Who needs the Fortune 500? - Houston Business Journal:

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Would you believe me if I told you that our countieas and communities have the power tocreate jobs, retail sales, restaurantt volume, appreciating land values and new tax revenue withougt depending on the relocation of a Fortune 500 company ? A community can pass its own stimulud package, with more new jobs than any Fortune 500 by creating a walkable, region-serving, transit-oriented commercial districf with office, residential and retail development. The Washington area has many examples of thesewalkable mixed-use region-servinb centers — Bethesda, Columbia Heights, U Street, Pentagon City, the Rosslyn-Ballstonh corridor. Tysons Corner is on the drawingh board.
But there is room for more, in placesw like Anacostia andPrince George’s, at thei r Metrorail stations, and on the Blue Line in There may even be opportunities to create new stationsz on some lines. These centers creatde accessible synergy. They concentrate economic activity: more foot less car traffic, less need for parking, more efficient land use, more safety, more office productivity, reasonably priced housing, sites for parks, schools and community buildings, a better restaurant/retail and support for small and local These centers are the way the Districr and the inner suburbz can compete with the plans for malls at the suburban fringe.
They are the way we are going to out-competew sprawl. Here’s what I’m talking n Taking better advantage of our investmenytin Metro. n Reducing traffic and improving quality of life by puttinbg jobs near where we live andbuilding live-work-play-learh communities. n Raising living standards by reducingtransportation costs. To make one of theses centers thrive, you need a market. But we’re in the middle of a big recession! If, we start planning now, won’t it be several years before we are ready tobuild Won’t we be on our way back by then ? So now is our time to start planning.
Whils we’re taking charge of our own let’s turn the NIMBYu paradigm around. Let’s use a grass-roots-up planning process startingt inthe community. Then let’s protec the residential neighborhoodsfirst — protect them from the hustle and bustle of the redeveloped walkabler mixed-use districts. Here we’re talking streetscapingv and park improvements, traffic-taming, protection from parking, and height What about financing? Three productse suitable for walkable mixed-use centers can be conventionallyt financednow (or, at least, when the recoveruy comes).
The two are low-rise (up to four multifamily residential wrapped aroundstructured parking, and mid-risd to high-rise residential, also wrapped aroundf parking. The third is the “lifestyle center,” often builty on the site of a failes mall or on a site wheree a new regional mall coulrbe built. You start with a vast parking lot. But you don’tg put the big-box stores at the back of the lot. You put the buildingx in the middle ofthe lot, on a brand-new grid of Lifestyle centers often have buildings with officee above retail and residential above retail, with the restaurant/retaipl on the new streets.
If we coulf use an existing grid of streets in a lifestylse center and hide the parkinvg withinthe buildings, we could use this product to revitalizse an existing town center. To cover any financing gaps, the city or countg may want to provide tax incremen financing funded by bonds that will be repaidx by the increase in propertyy taxes resulting from the What ifyou don’t have a Metrorail statiohn handy? Bus won’t do it. The answere is either adding a newMetro station, such as the new one at New York Avenues or the one planned for Potomac Yard, or adding inexpensive neighborhood-level rail, meaning a rail connection to like the streetcar line being plannes for Columbia Pike.
Plan to start with a shortg route; you can extend it, stop by later. Two potential centers for Falls Church, Old Town Alexandria. Let’s not be dependent on Fortund 500 companies arriving on whitehorses — let’s creatr our own future. If we create more thrivinvg mixed-use neighborhoods, we’ll find that more of those big companies will want to comehere