Building a Great Community: A Vision for Thriving Cities

Over the next year, I will be publishing a series of articles that highlight the creative work being done to ensure that communities thrive at a critical time in our history. The series, called Flourishing Cities, will highlight the innovative work public leaders are doing to sustain and improve our quality of life. Technology—and specifically geographic information system (GIS) technology—plays a vital role in enabling those efforts.

Throughout the series, we will examine impactful planning and development strategies. These include strategies for mixed-use development, green infrastructure, active transit infrastructure, community engagement, smart growth, placemaking, inclusive and affordable housing, resilient infrastructure, and access to open space, parks, and natural areas.

In many ways, this series gives sharper focus to ideas that have fascinated me most of my life. When I was young, I daydreamed about creating my own town. My vision was a community where residents could work and go to school close to home, with no sprawl or traffic congestion.

The city I envisioned had tree-lined streets and a robust network of ball fields, parks, and trails. The homes had lawns and front porches where kids could run and socialize. Sidewalks and bike paths funneled residents toward a thriving downtown with great coffee shops, the perfect record store, and locally owned businesses.

My town had an active volunteer radio station. Bicycles were the favored mode of transportation. The evenings and weekends offered outdoor concerts, independent films, and festivals. As an oddity, perhaps, my make-believe town had mountains with tons of snow and a tropical beach with perfect waves.? My town had everything I liked, and people loved living there.

As an adult, the characteristics of my perfect town are more realistic. The urban amenities that appeal to me don’t necessarily appeal to others. Not everyone wants snow!? That said, I do believe we share a common desire to live well and flourish in the places we choose to reside. This has become more challenging as urban population growth, and the associated infrastructure to support it, advances at unsustainable levels.?

You are likely noticing this right now through your experience with traffic congestion, commercial sprawl, and tract neighborhoods.? Major contributors to what we are experiencing include a dominating automobile-centric approach to design, a cultural bias toward overconsumption, short sighted economic development, and the commitment to the commercialization and development of land over its more socially beneficial intrinsic value.?

Over my 30-year career, I have been fortunate to travel the globe to support the implementation of GIS systems in government and communities of all sizes and jurisdictions. I continue to be inspired by public servants who are dedicated to making our communities and lives better.? It is through their dedicated leadership, vision, passion, and creative investment choices that the communities we want to live in are actualized. This is happening because more and more public leaders are realizing the value of human-centric design, or as one city describes – planning and designing at a human scale.

Creative approaches to urban development can not only make communities better but also have a positive impact on global issues, including climate change, sustainability, resiliency, and public health. It’s a deliberate effort that, when done properly, has paid these communities back in spades. GIS is playing a meaningful role in this work by leveraging the power of location and spatial analysis, which provide data for better insight, decision-making, collaboration, and engagement.

My hope is that the Flourishing Cities series will inspire communities to imagine what’s next and to leverage technology to create amenity-rich communities we can flourish in.

Be on the lookout for the first article on the impact of bicycle infrastructure on cities—it drops February 2 and will be followed by an audio podcast soon after.? I hope you enjoy the series.