Community And Neighborhood Programs

Award Winners

"Hometown Blues: The Struggle Over Growth in the Bay Area"was submitted by the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) in Oakland, California. The video was prepared by ABAG to provide an educational backdrop for intense discussions about growth in the San Francisco Bay Region of California. The video, intended for television broadcast and use at community forums, provides an excellent overview of sprawl, congestion, and other issues facing growing communities. For questions regarding this program, please call Laura Stuchinsky, ABAG at (510) 464-7995.

The California Main Street Programwas submitted by California Main Street in Sacramento, California. Since 1985 the California Main Street Program, an initiative of the State Trade and Commerce Agency, has been part of a growing national movement to improve the quality of life in America’s towns, cities, and neighborhoods by restoring the economic health of main streets. Since its inception, the California Main Street Program has worked to assist commercial districts help themselves by using the “Main Street Approach to Revitalization.' For questions regarding this program, please contact Keith Kjelstrom, The California Main Street Program at (916) 322-3536.

Certificates of Merit

The Sacramento INDEX: Software for Community Indicators was submitted by the Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality management District and Criterion Planners. This GIS-based software tool was developed for the Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality management District. It is designed for collaborative use by regional air quality and transit agencies, designers and developers, local governments, public interest groups, neighborhood associations, and citizens engaged in issue identification and goal setting. INDEX measures existing conditions and planning proposals with 50 livability indicators to evaluate alternative plans and designs, and monitor adopted plans. This tool can examine existing conditions and proposed scenarios with indicators that gauge not only what the positives and negatives are, but also where they are spatially. For questions regarding this program, please contact Elliot Allen at (503) 224-8606 or Ron Maertz at (916) 874-4800.

The Park Bay Diagonal program was submitted by Park Bay Diagonal Collaborative. It is a volunteer planning effort to convince city officials to create a public plaza which preserves a water view and a historic warehouse district while providing for economic development. Over the last four years, thousands of volunteer hours were put into developing a community-proposed plan that would provide first floor commercial space and a variety of hotel, residential and office uses. The proposed plan would connect an active, pedestrian portion of Balboa Park with mass-transit, a bikeway, and pedestrian-dominant streets. For questions regarding this program, please contact Catherine Smith, Park Bay Diagonal Collaborative at (619) 232-2112.

The Growing Vine Streetprogram, submitted by Carlson Architects in Seattle, Washington, is an environmental urban design and long-term community participation program. The goal of the program is to create a “green street' in a dense urban neighborhood, to engage the community in the creation and maintenance of the green street, and to re-expose rainwater runoff to the surface. The program originally started with a 15 member Steering Committee. Now dozens of other citizens have been involved through public outreach and approximately 20 city staff from transportation, public utilities, parks and recreation, neighborhood planning and strategic planning have been involved in the review of this program. For questions regarding this program, please contact Greg Waddell, Carlson Architects, (206) 441-3066.