Creating Quality Places:
Successful Communities by Design
Communities across the metropolitan Kansas City area are growing. Our challenge is to shape future development in ways that will maintain and enhance the high quality of life that our residents enjoy.
Creating Quality Places is intended to foster dialogue and action, resulting in positive changes in the region's built environment. The program began in 1999 when the Mid-America Regional Council convened a broad range of participants to develop a series of quality design principles.
These 20 principles form a set of affirmative statements and represent a powerful consensus on what is needed to design successful neighborhoods, vibrant mixed-use commercial areas and efficient transportation systems -- all within a healthy natural environment.
The principles are grouped into four categories:
These areas are presented separately, but are integrated in practice. For example, a clean and healthy environment is a prerequisite for any type of development. Successful, enduring places often incorporate a mix of land uses, adding vitality to the investment and to the community.
The Creating Quality Places principles are adaptable to any community. This program provides elected officials, planners, private developers and builders with a variety of resource information to facilitate implementation of these principles. Among the resources are case studies documenting local and national project examples, model ordinances, design standards and financing mechanisms.
