One reason for haphazard, ugly, people-unfriendly, and/or environmentally unsound development is the absence of neighborhood residents in town and city planning processes. Nobody thinks about what it's going to be like to LIVE near the results of development or redevelopment. Some people in Providence, however, are setting an example of constructive and proactive resident involvement in what their own neighborhood could be.
The Providential Gardener will be following their activities as they develop plans and influence changes on the part of North Main Street in Providence that stretches from Branch Avenue/Cypress Street (at the entry of North Burial Ground) to the Pawtucket city line. For those of you not in the immediate neighborhood, this section of North Main Street goes past:
- North Burial Ground, dating from 1700
- the Dexter House (built in 1755) at Rochambeau Avenue,
- "where the Auditorium used to be" (I understand Rocky Marciano's fights were held there, among many other events, but it's now a parking lot for The Miriam Hospital),
- the Armory, headquarters of the RI National Guard 103rd Field Artillery Regiment, and
- the derelict Sears Roebuck building on North Main.
The task is daunting. North Burial Ground isn't in the best of shape, but it could be another Mount Auburn Cemetery (see an earlier story), and several buildings are long abandoned, making for a depressing sight. It's worth your life to cross the street, and this commercial strip isn't well integrated into the neighboring residential areas. You can't walk from nearby homes to banks, dry cleaners, or a grocery store, for instance, because there aren't any. [There's a drug store, though, and a couple of blocks away, a major chain is building another big drug store. What does this mean? Is there only money in serving sick people? Are we all sick yet?]
So what are North Main Street's neighbors doing about this? What's been done so far? Click on the picture in this post to enlarge it so you can read it for details. In sum:
- Organized a group of partners (click on the picture above for the list)
- Set goals, for instance,
- New jobs for Providence residents [near the neighborhood]
- More homes and people on North Main
- Model Smart Growth & green buildings
- New business start-ups
- Destination attractions: shopping, entertainment, restaurants, park
- Safe pedestrian routes and paths
- Efficient, low-emission transit options
- Identified a process:
- Define the problem
- Find out what the neighbors want
- Figure out how to make happen what folks want
- Align with larger planning processes such as The Providence Tomorrow Initiative's series of charrettes, part of the new Providence Comprehensive Plan. More background on the development of the North Main Street Project are on the Summit Neighborhood Association (SNA) blog. The SNA has a meeting on Monday, September 17, to prepare for the neighborhood charrettes being held the week of September 24 for the Blackstone, Mount Hope, and Summit neighborhoods in the northeastern section of Providence.
Stay tuned! And send news of others who are making innovative plans for improving their neighborhoods. For instance, here's another neighborhood's plans: a March 2007 story about Washington Park/South Elmwood in Providence.
