Spaces to Places

The Luzerne County Association of REALTORS® in PA used NAR's Placemaking Grant to create a dog rest area along the Greater Hazleton Rails-to-Trails path.

Take them or leave them, elevated freeways are a mainstay of cities all over the world.

Even if there are places to visit just a short walk from your home, you may be unlikely to walk there if the way to get there is unsafe or unpleasant.

This is an updated repost from 2015. Please note that while NAR's Placemaking Grant does fund community gardens, the gardens need to be multi-functional spaces whereby anyone in the community can enjoy it as a destination. So don't forget to...

If you’ve been keeping up with the posts to date, you’ve probably thought of at least one site in your community that would be a good candidate for a placemaking project. But if you still can’t identify a site, you may want to take a look at any...

Written by Chris Bailey, Government Affairs Director, Greater Greenville Association of REALTORS® Like a lot of other small Southern towns, Greenville, South Carolina has experienced a rebirth and renaissance of sorts. Downtown Greenville is...

Land trusts and city parks conservancies exist to help communities address limited access to nature and unplanned development and to create and preserve parks and open spaces. Land trusts conserve natural resources such as natural areas, parks,...

Happy Valentine’s Day. Maybe it’s the perfect time to send your city a love note. Love notes are something Peter Kageyama, an urban strategist and author of For the Love of Cities, refers to as gestures between cities and its citizens. They are...

Does your community have a “Main Street”? If so, what sets it apart from other streets? Jim Thorpe, PA Why should a community have a “Main Street”? As argued in the Main Street Handbook, Main Streets help define a community so that a...

Many American cities were built around industrial centers along waterfronts. But as America’s transportation and industrial profile changed, manufacturing plants closed and were abandoned leaving behind deteriorating, unsightly and underutilized...

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Community Outreach Programs

Housing Opportunity Grant
Housing Opportunity Grants support state and local REALTOR® Associations’ affordable housing activities. The goal of the program is to position REALTORS® as leaders in improving their communities by creating affordable housing
opportunities.

Smart Growth Grant
Smart growth is an approach to development that encourages a mix of building types and uses, diverse housing and transportation options, development within existing neighborhoods, and community engagement. The Smart Growth Program offers state and local REALTOR® Associations to way to engage with government officials, community partners and the general public in planning and designing community’s future.

Diversity
Planned diversity initiatives makes good business sense. REALTOR® Associations with well-planned diversity programs create a stronger sense of community, particularly in neighborhoods with high concentrations of foreign-born and minority residents who are moving up the socioeconomic ladder and are buying homes.

NAR Placemaking Resources

Placemaking Guide: A Guide to Transform a Public Space into a Community Place
REALTORS® and state and local association staff can learn the details of Placemaking, the kinds of projects placemaking entails, how to organize them, and where to go for assistance and resources.

Placemaking Webinar Series
Our Placemaking Webinar Series will provide more in depth information on the various types of Placemaking and how REALTORS® were involved in Placemaking activities in their communities.

Placemaking Grant
The Placemaking Grant funds the creation of new public spaces, like pocket parks, trails & gardens, in a community. The grant focuses on “lighter, cheaper, quicker” placemaking projects, which can be built under a year and cost less than $200,000.