Placemaking MML

April 13, 2016

Getting Millennials Interested in Local Government

While attending the League's Capital Conference last month, I had the pleasure of sharing breakfast with local officials from Hazel Park, all of whom took a moment to update me on the new and exciting things happening this year in…

April 13, 2016

Hazel Park CNU24 Legacy Design Project is Inspiring

Team Leader Vinayak Bharne of Moule & Polyzoides Archtects & Urbanisms talks with Hazel Park residents about ways to improve their community as part of a CNU Legacy Project Tuesday. Hazel Park residents, city leaders and business owners got good…

March 4, 2016

New Guide to Placemaking Available for Free Download

The League has partnered with the Michigan State Housing Development Authority (MSHDA) and the Michigan State University Land Policy Institute (LPI) on numerous initiatives in recent years to promote investments in quality places across the state. Now, our friends at…

February 26, 2016

Rail across Michigan, coast-to-coast? Yes, please!

The pre-feasibility study looked at several routings for coast-to-coast service, as well as connections to existing Amtrak services. Rail service connecting Detroit, Ann Arbor, Lansing, Grand Rapids, and Holland? Yes, please! With the amount of travel we do just between…

February 23, 2016

TechBrewery Encourages Geek Culture in Ann Arbor

Ann Arbor is home to the University of Michigan, frequently deemed one of the best universities in the world, so you might safely assume it's a city full of geeks. Geek culture, however, transcends the basic campus community of students…

February 16, 2016

Flint: Bad Pipes, Worse Policy

Throughout the last couple months, news and commentary regarding the water crisis in Flint, Michigan has permeated the media. MLive literally has a "Flint Water Crisis" sidebar, celebrity tweets abound, and the topic has predictably wheedled its way into presidential…

February 9, 2016

Lessons from Allegan’s Pop-up Retail

A formerly vacant downtown storefront is full of activity during PlacePOP in Allegan. Read the full report here. Pop-up retail is a fun and creative way to activate and promote underutilized storefronts. In December 2015, we had the opportunity to…

February 9, 2016

Snapchat: A Placemaking Tool

Though many municipalities have bravely ventured into social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter to communicate with residents, for the grand majority of local governments Snapchat remains uncharted territory. It's understandable that local officials have hit roadblocks with social media;…

February 2, 2016

Historic districts: keeping the great places we already have

Last week saw Lansing take up bills for a "Historic District Modernization Act", as well as CityLab weigh in on historic districts' role in driving up housing prices and limiting affordability. In this context, we can revisit the role of…

February 1, 2016

Rethinking Rideshare

As innovation has made it possible for my generation to satisfy needs at an increasingly rapid pace, we've adapted accordingly. Millennials expect the same efficiency that we see in services like Amazon Prime and Spotify to be reflected in our…