Empowering Citizens for Change: Placemaking Comes to Chicago

MPC continues its partnership with the Project for Public Spaces on an exciting initiative to bring Placemaking to Chicago. Designed around the concept of creating places around the way people want to use them, the project will result in a guidebook and workshops that train community groups and city agencies on placemaking ideals and techniques, as well as an interactive website for people to share their own placemaking stories. | » More

Neighbors making a difference

Guest article about placemaking by Jay Walljasper. "My hope that day was to showcase inspiring examples of how everyday citizens made tremendous improvements in the place they call home by putting their heads together with neighbors to conceive new ideas for their neighborhoods and then rolling up their sleeves to put these into action. ..."

The City that NetWorks

Mayor's Advisory Council on Closing the Digital Divide recommends a Campaign for Digital Excellence to harness the opportunity and potential of a digital Chicago.

Streets as Places: Sold out roundtable creates buzz about rethinking how we use our streets

Learn the secrets of “placemaking” from Fred Kent, founder and president of internationally-renowned Project for Public Spaces, and join the movement to transform your community’s rundown streets into desirable neighborhood places.

Ogden Avenue Redevelopment Process: Listening to the Community

MPC's involvement in the redesign of Ogden Avenue will help organize North Lawndale around its strongest assets and catalyze redevelopment of the community at large.

Testimony to the Chicago City Council Committee on Economic, Capital and Technology Development - November 29, 2005

The Metropolitan Planning Council's recommendations on responding to the need for more grocery stores in Chicago’s low-income and minority neighborhoods.

MPC Issues Letter on Chatham Market

MPC issues letter to Chicago aldermen raising redevelopment issues about the proposed zoning change for the Chatham Market project on Chicago's South Side.

MPC Testimony on Downtown Zoning

MPC testified before the City Council's Committee on Zoning concerning the proposed zoning text governing Chicago's downtown. This module represents the last chapter of the zoning ordinance to be considered by the Committee. Once released by the Mayor's Zoning Reform Commission, the Committee will refer the entire ordinance to the City Council for its approval

Lay of the Land 2003: A National Survey of Zoning Reform

To help the City of Chicago in its zoning reform efforts, MPC looked at lessons learned from zoning ordinance rewrites in Pittsburgh, New Orleans, Boston, Cincinnati, Milwaukee, San Diego, Minneapolis, New York City, Seattle, and San Jose, Calif.

North Lawndale: A Survey of Existing Conditions

North Lawndale, a community located on Chicago’s West Side, has long faced serious redevelopment challenges. Fortunately today, as a result of tremendous community initiative and public investment, long overdue neighborhood revitalization is underway. To aid these efforts, the Metropolitan Planning Council (MPC) conducted a comprehensive inventory of: land use, structure types, building heights, roof types, and vacancy of each parcel in a defined area of North Lawndale.