Dreaming the Future: Community Vision Planning
by Walter Cudnohufsky
A small town in Massachusetts shows how vision planning works. Including a look at the Places of the Heart community survey, and observations on vision planning.
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...
As consultants, Mollie Babize (a landscape designer/planner) and
I worked with the Wendell Committee to design a community survey
to gather residents' ideas for a "community vision for the
future." Our goal included identifying both
the more obvious physical places such as the town hall, town
common, state forest, and several town ponds, and the more
subtle, hard to quantify aspects such as historic continuity,
which was felt most strongly near the town common or town
cemeteries, or the pride felt when using the local library. This
survey was later labeled a "Places of the Heart Survey," a
phrase attributed to California landscape architect and
community planner, Randolph Hester.
We had taken seriously the need for broad-based community
involvement, fully aware that planning for a vision that does
not spring from such involvement is doomed to a dusty shelf. It
was clear from the outset that Wendell, with its independent
citizens holding sometimes divergent or even conflicting views
on what was important to the town and its future, was not
unique. It was equally evident, however, that the residents deep
caring for this small Massachusetts rural and wooded town was
connected to common and widely shared perceptions of what was
important. ...
We offered two principal ways for residents of Wendell to
participate in the study: by completing the "Places of the
Heart" survey, and/or by attending a "Vision workshop." To
further aid in soliciting participation we offered a community
raffle with a diverse assortment of prizes that included, among
many others, a cord of firewood, a full body massage, a turkey,
a watercolor painting, a course in herbs, and passes to the
local coffee house.
The project had two basic components:
(1) taking stock of the existing situation -- physical facts, as
well as citizen perceptions and sentiments; and
(2) projecting a vision for the future -- based on an
understanding of the discovered facts and sentiments. ...