Getting StartedUACDC Mission StatementThe UACDC has a mission to restore, maintain, and protect Arkansas' small town quality of life through the promotion of more compact and livable communities, the protection of natural and historic resources, and the conservation of farm and forest lands. Achieving this MissionIdentify and Exploit the Region's "Sense of Place." To define a Sense of Place you must define all those qualities which set apart one place from all other places in the world. We call it a "Sense" of Place, because all five senses are actively engaged when experiencing a place. Sight, Sound, Smell, Taste, and Touch are powerful intuitive forces. Think about all the physical and social qualities, and related sensory qualities, when you group together to define your community's Sense of Place. Cotter has a Unique History, a Unique Culture, Unique Natural Resources, Unique Buildings, a Unique Landscape, a Unique Climate, and Unique People. Cotter has an extraordinary geography, a trout filled river, a historic bridge, a railroad and ferry history, a beautiful landscape, and amazing people. Your community is special. . .cherish that. Inherent in this concept of a "Sense of Place" is a mandate to restore, maintain, and protect the natural history and cultural history of the community. This means saving and reusing all historical buildings, and preserving and managing the natural landscape. Invest in Your Downtown Area. Locate new retail, commercial, and public development downtown, and make every effort to keep existing downtown businesses where they are. Make an effort to fill vacant buildings Build two story structures and create residential space on the second floor. A small community like Cotter cannot support commercial development in multiple areas. Focus new development downtown. Make Community Spaces. This means that site development is focused upon the exterior space remaining once the building program is satisfied and the building is placed. Buildings now constructed in American small towns treat external space as a residual element. Essentially, buildings are constructed with little or no regard for community space, or urban context (or the potential to create urban context). This is the wrong approach. The role of an individual building should be subordinated to the communal environment. Streets and squares, plazas, and parks take precedence over buildings. The buildings are conceived as elements defining and enclosing outdoor space. Streets are community spaces. The UACDC talked at length about developing or maintaining main streets in the central business district as important community spaces. The streets are key to stimulating growth and interest in downtown development. A community is defined by its streets. When the main streets of your community become great places to walk, talk, sit, relax, and greet neighbors, the community is well on the way to having revitalized energy downtown. Density is Good. Many people think of density as Manhattan, NY, and want no part of it for their small town. What they forget is that all towns were more compact before the development of the automobile. Walking was the primary means of transportation. Much of what people find desirable about cities, with a strong historical component, is directly related to high density. Even small towns need density. Density is a key ingredient for successful community spaces. It is the continuous facades on each side of Main Street that form the walls, that make a great street. Only density groups services close enough together for people to walk instead of drive. Mixed-use development groups retail, commercial, and residential amenities. This type of density keeps people, and hence activity, in the central business district 24 hours a day. Stop the Strip. The strip makes no space, and has no sense of place. The strip looks, feels, smells, tastes, and sounds exactly the same whether you're in Madison, Wisconsin or Mountain Home, Arkansas. You eat at the same restaurant, shop for the same clothes, and experience the same atmosphere. Big ugly signs, wide streets and speeding automobiles, garish colors, blinding lights, huge car saunas (parking lots), ridiculous building setbacks and uninspired buildings, dying or non existing vegetation, car exhaust, no sidewalks (but who would want to walk there anyway), and spiritless people characterize the strip. The development of the strip is simply not dense enough to create space. The strip has no sense of place because there is simply nothing unique about it. Utilize Existing Infrastructure. Define your city limits. Define development limits. Establish urban growth boundaries to help put an end to unmanaged growth. Revise your zoning codes to build density downtown, encourage mixed-use development, and discourage strip development. The UACDC always hears talk of creating a new housing subdivision. Subdivisions are costly. They are costly in terms of dollars, but also in terms of a lost sense of community. Dollar wise, the subdivision is expensive because city services: roads, sewer, water, electricity, etc., have to be extended to the new subdivision. The price tag for new infrastructure is very high. The greatest cost of a new subdivision, however, is not related to finances, it is the price you pay for a lost sense of community. Subdivisions are typically developed in an isolated area, outside the city limits. Although the subdivision itself, if planned well, may form a sort of neighborhood, it is still isolated from the heart of the community. Every town has a number of sites, mixed in size from single lots to areas containing 10 or more single family lots, in close proximity to their downtown. Cotter is no exception. There is ample opportunity to integrate new housing into existing city infrastructure. This is a better solution to the housing problem than the subdivision mentioned above. Infilling is less costly, and with added density you are creating a sense of community. A larger population near the town center, allows people to be out walking and not inside of their cars. Make community spaces by infilling vacant properties before falling into the subdivision trap. Take Action. Start a project. Organize your community. Actively participate in the physical planning of your city. Each person can make a difference. Cost of No MissionLook around. We live in a very ugly world. Without positive action, senseless development will increase exponentially. Our planning and design solutions are mainly dollar driven. Communities do not develop based on aesthetics, community minded values, natural resource protection, historic preservation, or any passion for a "sense of place." This means segmented, segregated communities, social problems, polluted resources, landscape abuse, and unappealing development. The following is a quote from David Glasser, Director of the UACDC:
Project ImplementationThe common response to discussions about plan implementation is: "Where do we get the money?" Money is an issue, but not always the biggest obstacle. There are several steps a community should take to implement a plan before even thinking about money. 1st Step: You Have to Care! The primary concern is to take pride in your community, and show care and concern for its past, present, and future. 2nd Step: Organized Community Voice Gather together as many caring souls as possible to begin, or continue, your planning process. Don't be elitist. Make sure all factions of the community are represented. Meet at a significant, neutral, public location. Brainstorm! 3rd Step: Shared Vision or Goal The community must have a shared vision or goal. Keep discussing, debating, brainstorming, and communicating until the entire group shares a vision. If you cannot agree, special interest groups will move ahead in different directions, compete with other groups, and nothing will happen. 4th Step: Time and Talent Everyone has something they can contribute to a project. Some people have resources: money or materials. Some people have special or unique talents, and others have spare time. Each person can make a difference. 5th Step: Locate Funding Any organization or individual considering funding a project, requires a community to be organized, or "have their act together". Achieving the four steps above greatly increase your chances of being awarded grant money or other available funding. Summing UpThe UACDC Cotter Team produced a large body of work during the eight week program. Reductions of all the drawings are included in this report. We also hope that our stay in Cotter energized community members enough to see the potential of the Region's future. The ideas and images illustrated by drawings are only CONCEPTUAL. The City must hire design professionals to further develop these ideas before any sort of construction can begin. Full size reproductions of drawings, 35 mm color slides of drawings and models, and additional copies of this report are available for community use. Copies of this report, and 35mm color slides are available (at cost) from: Mr. Gil Stammer |
Cotter, Arkansas - Trout Capital
U.S.A.