Brattleboro, VT

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2020

Project Category: Public space activation

Description: Residents considered the Brattleboro Transportation Center's parking garage to be ugly and uninviting. To change this, the Downtown Brattleboro Alliance worked with local artists to create signage for each level of the garage. The new signs feature a different animal for each level, with each creature -- the osprey, river otter, American shad and sea lamprey -- significant to the Abenaki indigenous community and the Connecticut River ecosystem. Additionally, the Alliance held a pop-up event in the garage's elevator to display the prototype for a new Ask the River kinetic sculpture. Visitors to the garage could view the sculpture and give their feedback. Today, the full-size version of the artwork decorates the facade of the Transportation Center building.

Akron, OH

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2025

Project Category: Public space activation

Description: Older adults in North Hill had few accessible public places to gather as longtime meeting spots faded and social isolation grew. Residents age 50 and over, including people from immigrant and refugee communities, lacked outdoor spaces that reflected their culture and supported everyday social connection. North Hill Community Development Corporation addressed this gap by transforming an underused area into the Howard Street Heritage Courtyard, a walkable public plaza shaped directly by older residents. Participants helped guide mural themes, seating and programming. The space added benches, walking paths, lighting and public art to support rest and conversation. The courtyard now serves as a permanent gathering place where older adults remain visible participants in neighborhood life. Cultural stories embedded in the art and events encourage intergenerational connection and reduce isolation.

Project description was created using generative AI and then reviewed for accuracy.

Kuna, ID

AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2017

Project Category: Public space activation

Description: Kuna has a large parking lot in the center of its downtown that goes largely underused for most of the year. To spark the community's imagination, the City and Idaho Smart Growth hosted the Park for a Day event, which turned the lot into a pop-up plaza. The event featured live music, a food vendor and sketches illustrating ways the space could be permanently transformed. Attendees also contributed their own designs for the parking lot. Suggestions included using the space for a series of short-term, recurring events, such as an Oktoberfest, a Christmas village, a renaissance fair or themed dance nights. The City went on to explore several ideas from the pop-up event, including paving the parking lot with solar panels and installing green stormwater infrastructure to sustain landscaping at the site.