centered sense of self, is an undetermined DOer and she is massively in-touch with inner feeling of place. Bonus points: marry a placemaker working on the Ohio Main Street revitalization program and you've got a public space power couple. |
Tim, Bridgette and the Neighbors of Bellevue
Bellevue, Kentucky Superpowers: Creating spaces where people can show up as they are , how they want and when they want. Not expecting or requiring of people. Bringing neighbors together around a monthly potluck where magic and connection happens through the "eating a pound of salt together." Keeping control local, Ownership/live here forever mentality, Take your money off Wall Street and put it onto your own street, Blending ABCD with Person-Centered strategies, bucking the "mask of care" idea of the careperson and the client and the disempowering labels we give people, "Institutions will insititution and Community will community," Asking three questions: 1) what is your gift?, 2) who else is interested? and 3) who else can we invite to a party/project that builds a team around this person, gifting community project funds to families with a special needs child so that the community can rally around the family and their project. |
MadJax Maker Space
Muncie, Indiana Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Big Car
Indianapolis, Indiana Superpowers: Coming Soon |
CAFE
Indianapolis, Indiana (Far East Side Neighborhood) Superpowers: Coming Soon |
City of Lafayette Economic Development Department, Tippecanoe Arts Federation, Sharing Gardens, Habitat for Humanity - Lafayette
Lafayette, Indiana (Wabash Neighborhood) Superpowers: Coming Soon |
What's Up Downtown
Flint, Michigan Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Mayor Melanie of Ferndale
Ferndale, Michigan Superpowers: Coming Soon |
The Porch Project
Flint, Michigan Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Artists on Woodward
Pontiac, Michigan Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Micah 6
Pontiac, Michigan Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Masterscape
Pontiac, Michigan Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Pontiac Holonomy Incubator
Pontiac, Michigan (Downtown) Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Place + Main Consulting and Downtown Happy Hour
Lansing, Michigan (works in many smaller than 50,000 people communities) Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Downtown Grand Rapids
Grand Rapids, Michigan Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Great Uncle Artie's Boxing Ring
Warren, Ohio Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Erie Arts and Culture
Erie, Pennsylvania Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Erie Downtown Partnership
Erie, Pennsylvania Superpowers: Coming Soon |
Sisters of St. Joseph of Northwestern Pennsylvania
Erie, Pennsylvania Superpowers: Coming Soon |
ClearWater Conservancy
State College, Pennsylvania Superpowers: Coming Soon |
3 Dots Downtown
State College, Pennsylvania Superpowers: Coming Soon |
