Category : Community & Regional Planning

Women’s History Month Series, Part Three: Find Your Purpose

In our third and final installment of RDG’s Women’s History Month series, we discuss the value of purpose-driven work and how supporting and lifting up others benefits us all.

We officially close out our Women’s History Month interview series with a conversation focused on finding meaning in your career, how important it is to pursue work that excites you and what it means to be supported and offer support to others in return.…

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A Blueprint for Success: Recognizing Women in Planning and Design

The first in RDG’s Women’s History Month series featuring women who challenge us to be better, dream boldly and create meaning together in everything we do.

Women have shaped our lives and communities in a myriad of ways, contributing their knowledge, expertise, skills and perspectives across a spectrum of industries and fields.…

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My 15-Minute City

What it looks like to create and maximize a hyperlocal approach to metropolitan life.

I don’t think I’m alone in my experience of needing to adapt in innumerable ways in 2020. The COVID-19 pandemic has forced us all to rethink how we engage with many seemingly mundane parts of our lives – grocery shopping, what to eat for dinner and even how we get to and from work.…

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Moving Forward, Even Amid the Uncertainty of COVID-19

Proactive community planning is a critical component to the health of any community. And right now, it’s more important than ever before.

The past 12 months have been very interesting here in Nebraska: in the spring of 2019, devastating floods swept across the state, wiping out infrastructure and leaving businesses destroyed; a year later, the global COVID-19 pandemic has flooded our communities in a different but equally significant and devastating way.…

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Four Foundations of Successful Preservation

National Preservation Month offers a chance to consider what it takes to preserve the past to create a better future.

The month of May is dedicated to National Preservation Month, a time to celebrate the diverse and unique heritage of our country’s cities and states.…

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The Ways Preservation Pays

From affordable housing to sustainable practices, a look at six benefits historic preservation can have on a community’s bottom line.   

My passion for historic preservation began when I was young. An admiration for the beauty of old buildings and the extensive details of these structures ultimately led me to pursue a career as an urban planner.…

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Design Residency Explores Urban Redevelopment and Transformation of a Living Community

Eleven graduate students from nine universities across seven states and two countries came together Nov. 5-8, 2019 for RDG’s ninth annual Design Residency.

Residents were charged with solving a challenging design problem: reimagine and reinvigorate the eastern end of Des Moines’ Douglas Avenue Corridor, a section of the city with a highly diverse yet low-income population, deteriorating infrastructure, lack of walkability and accessibility and numerous struggling businesses.…

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Create Meaning Together With Design Residency

Meeting The Challenges of Climate Change

In October 2018, RDG Planning and Design hosted its 8thannual Design Residency, a 3-day charette style learning event which gathers the nation’s top graduate students from many fields to address complex community problems.…

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Community Planning – Seeing Through The Lens of GIS

GIS, also known as Geographic Information Systems, is a software platform bringing understanding to our projects. This platform provides a variety of tools to perform data manipulation. For us at RDG, GIS is a foundational tool utilized in all of our community and regional planning work.…

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Designing a Revitalized Community

A community isn’t magically revitalized by spiffing up a building or two. Creative vision, thoughtful planning, and revived key places and structures can impress and energize locals and visitors alike, enhancing pride of place and making further changes seem not just possible, but desirable.…

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