Revitalizing Urban Main Streets: Mission Hill & Egleston Square, Boston
MIT OpenCourseWare offers this urban planning course on reviving struggling neighborhood commercial districts, combining classroom instruction with an applied studio project centered on Boston's Mission Hill and Egleston Square neighborhoods. Materials cover why urban business districts decline, the physical design and economic development tools planners use to diagnose a Main Street's problems, and the policy interventions, financing tools, and investment strategies used to reverse that decline. Students work toward a real deliverable: a formal neighborhood commercial revitalization plan prepared for an actual client business district. The course materials include syllabus, readings, assignments, and project guidelines as published through MIT OpenCourseWare, free to access with no certificate offered. It suits students interested in economic development, urban design, or community planning who want a case-based look at how theory translates into a workable revitalization strategy for a specific place.