Download Role: Neighborhood Liaison

Exercises and Homework
Exercise #1: Introduction to UrbanPlan - Warm-up
Name:
Date:
UrbanPlan is about a neighborhood called the Elmwood District in the city of
Yorktown. Urban communities all over the country share the Elmwood District’s
problems: what was once a thriving part of town is now run-down and
deteriorated. Like many cities, Yorktown is seeking a private real estate
development team (you and your teammates) to propose and build a project that
will revitalize its once proud neighborhood. Before considering the specific issues
involved in this complex project, we will first consider some general questions and
concerns.
Where You Live
1. What does your city or town look like right now? If you had to describe your
city or town to your teammate, what would you say?
2. What do you think is the worst building or place in your city or town?
3. What building or place do you like the best?
4. How did your city or town get this way? How much do you know about the
history of town? Do you know about any major changes or developments that
have taken place here?
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5. Based on what you know of how your city or town has changed, would you say
your city or town is becoming more or less of a good place to live? Why?
Where You Want to Live
1. What kind of place would you like to live in? Why?
2. If you could make a wish list of good living conditions, what would it include?
Identify at least five characteristics of a good place to live.
3. Do you know of any place that has more of those characteristics than your city
or town? What town or city is it?
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Exercise #2: Personal Priorities Investigation
Name:
Date:
What Makes a Good Place to Live?
Tradeoffs
Every decision comes with a cost. Each decision to use a resource requires a
tradeoff with another possible use for that resource (the money you have in your
wallet, for example). In designing your development, you will confront some
difficult decisions and have to make tradeoffs.
There is no “correct” answer for the best mix of land uses. Often you will need to
decide whether the cost—social, political, financial, or aesthetic—of a decision
will be worth the benefit it will bring to the project.
If you had to decide today, which would you say is more important for a
development to emphasize?
•
Jobs (commercial development) or housing (residential development)? Why?
•
Parks or parking? Why?
•
A strong tax base so that the city can provide services to its residents or
“affordable” housing so middle- and/or low-income people can afford to live
there? Why?
Priorities
On a scale of one (least important) to ten (most important), how important do you
think each of the following should be in a plan to revitalize a neighborhood?
_____ The redevelopment must include uses that consumers will demand and
support financially.
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____ The redevelopment must be able to provide a reasonable profit to the
developer so that the developer can attract investors willing to risk their
money in the project.
_____ The redevelopment should beautify its surroundings and be well designed
architecturally and spatially.
_____ The redevelopment should not cause the city government to lose money.
_____ The redevelopment should respond to the concerns of the neighborhood
where it is to be located.
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Exercise #3: Guided Reading
Name:
Date:
The UrbanPlan Handbook provides all the information you will need to develop
your proposal. Detailed knowledge and understanding of the information in the
package are essential to creating a winning proposal.
1. Begin by reading all of About UrbanPlan. This section will give you an
overview of the entire project plus vital background information.
2. Return to Understanding the City’s Development Request. The questions
below address the issues discussed in that section.
3. Next read RFP, Design Guidelines, Site Plan, and the five Neighborhood
Letters to answer the following questions:
Request For Proposal (RFP)
Read the Introduction.
1. What is the purpose of an RFP?
2. Look at Goals. What are “blighting influences”?
3. What are the city’s goals and objectives for the redevelopment area?
4. Does one goal seem more important to you. If so, why?
5. The American Heritage Dictionary defines the noun demand as the need or
desire for something. How does this definition differ from the concept of
market demand?
6. Why does the city want the proposal to be “based on market demand”?
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7. When is this proposal due?
Read Neighborhood History.
8. When and why did the Elmwood District decline?
9. Briefly describe Elmwood today.
10. Is the city willing to subsidize any land uses? If so, which ones and why?
11. What is a market analysis? Briefly, what did you learn from the market
analysis?
12. Must developers build every land use for which a demand has been identified
in the market analysis? Why?
13. Based on the information you have read, why do you think the city chose the
Elmwood District for redevelopment?
Read Price of Land to the Developer.
14. How does the city expect to get its money back if it paid ten million dollars
for the land and will sell it to the selected developer for six million dollars?
15. Who selects the winning development team?
Design Guidelines
16. Does the city have design requirements that affect what you can build on a
site?
If so, how do they affect what can be built? Be specific.
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Site Plan
17. What is the busiest street?
18. Where is the housing?
19. What resources surround the site?
Neighborhood Letters
20. Do the various neighborhood groups agree about what should happen to the
Elmwood District? Which groups appear to have the most political “clout”
when they present their wishes?
21. Do the requests of any of the neighborhood groups constitute economic
(market) demand as defined by your textbook? Explain your reasoning.
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The Development Team: Roles and Resources: Answers – When there are primary and secondary answers, they are
prioritized with numbers.
In the chart below, indicate WHERE in the UP handbook (tab(s) and page numbers) you will find the information to answer the questions.
City Liaison
Marketing Director
Financial Analyst
Neighborhood Liaison
Where can I find out the desires
and opinions of neighborhood
groups?
Site Planner
What are the City's goals and
objectives for the Elmwood
District?
Where can I find information
about the market demand for
various land uses?
What % return on investment is
required to attract investors?
What uses does the City's
redevelopment plan permit?
Which land uses have unlimited
demand?
What funding is available from the Which groups appear to have
City?
the greatest potential political
influence?
What are the about the City's
design guidelines for
development?
Does the City expect to make a
profit from the redevelopment of
the Elmwood District?
What are the characteristics of
the people who would move into
new housing in the Elmwood
District?
Do investors require a higher
Why do the opinions of the
return on real estate projects than neighborhood matter to a
on savings account? If so why?
developer?
What is the shape and
"footprint" of each new and
existing building?
How does the City want the
developer to deal with the
neighborhood in developing a
proposal?
What types of businesses would
be interested in moving to the
Elmwood District?
What land uses provide the most
profit potential to the developer?
What kind of parking is
required for each type of
building?
What impact can unhappy
neighborhood residents have on
a development proposal?
What is the history of the
Elmwood District, its buildings
and its neighborhood life?
Exercise #5: Research Problems for Development Team Members
Name:
Date:
This exercise will help you settle into your role before your rejoin your
development team.
For your set of questions, review your role description and suggested sources
of information.
You will use the information you gather in two important ways:
 To make your role and function clear to the rest of the team when you
meet with them to plan development strategy.
 To create the basis for talking points you will use when you prepare and
eventually deliver your formal redevelopment presentation to the judges.
Role: City Liaison
Using the RFP, information behind Existing Buildings, and the Land Use
Comparison Chart behind Project Checklist, answer the following
questions:
1. Does the city mandate the exact uses the developer must provide?
2. Which land uses have perceived public benefit, making the city willing to
invest funds?
3. What is the city’s position on the homeless shelter?
4. Which land uses are most likely to provide jobs to the community? Which
provide skilled jobs? Which provide entry-level/unskilled jobs?
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5. How will new retail businesses on the Elmwood site benefit the city?
6. Which land uses will provide a strong tax base for the city?
7. Which uses are most likely to attract residents to the Elmwood District?
8. Which, if any, of these uses conflict?
9. What is the city’s point of view regarding the needs and desires of
Elmwood residents and neighborhood groups?
10. Does the project need to make money for the city? If so, how, how much,
and over what period of time?
11. Why does the city advise developers that their proposals must be based on
market demand?
Role: Director of Marketing
Using the RFP, information behind Existing Buildings and New Buildings,
and the Land Use Comparison Chart behind Project Checklist, answer the
following questions:
1. How many years do you have to sell or lease your project?
2. Does demand tell the development team what they must build or what they
can build?
3. If the annual demand for mid-rise office space is 76,000 SF, what is the
demand over the life of your project?
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4. If demand for housing is so high, why are there so few affordable units
being built at present?
5. Identify land uses that are most compatible or most complementary to
each other.
6. Identify those land uses that, in spite of market demand, might conflict
with each other.
7. Who is most likely to move into new townhouses?
8. Where will customers for a QMart come from?
9. Under what conditions can the Elmwood District support new
neighborhood retail?
10. What do retail tenants value/seek in a location? What about office tenants?
Role: Financial Analyst
Using the RFP, information behind Existing Buildings and New Buildings,
and the Land Use Comparison Chart behind Project Checklist, answer the
following questions:
1. Which land uses will provide the greatest return on investment?
2. Which returns greater profits to the developer, an existing building
rehabbed into office space or a new office building?
3. Which land uses have perceived public benefit, making the city willing to
invest funds?
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4. Who gains the greatest financial return from QMart?
5. Identify a potential economic risk developing QMart.
At this point, your main goal is to completely familiarize yourself with the
Financial Planning Program. Review the instructions (and, if you have your
computer available, begin inputting some numbers to see how the program
works and how different land uses impact profitability to investors and tax
revenues to the city).
6. On what worksheet can you input the size and type of buildings your team
wants to construct on each block of the Elmwood site?
7. On what worksheet can you input the amount of affordable housing your
team wants to provide?
8. On what worksheet can you analyze the rate at which the market will
absorb the land uses you have selected?
9. On what worksheet can you analyze the cost of the project to the
developer and to the city?
10. On what worksheet can you analyze the value of the project to the
developer and the investors?
11. Where can you analyze the monetary value of the project to the city?
Role: Neighborhood Liaison
Using the RFP, the Neighborhood Letters, information in Existing
Buildings and New Buildings, the Land Use Comparison Chart and
Project Checklist, answer the following questions:
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1. Which neighborhood groups appear to have the most political clout?
2. Which neighborhood groups appear to have the least political clout?
3. Identify the land uses most likely to satisfy the greatest number of
neighborhood residents.
4. Identify the land uses most likely to dissatisfy the greatest number of
neighborhood residents.
5. Are any groups in general agreement with the city’s priorities as outlined
in the RFP?
6. Which groups would support a QMart? Why?
7. Are there groups that oppose affordable housing?
8. Based on your preliminary review of the neighborhood’s wishes, which
types of development should prevail in this project?
9. Can you make land use tradeoffs to satisfy some of the neighborhood’s
wishes while satisfying the city’s goals as outlined in the RFP? Explain.
10.. What can happen to a project if the developer cannot gain neighborhood
support?
Role: Site Planner
Using the RFP, Site Plan, Design Guidelines, and the information behind
Existing Buildings and New Buildings, answer the following questions:
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1. When Elmwood was a vibrant community, what role did 9th Avenue
play in the life of the residents?
2. Identify existing traffic patterns. How will they affect placement of retail
and residential structures?
3. Is there an existing structure or parcel of land that could serve as a
unifying focal point for this development? If so, identify it. If not, what
could your team create as a focal point?
4. How many levels of parking are provided in the low-rise office parking
structure?
5. Which uses will create the most new traffic?
6. What is the footprint (in square feet) of a neighborhood retail building
and how many stores will it accommodate?
7. What uses create the fewest shadows on other buildings?
8. What uses create the most “sidewalk appeal” to people walking down
the street?
9. What uses create the most activity in the daytime? What about nighttime
and weekends?
10.. What do historic and architecturally significant buildings add to a
project?
11.. Does a project need both private and public open space?
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