Kate Moran Carter

On Nov. 12, 2019 CREW Boston, the region’s leading professional organization promoting the advancement and parity of women within the commercial real estate industry, hosted a luncheon panel discussion about one of the industry’s favorite buzzwords: placemaking.  

The panel, which was moderated by Tara Piurko, a real estate partner at Toronto-based Miller Thomson and former CREW Network President, featured Jesse Brackenbury, executive director of The Rose Kennedy Greenway in Boston; Russell Preston, founder and director of Principle Group, a planning, design, and development firm; Al Wilson, founder and CEO of Beyond Walls in Lynn; and Laura Christopher, real estate innovation officer at MassDevelopment.  

Panelists explained what placemaking is, what it is not and why real estate developers in the private sector should consider investing in placemaking to create successful, sustainable, and thriving projects and communities.  

Small Investments, Big Impacts 

Although many placemaking projects create new attractions meant to encourage new visitors to cities, towns, and neighborhoods that have seen economic downturn or lack development investment or infrastructure, the more enduring goal of placemaking projects should be to bring along the community that already exists and to create opportunities for those who have already put down roots in these areas.  

The most successful placemaking projects are those that respond to the existing needs of a community rather than imposing an outside solution or vision of what the community needs or should be. For example, Wilson of Lynn’s Beyond Walls organization described how installing 600 linear feet of interactive and permanent LED lighting to a busy underpass not only created a visually arresting, accessible piece of public art, but solved a pressing need of the community by lighting a site troubled by crime and traffic accidents involving pedestrians.  

Placemaking can also help property owners and developers test their business plan before opening. While projects await entitlements or funding, property owners and developers can use the project site to host placemaking projects to ensure that the area is vibrant, visible and well-trafficked. Where “walkability” is an essential ingredient to a real community, ensuring that a project will draw people to a community is essential to the success of projects.  

Even small investments like bike and bus infrastructure can have a real impact by creating an amenity space for future residents or customers, without having already built a project. Preston explained that instead of spending money on marketing his firm, the Principle Group, invests in placemaking endeavors from the episodic, such as live music or a community chili cook-off, to the permanent, like a public art installation.  

As Laura Christopher explained, these types of success stories provide municipalities with the objective data needed to encourage public investment in emerging communities, resulting in lasting public-private partnerships. And, success begets success. A pioneering project in an emerging location, bolstered by placemaking that creates a larger community fabric, can encourage private and public buy-in for future projects.        

Be Nimble, Be Authentic 

Because placemaking is often pushing the envelope and thinking about new ways to activate communities, there can be conflict with municipalities. City permitting may not have a neat category in which to “fit” placemaking projects. Placemakers need to be nimble in order to respond to and counter “noes” from city hall.  

Placemakers must be able to test new ideas and be willing to fail when those new ideas flop. Remaining open to failure and observing how the public “votes with their feet” ensures that project proponents get it right and adopt placemaking projects that will have a lasting impact on communities. In this way, placemaking democratizes decision-making about the public realm.  

Importantly, the panel emphasized that placemaking should be as much about placekeeping as it is about creating new and innovative uses for existing properties and communities. As with anything, the most successful projects are those that feel authentic. True authenticity can only come from active listening and dialogue with the community and constituents that new projects are intended to serve.   

Kate Moran Carter is a lawyer at Dain, Torpy, Le Ray, Wiest & Garner, P.C. and co-chair of CREW Boston’s Programs, Seminars, and Project Spotlight Committee.