Joining Rhodeside & Harwell, Gensler and a diverse team of, transportation, zoning and economic analysis consultants to advise the City of Sandy Springs on updating its Comprehensive Plan.
The Challenge: As the City of Sandy Springs celebrates the 10-year anniversary of its incorporation, it is time to look ahead to the next decade and beyond. How should it grow, develop and get around? What will be the character of Sandy Springs in the future? How can it continue to thrive?
The Outcome: As part of this initiative, Michael Altman (while working at Gensler) joined forces with Landscape Architects Rhodeside & Harwell and a diverse team of, transportation, zoning and economic analysis consultants to advise the City of Sandy Springs on updating its Comprehensive Plan. His team branded the process as The Next Ten, a citywide dialogue to answer important questions for future growth.
Gensler’s Planning + Urban Design team focused specifically on preparing detailed, geographically-specific small area plans for Roswell Road Corridor, Perimeter Center Improvement District, Powers Ferry and North Springs MARTA station and new MARTA station. Extensive community engagement was planned (with input from Michael Altman) from the very beginning and the public was heard from in a variety of ways:
- 120+ attendees at focus groups and interviews
- 300+ attendees at meetings and open studios
- 300+ interactions at festivals + open workshops
- 102 comments via email and web
- 350+ web and text poll responses
- 950+ comments on interactive map
- 4,600 unique visitors to theNextTen.org
Synthesis of all of this input lead the team to crystallize the community’s priorities and develop a set of 10 comprehensive plan goals that included; preserving and sustaining SandySpring’s high-quality neighborhoods, improving citywide mobility, creating a connected city, celebrating the city’s network of parks and open spaces, creating a balanced and attainable community for all generations and income levels, continuing to thrive economically, maximizing the potential of the city’s transit infrastructure, promoting redevelopment, creating a constellation of unique places and developing tools to manage development and implement the vision -- specifically revising the City’s zoning code and subdivision regulations.
Then, Gensler identified specific locations for redevelopment or investment and aligned the goals for the Comprehensive Plan with the City’s capital budget and capital improvement plans. Each plan contained a series of recommendations and detailed strategies for implementation.
Learn more about progress on The Next Ten.
