One of the things that I think is crucial for those of us trying to figure out how to plan for and grow a better Albany is not to work in a vacuum. While every city is unique, we also share a lot of things in common, and there are great lessons to be learned from creative people overcoming what seemed like insurmountable obstacles in similar cities. These stories are useful for generating ideas and learning lessons, and also a good response to nay-sayers and cynics.
One great report in that vein that I recently had the pleasure to copyedit is Voices From Forgotten Cites: Innovative Revitalization Coalitions in America's Older Small Cities (pdf file). It comes out of a seminar series at MIT, and is peppered with quotes from real folks doing revitalization work on the ground. It describes a small handful of places making some really great turnarounds, and gives some analysis of why. The tantalizingly hopeful and yet difficult conclusion they offer is that the most important thing to do is gather a wide coalition together to do something well. Almost anything, as long as it's meaningful and people might not have expected it to go well. Then capture that excitement and keep going. Sounds easy. Isn't. But isn't impossible either.
Perhaps as, or even more, important, the report is also particularly good at making those of us in "older small cities" feel not alone. It travels through the psychological effects on a place that has lost clout and population over the past several decades, and doesn't pull any punches when it talks about the dysfunctional patterns in local government that that leads to. Much as it's fun to glorify in Albany's seedy machine history, I actually found it comforting to be reminded that a lot of what happens here is not that unusual.
Worth a read. I'll collect a few other resources in another post soon. (And I haven't forgotten that I owe you my own elevator pitch. Though ya'll said it so well, I'm not so sure what I have to add.)
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