Barbara Arens, PE, PTOE

Woodward Avenue Complete Streets Study of the 27-mile Woodward Avenue corridor from the Detroit River Front to the Loop in Pontiac.

The Michigan/Grand River Avenue Charrettes were part of the Mid-Michigan Program for Greater Sustainability's nine regional demonstration projects spanning the 19-mile Michigan-Grand River Avenue corridor from the Michigan Capitol through Lansing, East Lansing, Meridian Township, Williamstown Township, City of Williamston, Leroy Township and the Village of Webberville. The transect includes a range of development areas from urban and small town CBD's, older neighborhoods, Michigan State… Show more

The Michigan/Grand River Avenue Charrettes were part of the Mid-Michigan Program for Greater Sustainability's nine regional demonstration projects spanning the 19-mile Michigan-Grand River Avenue corridor from the Michigan Capitol through Lansing, East Lansing, Meridian Township, Williamstown Township, City of Williamston, Leroy Township and the Village of Webberville. The transect includes a range of development areas from urban and small town CBD's, older neighborhoods, Michigan State University and student housing, suburban commercial tracts, agricultural and rural areas. It is the region’s “Main Street” with over 1.7 million transit trips annually. The charrettes provided opportunity for in-depth public engagement with over 6000 volunteer hours spent developing the future design of the corridor. The goal was to produce consensus based sustainable plans for transportation, urban design, land planning, housing and economic development to be implemented throughout the corridor over the next 20 years. As TCRPC's project manager for this effort, I coordinated it's implementation with Bill Lennertz of the National Charrette Institute (project lead), Dover Kohl and Partners (charrette team leader), team members from Mead and Hunt, Strategic Economics and Parsons Brinkerhoff, along with scores of other community partners, to develop a consensus based redesign plan which also supported a proposed Small Start Bus Rapid Transit project in the corridor from the Capitol to the Meridian Mall. This effort was just one facet of the much larger national demonstration Mid-Michigan Program for Greater Sustainability funded by a three year $3 million HUD Phase II Sustainability Implementation Grant , with additional funding from the Michigan State Housing Development Authority and other community partners. The Final Report for the Capitol Corridor can be downloaded here:
http://migrand-charrette.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Capitol_Corridor_042814-web.pdf
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