Designing Vibrant Communities
Written by Rachel Cramer
It’s a dry, fall day in northwest Iowa. Gretchen Reichter walks through Emmetsburg’s downtown, passing storefronts adorned with scarecrows from a recent retail competition. The community’s marketing and development coordinator stops when she reaches a gap between two businesses. Faded murals of sunflowers and a cornfield cling to the brick walls on either side of the pocket park.
“We want it to be an immersive park and something people really want to spend time in,” Reichter said, explaining the plan to add a patio, benches, string lighting and garden beds. Plans for the park also include outdoor musical instruments for kids and a pergola for live music and outdoor educational sessions.
Across town, Reichter points out several transportation improvements. Flashing beacons urge drivers to slow down near the elementary school. Painted lines on roads separate cars and bikes, and a new trail connects the middle and high schools with the hospital and Iowa Lakes Community College.
These and other project priorities in Emmetsburg emerged from participating in Iowa’s Living Roadways Community Visioning Program in 2020-21. The program is a collaboration between the Iowa State University College of Design, ISU Extension and Outreach Community and Economic Development (CED), the Iowa Department of Transportation (DOT), the nonprofit organization Trees Forever, private-sector landscape architects and community stakeholders.
Since its creation in 1996, 258 towns have participated, 40 of which have been in the program more than once.
While the Community Visioning Program doesn’t fund the projects, each town receives research and design services equivalent to $100,000 — for free. It also helps connect participants to state and federal grants that can turn design concepts into reality.
Community Visioning Program: ‘Planning 101’
Julia Badenhope, Iowa State professor of landscape architecture and Community Visioning’s principal investigator, says the program is “like Planning 101 and a springboard to do more.” Most of the towns that participate each year have populations under 2,000.
While the program has evolved and expanded over the past 27 years, it’s rooted in research Badenhope conducted to understand community action and gaps in design services in rural Iowa when she was the ISU Extension landscape architect.
She developed and piloted the Community Visioning Program with the Iowa DOT. Mark Masteller (BS 1978 Landscape Architecture), the state agency’s now-retired chief landscape architect, was there from the start.
“Originally, the DOT was interested in this because we have always permitted people to do plantings on the highway right-of-way, but they often don’t have any professional expertise. I remember getting a plan drawn on a napkin,” Masteller said.
“The Community Visioning Program was a big help to the DOT to have these smaller communities access professional services and get more buildable plans.”
Badenhope emphasizes that the program is an “opportunity to weave a web of service” between the public and private sectors across Iowa. Two key threads within that web of service are private-sector landscape architects and student interns.
Since 1996, Community Visioning has employed 262 interns, more than 90% of whom are ISU College of Design students or recent graduates. Visioning interns either assist with community assessments in the program office in Ames, are hired by a landscape architect, or both. The internship gives the students the opportunity to engage with residents and learn more about participatory design.
“The goal is to help the community and listen to their voices, so the designs really have a meaning behind them instead of just we as designers doing whatever we want,” said Alexis Banks, a fifth-year landscape architecture student who has worked as a design intern for the program since 2022.
More than 80 landscape architects, many of whom are College of Design alumni, have participated in the program. About two dozen of these practitioners also worked as design interns while attending Iowa State, which demonstrates the impact that Community Visioning had on their career choices.
One such professional is Samantha Price (BLA 2009 Landscape Architecture), who interned with Craig Ritland Landscape Architects in 2009 and was subsequently hired by that firm.
“I stumbled onto Community Visioning through Professor Badenhope, as she encouraged her students to apply for the internship program,” Price said. “Fifteen years later, I’m still participating in Community Visioning because I truly love the program and I can help make an impact in rural Iowa communities like the one I grew up in.”
What’s included in the ‘web of service?’
Every November, new community applicants are accepted into the program. Trees Forever organizes monthly meetings with each town’s volunteer steering committee. Meanwhile, Chad Hunter (MLA 2014 Landscape Architecture), a lecturer and project manager with Iowa State’s landscape architecture department, leads the student interns in creating large maps for each community. They collect data about the local topography, vegetation, watersheds and transportation networks.
In the spring, program staff and interns conduct focus groups, using the maps to understand how residents of varying ages, abilities and interests walk, roll and drive across town. They discuss transportation-related barriers and assets and share ideas for improvement. In towns with larger populations, the program also conducts a random-sample survey.
Following the focus groups, Community Visioning Program staff and students distill community input into a series of presentation boards while the landscape architect assembles an infrastructure assessment. Both go to the steering committee, which prioritizes projects.
Residents provide feedback through several public events, and then the landscape architect and student intern create conceptual designs and a feasibility report with cost options. A Trees Forever field coordinator continues to follow up with the steering committee, providing guidance on implementing projects and applying for grants.
Outdoor recreation and disaster recovery
Projects that emerge from the Community Visioning Program reflect the needs and priorities of rural Iowa, some of which have shifted over the years.
“When I first started, it was more about entryway enhancements and roadside plantings, which are still relevant, but it has expanded to focus more on trails and accessibility, and healthy lifestyles,” said Sandra Oberbroeckling (BA 1988 Journalism & Mass Communication / MA 1996 English), Community Visioning Program project manager and CED communications specialist.
Looking to the future, Oberbroeckling expects more communities will also focus on mitigating and recovering from natural disasters. “Transportation is not only roads and sidewalks. It’s trees and bioswales and permeable pavement, all of which can help a community be more resilient,” she said.
Oberbroeckling points to Mapleton in western Iowa as an example. In 2011, an EF5 tornado destroyed 60% of the town’s tree canopy. Through Community Visioning, residents discovered the denuded areas had more flooding, spurring projects to improve Mapleton’s stormwater management.
The program has aided other communities devastated by tornados, including Parkersburg, and the 2020 derecho.
Building momentum for bigger projects
Near the Loess Hills in western Iowa, combines and trucks trace golden fields and fence lines. In the distance, across the Boyer River and the largest remnant of the historic Lincoln Highway, a 65-foot-tall metal corn stalk with LEDs adorns an old grain elevator. Before the public art installation — an outcome of Community Visioning in 2007-08 — the 1940s milk-carton-shaped structure was in danger of being demolished.
“It was considered an eyesore, right at the town’s gateway. However, many residents remembered tagging along with grandpa in hopes of a cold soda from the cooler or listening in on local gossip,” said Deb Sprecker, executive director of Woodbine Main Street. “The community rallied to save it, and now it’s an iconic piece of Woodbine culture and a quirky ‘mile marker’ for travelers going from Omaha to Ames.”
Turning the grain elevator into public art, along with revitalizing the downtown, created momentum to tackle other priorities, Sprecker said. A community apple orchard is a nod to the region’s agrarian past and provides free, fresh produce. A new wellness center houses an indoor pool, walking track, gym, conference room and childcare center for Harrison County residents. And last August, IGNITE Pathways opened its doors to prepare high school students for high-demand jobs and fill a gap in southwest Iowa for continuing technical education for adults.
Each November, the Community Visioning Program hosts its annual celebration. Participants who just wrapped up the year-long process showcase their design concepts, attend workshops and meet with vendors. For the new cohort, it is an opportunity to see what’s possible and ask questions. They’ll return a year later to share what they’ve learned and their plans for the future. It’s all part of a growing “web of service” to support vibrant small towns across the state.