Engage New Albany Strategic Plan New Albany, Ohio
Services Provided
Comprehensive Planning
Strategic Planning
Public Engagement
Focus Area Planning
People Involved
Chris Hermann
Andrew Overbeck
Sarah Lilly
Jeff Pongonis
Strategic road map for New Albany continues to guide community toward its future vision.
Since 1998, the New Albany Strategic Plan has been guiding development in this growing community. The city relies on it as a critical tool to plan for growth, guide future development, enhance the community’s character, and tackle challenging issues facing the city. MKSK created the original plan in partnership with the city and has performed each update since, on a roughly six- to seven-year interval. While technically comprehensive plans, these plans are referred to as “Strategic Plans” due to their focused nature. The 2020 update, titled Engage New Albany, prioritized broad public outreach and engaged more than 1,300 community members through a variety of traditional and non-traditional methods.
Engage New Albany is a holistic rewrite of the plan that includes updates to foundational elements such as the Future Land Use Plan and Thoroughfare Plan. Based on initial community feedback, this plan also added new chapters covering important topics to residents—Sustainability, Parks & Recreation, and Community Wellbeing. Community feedback factored heavily into the recommendations throughout the plan.
Several catalytic ideas from Engage New Albany have already been implemented, including the development of a Parks Framework Plan, led by MKSK, to address needed improvements to city-owned parks. Another early implementation item was the formation of the New Albany Inclusion Diversity and Equity Action (IDEA) Committee, a formalized city committee comprised of a wide range of stakeholders working together to advance diversity, equity, and inclusion in New Albany.
Another significant feature of the update was the inclusion of focus area plans: five geographic areas within the planning area where change to the built environment is expected and/or desired. The team analyzed these areas and created frameworks to guide future development and redevelopment in the focus areas.
New Albany’s Village Center is one of the focus areas because it is the heart of the community and continues to be a priority of the city – blending old and new into a dynamic, walkable, mixed use environment. Special emphasis was paid to the Village Center to ensure its continued development aligns with the community’s needs. This includes encouraging compact housing types, extending the Rose Run greenway, infilling residential development in the historic core, expanding the street grid, adding commercial office development, and reinforcing local retail destinations.
The Engage New Albany Strategic Plan was unanimously adopted by City Council.
For a video summarizing the planning process, click here
