Call for AICP President Candidates
The AICP Nominating Committee is seeking qualified
potential candidates for AICP President-elect. This position represents
a 4 year commitment that begins 6 weeks after the annual meeting in
April of 2008. If you are interested in being considered a candidate,
please contact James van Hemert at 303-871-6970 or jvanhemert@law.du.edu
. The deadline for candidate position statements is October 31st. They
must be submitted to Mike Welch at mwelch@planning.org
. For more information please go to http://planning.org/elections/index.htm
. The nominating committee will meet in November to nominate two
candidates for each open AICP Commission position.
2007 Daniel Burnham Award for a Comprehensive Plan PlanCheyenne
Magic City of the Plains
The plan for Cheyenne, Wyoming, lives up to the community's
nickname.
By Cat Urbigkit
It's the epitome of the Wild West, home of "The Daddy of 'em
All," the world's largest outdoor rodeo, the capital of the least
populated state in the union. Cheyenne, Wyoming (pop. 57,000), has a lot
to be proud of, including its new community-driven plan. Adopted in
November 2006, PlanCheyenne received APA's 2007 Daniel Burnham Award for
a Comprehensive Plan.
Planning in Cheyenne got off to a good start way back in 1867, when
Gen. Grenville Dodge laid out the four-square-mile town to take
advantage of Wyoming's abundant sunshine and minimize the impact of its
bitter winter winds. The town, nicknamed the Magic City of the Plains
because it sprang suddenly from the empty prairie, grew steadily until
the 1970s, when it went through a series of booms and busts tied to the
energy economy. Plans were created and adopted, but they became outdated
as conditions changed.
In the mid-1990s, there was a flurry of plan making, including a
master area land-use plan, followed by a transportation plan and six
neighborhood plans. While useful, the documents didn't offer a cohesive
approach to shaping the city's future.
A different way
In 2002, community members joined to create Vision 2020, a planning
vision for the area. That process provided the strategic direction for
the PlanCheyenne process.
The need for a strong comprehensive plan was evident. "The
elements for unprecedented growth are aligning in our region as growth
is heading north up the Rocky Mountain Front Range," noted members
of the Cheyenne Metropolitan Planning Organization in a letter
supporting the plan's nomination. Located just 90 minutes north of
Denver, Cheyenne serves as the northern anchor of Front Range growth.
From the outset, planners and officials decided PlanCheyenne would
not be built like previous comprehensive plans: separate elements for
development, site planning, zoning, and long-range land-use plans;
another document containing goals and policies; and a map showing
preferred land uses. Instead, this effort would be an integrated
approach that incorporates three distinct planning disciplines into one
process: a transportation plan; a community plan including
scenario-based land-use planning, urban design, and character
discussions; and a parks and recreation plan.
The plan is divided into four sections:
• Snapshot summarizes the Cheyenne of today, providing information
and analysis about the community's population, economy, employment,
parks, and transportation.
• Structure addresses the physical image of the city — its
architectural identity and the elements that make its neighborhoods and
districts livable and unique.
• Shape is the plan component that pulls together diverse interests
into a preferred land-use alternative. It determines the location of
future neighborhoods, commercial centers, parks and recreational
facilities, major roads, greenway extensions, and all the other elements
that make a community vibrant.
• Build offers the tools needed to implement the community vision,
including a detailed list of strategies and actions, from new
development incentives to city ordinances.
Involving the public
From the time the request for proposals was issued in late 2003,
those involved in the development of PlanCheyenne knew that successful
marketing of the planning process would be critical to its success. The
planning team developed a public participation matrix describing the
various events, identifying their purpose, and then quantifying the
benefits. Activities were ranked according to their roles in generating
excitement, providing information, allowing for diverse public
involvement, and meeting legal requirements.
The planning process went far beyond the public participation efforts
mandated by law, notes Matthew Ashby, AICP, a city staff planner and
PlanCheyenne's project manager. The team offered regular updates via its
website, postcards, and e-mails. It also put on a "Blitz Week"
of events to promote public awareness as the planning process began. The
week's activities ranged from a dozen radio appearances and 40 plan
presentations to civic clubs, to hosting in-person "listening
stations" at local grocery stores, high schools, and the public
library.
The staff also organized SimCity exercises and public design
charrettes, where community members could identify what they liked about
their city — the gateways, corridors, landmarks, districts, and
activity nodes — and rate different types of development. The
brainstorming sessions resulted in the creation of a community design
handbook, which serves as the base for the second component of the plan,
StructureCheyenne.
A special effort was made to reach out to young people and citizens
of typically underrepresented sections of the community. Laramie County
Community College Foundation executive director Angela Glode praises a
joint initiative in which three LCCC professors structured their course
curriculums around PlanCheyenne. Their effort resulted in a report that
"reflects a students' perspective on community growth," she
wrote in a letter of support. "The students became vested in the
process and a number have continued to follow the [progress of the]
plan."
Transferable innovations
"PlanCheyenne stands as proof that small communities can create
innovative plans," Ashby says. "The challenge lies in creating
the balance between importing new ideas while staying true to your
community's values."
Joanne Garnett, FAICP, the president of the Wyoming chapter of APA,
noted in a letter that the plan provides a structure and process that
can be replicated in other communities. "Critical elements and
concepts from this plan can be transferred and modified for use by small
to mid-size communities," she wrote. "The fact that this comes
from a Western-flavored community will have great impact upon rural
towns facing a changing future," added Garnett, who is a former
national APA president.
The PlanCheyenne website, www.plancheyenne.com, includes a section
called "Planner Resources," which describes some of the
approaches used in Cheyenne and includes downloadable plan documents,
marketing materials, the public participation matrix, and the RFP, which
emphasized the need to retain a "fun factor" to keep the
public captivated.
An important online feature of the RFP process was a website area
dedicated to consultants, where they could contact local consultants to
form a planning team and access project updates via an interactive FAQ
maintained by the planning staff.
So far, the PlanCheyenne website has generated more than 55,000 hits.
At a cost of $382,000 — not including staff time — the final
product is "an excellent value," Ashby says. Several agencies
kicked in on the funding, including the MPO, city, county, and the parks
and recreation department.
"Three plans in one process, 750 pages, three years in the
making, nine pounds printed," wrote Garnett about PlanCheyenne.
"Cheyenne may be a small community, but this is no little
plan."
Cat Urbigkit is a Wyoming rancher and writer.
Images: Cheyenne's historic character was a rallying point for the
plan. Citizens, including high school students, were active in
formulating Plan Cheyenne, using puzzle pieces and other tools to
understand the concepts of density and efficient land use. Photo
courtesy Cheyenne MPO.
©Copyright 2007 American Planning Association All Rights Reserved
