urban renewal

I was chatting with a friend recently and the topic of commercial real estate came up. If you know me at all, you know that I have NO concept of spatial relationships. It's a mental block, I guess, but if you need help arranging your furniture, I'm not the person to ask. If you need help estimating square feet, you need someone else. I'm equally bad with volume. Cups? Quarts? What's that?

So see, I've been to three different birding stores in this area in the last few months. And I can tell you that I think one looked crowded and another looked organized. The problem is that I have no idea how big they are, or how big they are supposed to be, and that makes it difficult to look at empty retail spaces and know if they are big enough (or too small) to hold the same kind of bird store.

Anyway, in the middle of this conversation, my friend made an off-handed suggestion which has really proven useful. My friend suggested I look for Community Improvement Districts (CIDs) in each of the towns I was interested in moving to. CIDs are designated in areas of cities in need of renewal. Often, tax incentives are provided for retail stores willing to relocate to those areas.

Well, as it turns out, they aren't called CIDs in Colorado, but such programs do exist through the Urban Renewal Authorities located in each city. This isn't just City Council stuff, though it involves the city council to a great extent. It's essentially a group of people looking at the 5-15 year plan for the future growth of a city - what will go where, what will appeal to what group and what will be needed to make it all happen.

I think I like planners. I can relate to people who look to the future, set a goal, and lay out the steps to achieve what they want. And now that I know where to look, I'm going to be reading up on their plans for my three new favorite cities. Where Atlanta is now known as the third emptiest city in the country (after Vegas and Detroit), I am not discouraged. I am looking to the future, setting a goal and laying out the steps to achieve it.

I guess that makes me a personal planner.