Cuyahoga Metropolitan Housing Authority
Cleveland, Ohio
A master plan to guide redevelopment of a 20-acre public housing site into 573 units of mixed-income housing and stores.
Recognition:
- Boston Society of Architects—2001 Urban Design Award
- Congress for the New Urbanism—2002 Charter Award
Project Highlights:
Community opposition and financial issues inherited from previous redevelopment efforts had kept the housing authority from using a HOPE VI grant. The presence of 501 units of low-income elderly housing also undermined efforts to establish a mixed-income community.
Strategy:
- Significantly increase the density of new housing on the site to create a critical mass of market-rate and moderate- and low-income family units.
- Provide a wide range of housing types, from single-family townhouses to lofts and mid-rise apartments, that would accommodate a highly diverse community.
- Identify strategies for redeveloping existing low-income housing towers, which had faced consistently high vacancy rates.
- Narrow an arterial street that separates the site from the neighborhood. Locate retail at street level to further reduce the site's isolation and to extend an adjacent, pedestrian-friendly Main Street.
- The plan's crescent design and active mixed-use buildings along the Main Street form a long-missing transition between Cleveland’s West Side and downtown. Funded in part by HOPE VI, the new neighborhood replaces 143 public housing units and a mix of other uses on the site.
- Goody Clancy's intensive, multiday charrette, held early in the process, drew representatives of residents, advocacy groups, government agencies, and private developers. It formed the centerpiece of an extensive community-outreach program that generated widespread support for the plan from surrounding communities and public housing residents.