CivicMoxie worked in partnership with the MassDevelopment Transformative Development Initiative (TDI) and local stakeholders to create a strategy to take a decade’s worth of planning studies to the next level and activate vacant ground floor uses and public space in the downtown core of Worcester, MA. Known as a gateway city, Worcester has struggled over the years to capitalize on a strong academic and cultural community to revitalize its downtown and populate vacant office buildings and ground floor retail spaces. Along with an economic development consultant and real estate development consultant, CivicMoxie applied a placemaking approach to the challenge by taking previous planning efforts and prioritizing goals and strategies to achieve both short and long-term results. The result is a series of Action Kits that provide step-by-step work plan for activating public spaces, jump-starting tactical urbanism projects, and creating momentum in line with our team’s targeted real estate development opportunities and business development efforts. The CivicMoxie provided real-time technical and graphic assistance that included a restaurant map that was distributed by food truck operators to assuage concerns of competition by food entrepreneurs and business development and marketing assistance workshops. The plan is moving forward and a downtown BID has been created, which was a key recommendation of the plan.

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Project type:

Arts and culture, community engagement, community revitalization, corridor / main streets, downtown / district plan, placemaking, real estate planning