Got an idea to make Downtown San Antonio a great place?
-Online mapping tool offers opportunity for public insight-


In an effort to revitalize downtown San Antonio, the City's Center City Development Office is asking residents and tourists to identify opportunities that will help make the heart of the City a great place. Ideas and comments on the best and most opportunistic downtown spots can be taken online at http://www.pps.org/placemap/sanantonio.

Placemap, the interactive, online mapping and community assessment tool, offers an opportunity for the public to share ideas for the area that will help City staff determine strengths, prioritize revitalization efforts, and identify specific projects to reinvigorate downtown San Antonio. Users are asked to share an idea and map it on an interactive map of downtown. Participants can also browse through other ideas and comments and view the ideas map, which maps all user ideas to date.

The Placemap also serves as an important resource for Centro Partnership, a public private collaboration, as it kicks off the Downtown Strategic Framework Plan effort. The first Public Workshop for this effort is scheduled for July 19 at La Villita Assembly Hall from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m.

"We want people to re-imagine our downtown spaces by identifying placemaking opportunities to enhance our parks, plazas, markets, and streets," said Pat DiGiovanni, Deputy City Manager. "A place has an emotion tied to it--and we want our stakeholders to tell us how they'd like to transform downtown from a public space to a place where they will want to spend time in, live in and work in," he added.

Placemaking is a multi-faceted approach to the planning, design and management of public spaces. The Center City Development Office contracted with the Project for Public Spaces (PPS) to provide educational and technical assistance focused on Placemaking. The non-profit group has experienced international success in the creation of more livable communities around the globe. They have helped more than 2,500 towns around the world improve their communities by showing that mobilizing people to make great places strengthens neighborhoods, cities and entire metropolitan areas.