This community visioning exercise that uses regional maps and Legos to supplement to discussions of planning and growth issues. Lego blocks may represent jobs, housing units, people, or other attributes to help people devise a vision for the future.
The Center for Sustainable Economy’s Ecological Footprint quiz measures the amount of land required to support one person’s consumption of resources. This educational tool illustrates that everything we do has an impact on land around the world.
Community Theater projects expand upon the concept of local theater to produce shows that are based upon or document the character of the community itself or explore issues the community is dealing with.
Graffiti Walls (or "Idea Walls") are public spaces for citizens to brainstorm graphically. They provide an informal place to help community members generate ideas or suggestions and respond to the ideas of others.
Community Video projects are any type of video documentary or film describing local community or presenting profiles of residents. They can be used specifically as tools for planning when they address certain complicated planning topics or issues.
Community members can create collages to share what they love about their town, what they'd like to change, ideas they'd like to see developed, or to answer some other question or challenge.
Participants in a Crayon Your Community event draw maps of their neighborhoods or towns, including all natural and built elements that they identify as important to their vision of the community.
A variation of traditional opinion polling, deliberative polling measures subjects’ opinions, but also the reasons for those opinions and their capacity to change.
Growth Chip Games are a fun, effective activity to engage community members in planning decisions. Players use chips to represent development attributes and place them on maps to create different scenarios for growth and change.
Essay contests are used to collect stories and opinions about a community and engage people in thinking about the community's future. They can be very open-ended or be directed to address specific community planning or character issues.