Ohio Leaders Learn Lessons from Europe

Greater Ohio’s Executive Director, Lavea Brachman, will be joining 20 leaders from Cleveland, Youngstown, Flint, Detroit, Pittsburgh, the federal government, and select philanthropic foundations on a 8 day learning tour through Barcelona and the Ruhr Valley of Germany.  Sponsored by the German Marshall Fund of the United States, the tour is part of a 3-year “Cities in Transition: Shrinking Cities” Project that is exploring successful policies and practices Europeans have used to rebuild their cities and economies.   Lavea Brachman is a senior fellow at GMF and has played a leadership role in shaping the Cities in Transition project for the last 18 months.  While in the metro regions of Essen and Barcelona, this year’s study tour participants will learn about innovative regional economic development agencies that coordinate business site selection, industry clustering, and external promotion of the region; the transformation of heavy manufacturing facilities into multiuse R&D labs, business incubators and recreation spaces; remediation of coal mining sites for new uses; and the incentives and investments used to develop a knowledge economy.  These cities and their surrounding industrial regions have successfully addressed many of the economic development challenges Ohio’s cities still face. 

This tour offers unparalleled opportunities to talk to the architects and officials who envisioned and implemented the rebirth of Europe’s struggling cities and regions.  Viewing the results, talking about strategies that have and haven’t worked, and learning how a metro’s vision became a reality enables participants to quickly gain a deep understand of best practices that might be replicated in Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania.

In the coming weeks, we will discuss lessons learned on our blog and website.

To learn more about the key takeaways and observations from last year’s German Marshall Fund study tour to Manchester, England and Leipzig, Germany, you can read past posts on: the use of public money as investments not subsidies; the role of leadership in these cities’ revitalization; neighborhood revitalization successes; comprehensive urban, economic, and community planning and development.

Parking Smartly and Alternative Uses for Metered Parking Spaces

Car parking and specifically, parking spaces, have been getting a fair bit of attention lately in Ohio and beyond.  San Francisco recently launched “SFPark” a web-based system that enables smartphone users to find available parking in real time.  The sensors that provide information on open and filled spots are also helping the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency to determine high-use and underused areas.  With this information, SFMTA can adjust meter pricing to incentive drivers to utilize (cheaper) spots away from the high-use streets.  Although the initial investments for this pilot project have been expensive (a $19.8 million grant from US Department of Transportation), the long term savings of improved traffic flow will result in reduced gas consumption and emissions from circling cars, and a likely increased use in public transit to high-use, high priced, areas.  Most importantly, this system allows San Francisco to more effectively use the resources they have already, and reduces the need to build more parking in the urban core—an aggregated cost that likely would be much higher than the price of the pilot. Closer to home, cities throughout Ohio will be participating in PARK(ing) Day on Friday September 16^th.  PARK(ing) Day is a worldwide event where artists and citizens use metered parking spaces for temporary public art spaces.  The event uses DIY art installations to “call attention to the need for more urban open space, to generate critical debate around how public space is created and allocated, and to improve the quality of urban human habitat.”  Whereas SFPark works to make the existing parking infrastructure more efficient, PARK(ing) Day raises questions about the infrastructure itself and suggests that public space can be used for more than just car parking.  Here in Greater Ohio’s homebase, Columbus, high school and college art students can register their PARK(ing) Day spot for a public art competition.

Revitalizing our cities and using land in intelligent and economically competitive ways means that parking will always be part of the conversation. 

The original PARK, a public art installation set up for two hours at a San Francisco parking meter in 2005.  Photo courtesy of Rebar Art and Design Studio.

Setting the Stage for Brownfield Redevelopment

Greater Ohio's partners continue to create innovative programs that are building prosperity throughout the state.  This month's guest post is from Diane Alecusan, an Urban Revitalization Specialist for the Department of Development.  The US EPA defines a brownfield as property “complicated by the presence or potential presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant, or contaminant”. The impacts of brownfields however are often not limited to the potentially contaminated property alone. These negative impacts may move beyond the property and have an economically devastating effect on the larger area including homes, businesses, schools, and recreational areas that are not brownfields. Impacts can range from vacancy to a decrease in property values to public health concerns. Planning for this larger brownfields-impacted area at one time can ensure that remediation and reuse occur in a coordinated, efficient way and in turn, result in greater success.

The Ohio Department of Development, Urban Development Division has developed the Brownfield Action Plan Pilot Program in an effort to engage with communities on improved, more focused brownfield and area-wide planning techniques. The pilot program will use existing funds to assist communities in the development and implementation of an area-wide brownfield action plan. The development of the plan will set the stage for a quicker, clearer path to redevelopment of the area, resulting in successful revitalization of the community, returning entire corridors to productive use, and restoring neighborhood health.

The pilot program, loosely modeled after the US EPA’s Brownfield Area-Wide Planning Pilots, will involve two parts: 1) technical assistance from the Division for development of the plan, and 2) completion of a grant-funded activity that will provide more detailed research or jump-start implementation of their recently-completed plan. The two-phase process is designed to quickly but thoughtfully develop an actionable plan and maintain momentum to ensure the plan’s next steps are implemented, increasing the likelihood and speed with which properties will transform into economically beneficial use.

The Division’s goal is to use the area-wide planning approach to help communities leverage and prioritize limited local, state, and federal resources to create the greatest economic impact in areas containing brownfields.  In addition, the Division has partnered with the Community Development Division to maximize funding availability and flexibility and to provide an additional level of expertise.

The Urban Development Division will release the Request for Letters of Interest and application form on Thursday, September 1, 2011 with a due date of Friday, October 14, 2011. The Division anticipates awarding up to four pilot projects, which would be notified by the end of November. Additional information can be found on the program webpage: www.development.ohio.gov/urban/brownfieldawp.htm.