If you get the City’s newsletter you probably already knew this:
This week, the Greater Dallas Planning Council presented an award for urban design in the built environment to the City of Richardson for the City’s commitment to good urban design.
Urban design relates to the form, arrangement, design and functionality of buildings, neighborhoods and public spaces, including parks, yards, sidewalks, and even transportation facilities. The goal of good urban design is to create attractive environments for people and their activities. The panel of judges felt that the City had demonstrated a particularly good effort for a first-ring suburb, where redevelopment and construction on infill sites is more common than new development on vacant property.
Richardson received the award for the combined impact created by several projects—the Brick Row and Eastside mixed use developments, each of which contain important streetscape and open space requirements; the Neighborhood Vitality Program, which was conceived to strengthen and support neighborhoods and encourage reinvestment into residential property; and the construction of Routh Creek Parkway, which was built not as a sterile transportation corridor, but as an attractive public area that links motorists, pedestrians and recreational users with the Spring Creek Nature Area nearby.
This is the type of stuff that makes me proud to live in Richardson. This city gets it and continues to strive at making it a better place for it’s residents.
