Livability Library: Public Places and Outdoor Spaces

FREE PUBLICATIONS

• Creating Community Gardens for People of All Ages

• The Parks and Public Spaces Collection

HOW TO'S

• Dog Park Details and Design (2023)

• How to Plant 99 Street Trees in Just a Few Hours (2015)

• How to Create a Grandparents Park (2014)

• How to Create, Maintain and Manage an Intergenerational Community Garden (2015)

INSPIRING EXAMPLES 

• Parks for People and Pups of All Ages (2023)

• Slideshow: The Magic of Murals (2019)

• Livability Lessons from Melbourne, Australia (2019)

• How a Community Can Become a Work of Art (2018)

• Slideshow: Downtown Charlotte, North Carolina (2018)

• Video: Musical Instruments Everyone Can Play (Avoca, Iowa) (2018)

• Shared Space Solutions (2017)

• This High School has a Senior (Citizen) Center (Swampscott, MA) (2017)

• Advice from the Friendly Streets Initiative (St. Paul, Minnesota) (2016)

• Solutions for Urban Streets and Downtowns (2015)

• Transformation: Suburban Streets and Commercial Strips (2015)

• Solutions for Small Town Main Streets (2015)

• Solutions for Rural and Local Roads (2015)

• Solutions for Back Streets and Underused Places (2015)

• Slide Show: A Tour of Livable Des Moines (2015)

• 11 Inspiring Livability Efforts (2015)

 

CHALLENGES AND SOLUTIONS

• A Paw Park on the Prairie (2023)

• Turning Transit Stops Into Community Spaces in St. Louis, Missouri (2023)

• Helping People Warmly and Safely Social Distance Outdoors During COVID-19 (2020)

• Gardening Boxes Are Great for Grownups (2018)

• Video: Reviving a Vacant Lot in Omaha, Nebraska (2018)

• Vacant Lots Create Cleaner Water (2017)

• Welcome to the 20-Minute Village (2017)

 

FROM THE EXPERTS

• Video: Gil Penalosa Discusses Cities that Work for People of All Ages (2021)

• "Creating a Local 'Luvet' List," by Jay Walljasper (2021)

• Video: Making Cities and Spaces Work for People with Matthew Lister (2019)

• Video: Hold On To Your Why With Odetta MacLeish White (2019)

• Video: Age-Friendly by Design in Rural Communities with Mark Fenton (2019)

• Keynote Address with Gil Penalosa, Founder of 880 Cities (2016)

• 5 Questions with Mitchell Silver on Being a Planner and Parks Commissioner (2014)

 

RESOURCES

• 13 Short-Range Livability Projects (2015)

• Mid-Range Projects (2015)

• Long-Range Projects (2015)

• Fact Sheet: Revitalization without Displacement (2014)

• Fact Sheet: Street Trees (2014)

• Fact Sheet: Sidewalks (2014)

• Fact Sheet: Form Based Code (2014)

• Fact Sheet: Density (2014)

 

RELATED PAGE

• Livability Library: Placemaking