For two Ball State graduate students, making Muncie walkable means improving the community overall.
Andrew Derry, a first year graduate student of wellness management, said that he and another graduate student, Christina Heberer, are encouraging community well-being through the improvement of the streets of Muncie.
“[We’re] working to develop an infographic on ten ways to improve streets and make streets places,” Derry said. “From implementing bike lanes, improving sidewalks and having places to walk and bike to, we can create a walkable and bike-friendly community… The healthy option needs to be the easy option.”
Derry will be attending a conference today held by Building Better Communities to learn more about engaging communities and potentially polish his project.
The Primacy of Place Conference, or PoPCon, is in its second year and will be held in Indianapolis.
Dick Heupel, one of the creators of the conference and director for economic and community development for BBC, said that primacy of place is the idea that a community’s overall prosperity can be improved not only by jobs, but also by the enrichment of life for the residents there.
Heupel said that employers are starting to look for business opportunities in communities where residents have good quality of life, which can help attract people with special skills.
“We’re struggling to find any community that is rich in talent that has a lagging economy,” Heupel said. “People are choosing to live where they want, and then employers are finding those places where they can get access to them.”
PoPCon is a one-day conference that will feature speakers and workshops that focus on improving quality of life for residents of Indiana, and show communities the importance of place and how to attract and keep talent.
There will be three keynote speakers: Mike Langellier, president of Tech Point, a company that strives to grow the technology sector in Indiana, Ed Burghard, who speaks around the country about how to strengthen American brands and CEO of The Burghard Group LLC, and Aaron Renn, a blogger who writes about issues of place.
The conference will also include four specialized breakout sessions. These sessions will focus on the six ways BBC believes communities can improve the quality of life for their residents. Areas include arts integration, central city revitalization, community well-being, educational excellence, readiness for change and municipal governance.
Derry said he decided to attend the conference to learn more about the importance of primacy of place, and to gather ideas to apply to his other graduate studies.
“One of my main focuses in graduate school is furthering placemaking in [the Muncie] community, and this conference will provide me with a network of individuals and a new knowledge base to further my work,” Derry said.
Brian Blackford, education and training director for BBC, said that the conference will be helpful for introducing ways for Indiana communities to attract skilled residents. Blackford was also involved in planning the conference.
“We think the conference is one way that we’re [trying to] showcase… the concept that communities, whether large of small, need to look at what they can do to attract talent,” Blackford said. “To attract talent you have to take a whole new look at community development and… the variety of opportunities to improve your local areas.”
Derry believes that students should be motivated to improve their communities.
“We are at a stage in our lives where we have experienced and witnessed areas of communities that need improvement, and we have creative and innovative ideas to make change,” Derry said. “… If we want to create great places to live, work and play, we need to be at the forefront of the placemaking movement.”
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