Recollections of Place Making

In the 1970’s, I was at the Tug Hill Commission as a planner tasked with improving the nature and culture of the many small towns in and around the “Lesser Wilderness”. In this early stage of my work, I was piecing together a philosophy of planning based on authenticity. Seeking out the people, the environments, the social customs and habits that characterized a specific place, then trying to find ways to both preserve and encourage these traits in ways that would convey their importance into the future. My nascent philosophy of place-based planning was my response to what I viewed as the catastrophic impact of urban renewal policies and banal “modern” architecture. I developed and maintained the professional approach of understanding the place before making any attempt to “plan” for it. Much of the prevailing thought of this time was to focus on the physical—remove the existing fabric and with a “clean slate” design something contemporary. The physical place is an embodiment of the social, economic and historical elements and cannot be treated separately. 

Place making is a term that has evolved from the work of a wide variety of experts and organizations. My first recollection of its use in the planning context was at an American Planning Association conference in the early 1980s. Ronald Lee Fleming used “Place Making” as he spoke about the work his Townscape Institute was doing at the intersection of public art and sense of place.  There were many involved in similar work coming from different and independent perspectives. Place making itself is an organic idea and has equally many wellsprings that have shaped and molded its trajectory to this day. 

After my work in Tug Hill, I learned of the fledgling Main Street experiment by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. In my position in the US Department of Agriculture’s Office of Rural Development Policy, I was able to channel grants to help expand the few early Main Street towns to hundreds across the US during the early 1980s. Main Street was a systematic effort that went beyond the physical design and appearance of small towns to the underlying issues that shaped them: economics, management and promotion. One of the elements funded under the USDA effort was a training program for Main Street managers along with standardized materials and case studies that were shared and used as part of the curricula. It also included political advocacy. In many communities, state efforts regarding highways was less than sensitive to the character of small towns, so local leaders were schooled in showing transportation departments that there are sound alternatives to widening streets and providing thought for pedestrians along with cars. The first Inter-modal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act (ISTEA) was a landmark in reflecting a less car-oriented approach that respected pedestrians and bikes along with lighting, landscaping and environmental protection.

It was my good fortune to work at this concept of place making internationally, too. In 2011, I was involved with the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS) which developed the Valletta Principles establishing details for both preserving existing places, but also ways to sensitively add new development. Later that year, I co-authored a paper for the American Planning Association describing how arts and culture enhance community character. As a Fellow for the Energy and Climate Partnership of the Americas (ECPA), I promoted sustainable place making and walkable cities under a grant from the Organization of American States (OAS) in 2014. That led to a report on the issues and solutions for each of four Caribbean cities: Bridgetown, Barbados, St. Georges, Grenada, Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago and Parimaribo, Surinam. The full text of the report can be viewed on my blog site: http://dolmenchamber.blogspot.com/  (apologies for the missing illustrations.  If you would like to receive the illustrated copy, please email me.) 

In 2015 a variety of organizations came together the form Planners for Climate Action (P4CA). We published a bookletGuiding Principles for City Climate Action Planning that incorporates elements of Place making that are by now, familiar refrains: historic fabric preservation, infill, walkability, mixed use, and human scale architecture to mention a few. 

The Climate Heritage Network was created in 2018 to focus attention on the linkage among climate action, cultural heritage and place making. 

In April of 2020, I retired from APA but remain involved in a variety of efforts including management of the Place Making Institute (PMI), described below, under the leadership of Ronald Lee Fleming.  

The Place Making Institute (PMI) serves as a long term advocate for community-based planning and design, with programming for education, engagement of public officials and non-profit organizations. In addition, research will be sponsored through a fellows program that houses two to four fellows in residence annually at Bellevue House, utilizing the new library and other facilities.

 

One of the key aspects of ‘Place Making’ is managing the integrity of the community in its public space, architecture, civic institutions and design standards. The PMI encourages increased respect for places and focuses on enhancing skills and techniques which support communities across America.

 

The Institute is similar to the long-running Mayor’s Institute on City Design, which brings mayors together with a design faculty to discuss specific issues relating to the character of each city. This program was conceived in 1989 and has continued to the present at the National Endowment for the Arts. I staffed the Mayor’s Institute during the first several years with guidance from the founders, former Mayor Joe Riley of Charleston, Jaqueline Robertson, then Dean of the School of Architecture and Planning at the University of Virginia and Adele Chatfield-Taylor, past Director of the NEA Design Arts Program. 

 

Six to eight mayors come together with design professionals and each brings a specific issue their city is facing.  The faculty along with the mayors engages in lively and insightful conversation illuminating ways to manage and solve city issues.  In addition, some faculty members offer short talks that illustrate their work and general practices on topics such as economic development, cultural conservation or design guidelines.

The PMI is conceived along the same contours, but aimed at planning directors and local leaders rather than mayors.

 

Planning directors face challenges from politically appointed planning boards who are often dominated by development interests. The concept behind the PMI is to encourage planning directors from communities with great assets--historic character, scenic beauty, geographic setting, and outstanding architectural ensembles to fortify their capacity for providing strategic leadership.  PMIs intention is to strengthen the hand of the planners and community leaders by sharing experiences from other locales, expanding strategies and crafting tools for implementation.  In the future, there may be regional variations hosted by faculty from the Institute.