Connecting a virtual world to the physical

The benefits of building community virtually (via the internet) are often seriously limited without a physical venue by which the online participants can meet face to face.  The goal of CoolTowns is to provide both.

What would this look like?  Simply combine the virtual community elements in yesterday’s blog with the third places described on this web site.  Then you’ll come up with things like a “Friendster Bar” as a friend of mine would like to

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Building community - virtually

There’s an old argument that the internet is isolating people.  However, if you ask anyone in the net generation, they wouldn’t know how to meet and keep their friends otherwise.

Take something as simple group email programs.  About twenty of my college friends keep in touch this way, and we plan reunion trips every few years.  There’s no way we’d keep in touch like this without the internet.

Then there’s services like Friendster, myspace and Meet Up that

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The things a CoolTown piazza can’t be without:

Movie theaters - There are several reasons why movie theaters can be the centerpiece to making a CoolTown piazza a true destination:

1. It will single-handedly bring hundreds of people out at night (away from their couch and TV sets.)  They’d then be within a mecca of food, entertainment and social opportunities.

2. It promotes diversity - see point #4 of this previous CoolTown blog.

3. In Europe’s oldest

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CoolTown piazza 4: The eclectic nightclub

The things a CoolTown piazza can’t be without:

The eclectic nightclub - Nightlife is a must for the creative - entrepreneurial market, and for many the night doesn’t begin until the morning.  If you’re the only nightclub in town, then you need a minimum of three stories to play three genres of music - whether it’s hip hop, r&b, house, techno, trance, salsa, ‘new swing’ or that 70s, 80s, 90s stuff.  Why?  Just ask any creative - entrepreneur what kind

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CoolTown piazza 3: The pub

Essential #3 - The things a CoolTown piazza can’t be without:

The pub - Where everybody knows your name.  The pub is a standard in England, and the typical ones there are small, very homey, lots of wood floors, walls and furniture, and a line of regulars parked on the bar stools.  For some, that bar stool is the equivalent of the couch in the living room, while the buzz of conversation in the air replaces your television set.  Well in fact, many pubs do have a

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CoolTown piazza 2: The cafe

Seinfeld fans can relate to this one…

Essential #2 - The things a CoolTown piazza can’t be without:

The late night cafe:  The place where you can get $5 sandwiches/burritos or $4 bacon*/eggs/toast at 3 in the morning, without OD’ing** on grease, fat and sugar.

The key is to establish places that people can theoretically frequent every single day without going bankrupt or skyrocketing their risk for diabetes.  Not everyone has to drink coffee or tea, but

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This week I’ll take a look at what the ideal shops, restaurants, entertainment and services would be on a CoolTown main street, or even better, a piazza.  Thus, imagine the coolest of main streets as a piazza.

Essential #1 - These are the things a CoolTown piazza can’t be without:

The hang-out coffeehouse.  The one with the local owners, local art on the walls, local live bands stopping by (see the pattern?) and bulletin board stuffed with ads from

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The Creating Cool conference: Part 2

The most inspiring person at the Creating Cool conference was the lunchtime keynote: Bill Strickland of the Manchester Craftsmen’s Guild.

Here was a simple man with no money who established a center for excellence in job training, art and music production in “a black neighborhood in inner city Pittsburgh” as he reminded the audience repeatedly.  The incredible story behind the center is definitely worth the time to read.

Another great story told at the

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The Creating Cool conference: Part 1

How big a trend is this ‘cool town’ thing?  The organizers for today’s Creating Cool conference in Lansing, Michigan were expecting 700 attendees.  There were 1400.

Governor Jennifer Granholm opened the one-day event, and I’d have to say I haven’t witnessed a cooler governor.  She wasn’t out there giving a typical political speech with statistics and policy promises, she was out there impassioning people to think creatively, to think cool.

Richard

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Off to the Creating Cool conference

The Creating Cool conference is on Thursday, Dec. 10, 2003, in Lansing, Michigan.  Richard Florida keynotes.  Click here for

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Pennsylvania - Far from supporting CoolTowns (so far)

This new report from the Brookings Institution, Back to Prosperity: A Competitive Agenda for Renewing Pennsylvania, December 2003 can be summed up in this excerpt:

“Pennsylvania’s cities, boroughs, and older townships possess centrality and convenience. They marshal numerous health centers and educational institutions, strong business traditions, and abundant transportation links. And equally important, they offer in abundance the

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Community profiler ePodunk ranked the top college towns in their College Town Index.  Focusing on the community rather than the colleges, some of the criteria include restaurants; book, music and periodical stores; entertainment offerings; and publishers, recording studios and other information-oriented companies, among the usual economic demographics.

A summary of the rankings:

Big Cities
1 Boston-Cambridge, MA
2 Minneapolis, MN
3 Denver, CO
4 Columbus, OH
5 Seattle, WA

Medium-Sized Cities …

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Investing in infill

So what can the private sector do to invest in infill neighorhoods in cities and towns when public sector legislation favors sprawl?

Find out if City Hall is ‘cool’.

1. If you’re in one of those cities that is legislated for sprawl (ie disallows mixed-use, higher densities, low parking ratios and tax reinvestment back into the project’s infrastructure) - find another city to invest in.  You’ll have a very low ROI, if any, otherwise.

2. If you’re in one of those cities

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The Washington Post: Retailers Embrace the Great Outdoors

There’s no better way to make a case for this week’s blogs on investing in infill, than providing evidence of both the economic benefits and market demand:

- An International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) survey found that ‘outdoor malls’ (urban-oriented town centers) produce better sales than enclosed, typically suburban shopping malls.  Last year they reported median

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To answer the previous entry’s questions:

Municipalities (economic development agencies in partnership with planning agencies) have the power to reverse the ‘greenfield easier’/‘infill-harder’ reality.  The overwhelming desire to truly accomplish this is years away unfortunately.

What municipalities can do to help build CoolTowns:
1. Property/site identification and assembly assistance.
2. Tax increment financing (TIF) program to fund public infrastructure, namely project-killing parking

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To answer yesterday’s question:  Why is it easier to build greenfields/sprawl?

Because it’s legislated that way, and the private sector has followed.  How’d this happen?  A quick history:

Early 1900s to 1934:  A group of home builders lobbied the government relentlessly to allow them to mass-produce homes just like Henry Ford mass-produced automobiles.  Of course, people lived in villages, which were anything but.

1934:  As a result, Congress passed the FHA (Federal Housing Administration)

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Greenfield/sprawl developments are easy for the private sector to do, but not economically, socially and environmentally beneficial.  Meanwhile, infill/urban/redevelopment projects are difficult, but highly beneficial economically, socially and environmentally.

Greenfields/sprawl vs. infill/urban/redevelopment impacts, as it relates to the creatively entrepreneurial CoolTown audience:

Economic:  Workers are increasingly bolting office parks to work for

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