What to do when no one seems to be providing a bold vision for downtown Louisville, Kentucky?

Last fall a core of creatives in Louisville established a beta community and set forth on that very mission.  The above image is the result of that local beta community to date, from a group of future patrons, tenants, developers, building owners and city officials, presented as the South Fourth Street Entertainment District.  Five of the buildings are owned by beta community participants who are

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What does Web 2.0, the most intelligent communities of 2007, the beta community, and building cool towns for the creative class have in common? Ok, so it’s not really a secret.

As stated, Web 1.0 was about commerce, Web 2.0 is about people - you. As cities have found the hard way, innovation can’t just be tech-centric (ie build city-wide wifi and they will come), but people-centric - you-centric (build places the most creative truly want to be in, integrating wi-fi). Beta communities are the

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The NY-based Intelligent Community Forum recently announced their Intelligent Communities of 2007 (don’t shoot the messenger!) based on the following criteria:

- deploying broadband
- building a knowledge-based workforce
- combining government and private-sector ‘digital inclusion’ for all
- fostering innovation and marketing economic development.

One of the cities on the list, Dundee, Scotland, like in many other regions, suffered sweeping job losses in the 70s to mid-90s as manufacturing

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Continuing the previous entry introducing the two economy-generating factors, Web 2.0 with the creative class, what happens when you combine the two in your city?

Let’s take the most popular Web 2.0 website as an analogy…

Imagine the rabid popularity and obsession young adults spend on MySpace, but applied to job-creating entrepreneurs in a single walkable district in your town. Now, people may spend inordinate amounts of time meeting new people by commenting on the blogs, pictures and

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First of all, what is Web 2.0?  In a nutshell, Web 1.0 was commerce. Web 2.0 is people.

Its wikipedia (a Web 2.0 product) definiton: perceived or proposed second generation of Internet-based services - such as social networking sites, wikis, communication tools, and folksonomies (don’t worry, we’ll go through these) - that emphasize online collaboration and sharing among users.

The creative class is well documented, as well as its connection to job growth.  These are the innovators (ie the

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Let’s do one better. Why don’t we all pool our most inspiring photos, the ones that inspire us to say, “Wow, I wish that was in my neighborhood!“. There’s no better source for this of course than Flickr, and coincidentally, we’ve just set up a group photo pool called Cool Places right here.

If you’re not a Flickr user, it’s quick, free and painless to sign up.  If you are a Flickr member, just click on the Join this group? link on the group page and share your photos!  It’s highly preferable

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Continuing yesterday’s entry, what happens when a city takes a more open-source approach to real estate development?

New Urban News features two such stories in one article, More developers, better results: A lesson in orchestration.

In each example, the city established an RFP competition for multiple sites, selecting multiple developers.  The primary reason?  Diversity and variety, which speaks to authenticity, which is paramount to a creative class that dispels much of new urbanism on

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The talent and assets (or at least access to them) for building places that raise the benchmark for quality of life and economic vitality already exist in your city. If you’re skeptical, maybe this story from Mavericks at Work will make you a believer…

Entrepreneur Rob McEwen purchased what many considered a fool’s decision - a 55,000-acre gold mine with no gold. Why did he buy it? Because it went cheap, and it was adjacent to a very productive mine.

A couple of frustrating years later,

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According to the NY Times, the word on the street is that New Yorkers are worried that ‘it’s getting boring around here.‘ “The chain proliferation and the sameness they have brought to so many blocks has become a pet peeve for many New Yorkers, and the butt of jokes for others. On a recent episode of the NBC comedy 30 Rock a character sent to pick up a prescription was stymied by the presence of ‘Rite Drugs’ outlets on all four corners of an intersection.“

Meanwhile, last November San

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The city of Renton, just south of Seattle, has long been synonymous with Boeing.  However, visit their website today and there’s not only no mention of the airline giant on their home page, but missing from their economic development and vision, mission, and business plan pages as well.  There’s just a picture of a jet on the business home page, but no mention of Boeing when listing the city’s assets.

Why? The City is steadfastly, wisely, deftly moving Renton away from the industrial economy

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