Building Confidence, Building Community
The Real Story: Interviews with Rick Holliday
The Real Story BLog
When Rick Holliday talks about people moving to West Oakland’s Central Station, he relates some of the anecdotes of daily living, urban style: people bicycling to BART and enjoying a door-to-door commute to downtown SF that’s fifteen minutes long…neighbors becoming friends while washing their dogs at a “Laundromutt”.
What he doesn’t mention is the role that the developer can play in brainstorming some of the small, but essential touches that help people feel that they are a part of a community—like converting a janitor’s closet into a dog wash room, or negotiating for thirty used bicycles from a friendly bicycle touring company so that homeowners have instant, easy access to transportation to get them to public transportation. At that point, the discussion about community building has nothing to do with bedroom and bath count, and whether there is tile or laminate on a countertop… building community is all about creating natural places for people to gather, meet and connect, and making use of the resources around the built environment to make more connections possible.
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