One study by ASU’s Sara Bratcher looked at what communities invest in downtown and what a “blueprint guide to a successful downtown revitalization” might look like. Sarah does a great job of demystifying the points that make a successful downtown investment.
Qualitative Success (Physical Attributes, Downtown Brands):A qualitative success problem is defined as an action that improves or adds quality in a particular area and cannot be measured, but rather visually observed. The physical characteristics of the downtown area should have characteristics that enhance the overall quality of the downtown area and invite people to spend time in the area. (Ferguson, 2005).
Legislative/Governmental Successes:Legislative action by governments at all levels is the final theme, leading to success defining the elements of revitalization. Legislation infuses the revitalization process in a number of ways. Application, planning and zoning actions and ordinances for individual projects. The inclusion of these elements can have a significant impact on the activation process and its timelines, which in turn impacts overall success. Local government planners, politicians and the general public , and development community efforts have been shown to improve building quality and sense of place within a city (Warson, 2006). The following list are some legislative elements that define successful activation, repeated by experts and academics.
partnership: One of the most repeated defining elements of success is public-private partnerships (Leinberger, 2005). Effective partnerships allow us to complete a variety of projects in the downtown area. This serves both private developers and the city’s overall goals, depending on the type of project. These can include anything from developer incentives to zoning and ordinance support. Public-private partnerships revolve around the inclusion of government grants for private development projects. Within the context of this report, this is an act between the government and private developers, with private companies receiving funding incentives from government agencies. These funds are based on her two-party agreement that the government will provide certain incentives if private companies provide agreed development.
Success as a sense of place: Based on success defining elements within the categories of qualitative, quantitative and legislative elements, “sense of place” is used as the universal definition of success within the report. Sense of place does not have a clear definition, but it takes into account various factors that create a particular identity of a place. Contains location elements. historical factors, economic diversity, cultural and pedestrian comforts, and overall attractiveness to visitors (Robertson, 1999). A sense of place has been viewed as including quantitative, qualitative, and legislative elements. Failure to find all three elements in a revitalization effort is not considered a successful project within the scope of this report. Downtown should also include functional essentials as components to be considered successful in this report. Functional necessities include courts, post offices, libraries, theaters, and stores all in close proximity to each other (Gratz, 1998). These services are associated with downtown business, government, and tourism activities.
