Note from Storm: It’s hard to build a Restoration Economy if you don’t know what you have to work with. Cleveland has been doing a lot of things right for some time now. This is the latest. If revitalization is the cake, then renewing, repurposing, replacing, and reconnecting your distressed, abandoned, and vacant assets are the ingredients.
In Cleveland, Ohio, the Western Reserve Land Conservancy’s Thriving Communities Initiative is undertaking an enormous survey of the city.
Eight pairs of surveyors are walking down each and every street in the city, visiting all of the storefronts, houses, and vacant lots there are to see. Parcel by parcel, the teams are documenting how many of Cleveland’s roughly 158,000 properties are vacant, distressed, or abandoned.
The database will help Cleveland city officials to direct their efforts to demolish abandoned properties and consolidate vacant and abandoned lots.