← GovLove - A Podcast About Local Government
GovLove - A Podcast About Local Government
#721 How Participatory Mapping Can Transform Your Community with Emma Falkenstein, Highland Planning
00:40:06
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- [00:14]
A
Coming to you from Durham, North Carolina, this is Gov Luff, a podcast about local government brought to you by Engaging Local Government Leaders. I'm Tony Thompson, Director of Strategy for the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services and your gov host for this episode. GovLove is produced by EOGL engaging local government leaders. You can support GovLove by becoming an EOGL member. EOGL is a national volunteer run, membership based nonprofit organization with a mission to engage the brightest minds in local government. Check us out and learn more about our $50 annual membership@eogl.org and now on with our show. Today's guest is Emma Falkenstein from Highland Planning. Emma is a community planner at Highland Planning, a woman owned urban planning and design firm. Highland Planning partners with communities across the Northeast on long range planning, revitalization, transportation and climate resilience, bringing a deeply people centered, customized approach to every project. Based in Rochester, New York, Emma is passionate about working with communities of all sizes to translate big picture visions into actionable strategies, challenging the status quo and ensuring plans reflect the unique character and priorities of the places they serve. Welcome Emma. Thanks for joining me today.
- [01:34]
B
So excited to be here Tony to talk with you.
- [01:37]
A
Yeah, so we do a lightning round for all of our guests. So I have some lightning round questions for you so our listeners can get to know you better.
- [01:45]
B
Wonderful. Get away.
- [01:47]
A
Awesome. All right, first lightning round question. What is currently inspiring you in your professional work?
- [01:54]
B
What inspires me most as a community planner is getting to work with super cool communities and people who serve them to make places a better place for people to live. And so it's getting to work with my teammates at Highland Planning and our communities across the Northeast. From long range planning projects to engagement strategies, we get to work with fantastic municipal leaders and communities that are really trying to make a difference for the future.
- [02:21]
A
Yeah, I love that. Second lightning round question. What's a book, podcast or show you think every public servant should check out at least once?
- [02:31]
B
Great question. The probably top book on my urban planning bookshelf is the book Happy City by Charles Montgomery which focuses on how urban design can create a happier society. And after reading this book that has really informed my current work and I'm starting to incorporate what I've termed a happiness lens into our long range planning projects. And so I'm super excited to implement some of this work in our comprehensive plans in Central New York and thinking through from engagement activities to long range strategies, how can we use comprehensive planning as a way to make people happier and create more Thriving communities.
- [03:07]
A
I think that's great because I think a lot of people, when they hear or think about planning happiness may not be the first thing, a framework that comes to their mind. So I think that's awesome.
- [03:16]
B
Thanks. Excited to talk more.
- [03:18]
A
Yeah. All right, third question. What do you do for fun to keep you energized?
- [03:25]
B
So, outside of being an urban planning nerd, I'm also a huge foodie, and I love to cook. And so one of my current goals in 2026 is to try a new recipe every week. And I'm somewhat on track for that. But living in Rochester, we also have a really great food scene and so love to go out and try new restaurants. And if you're in shout out in the upstate region, hit me up if you want to go try some new places. And then Tony and I were just talking, but we've had a really hard winter this year. Lots of snow, lots of ice. And so really looking forward to the summer and getting out onto the Finger Lakes region to experience the best of nature has in upstate New York.
- [04:05]
A
That's great. That's awesome. I like to think of myself as a foodie, too, but I've destroyed the last two dishes I've tried to make there that were different. So I'm a little. I'm a little gas right now. A little hesitant. Yes.
- [04:17]
B
Been there.
- [04:18]
A
It's okay. Okay, final lightning round question. What's the best professional advice that you've received?
- [04:26]
B
Best professional advice, I think, is also somewhat of a life lesson that I try to live by. But it's the thought that when you're doing something new, it can feel a little scary, whether it be a new job or taking on a new project or working in a new community. And those little tingly feelings that you have typically mean that you're stepping out of your comfort zone and growing, either professionally or personally. And so I like to kind of reframe some of that scariness into a growth opportunity. And so to not shy away from those opportunities, but really kind of leap into the unknown and take on new experiences. And as part of that, I think when you're growing and engaging in new opportunities, you typically have a lot of questions and need to start to learn and not be afraid to start to dig into the big and small picture and not be afraid to ask why. And so kind of those two life lessons I hold really dear to me in my personal life, but those are also two really core values that we have at Highland Planning, and that not being afraid to embrace change and making sure that we're open to experiencing new things and new ideas.
- [05:33]
A
Awesome. Thank you for those Lightning round questions. I wanted to invite you on today because I saw that you and your team had recently published a really cool story report on how to leverage a walk audit as a planning tool to transform communities. And that really just inspired me because like first like, oh, what's walk audit? So reading the report, I found it really inspiring. But before we get into that, I want you to tell our listeners about, you know, your professional journey. You've been on the, on the podcast before. I, I interviewed you when you were just a grad student. So just kind of giving us an update about from that point in time to how you got to where you are today, but also talking about your journey, you know, what drives you, what do you do specifically for Highland Planning and yeah, how you got to this current point in your career.
- [06:24]
B
Yes, I'd love to talk about how I got to where I am today. So in terms of what drives me is a passion for really helping communities thrive. I am fascinated by seeing kind of the big picture of how little pieces of a community fit together, how people interact, policies that create good things and bad things, and then figuring out what do we do from here to create communities where people want to live. And so leveraging that passion, I'm super glad to be able to work as a community planner for Highland Planning where I get to work on primarily long range planning and community development projects throughout the northeast region that really help to kind of empower communities, local governments, community organizations to think strategically about what's working in their communities and what's not and then give them the tools and the resources to move forward and create the types of communities where they want their, their residents and businesses to live. And so I of fell into the planning profession like a lot of planners will say is it's we need to do a better job of advocating and showcasing the diversity of the profession for younger students. But as Tony mentioned, we met when I was finishing up grad school and so I did my master's in urbanization and development at the London School of Economics, which was really eye opening in terms of the intersections of public policy, urban planning or local politics. And from there really got interested in the ideas of participatory community engagement, long range planning from a strategy lens. And so I really consider myself a community geographer as well as a community planner in terms of really reflecting that people centered approach to planning. It's not all technical zoning codes and development processes, but really how, how do people and place fit together?
- [08:17]
A
Yeah, I really love that. I mean, thinking a people, you know, human centered lens into planning and then, you know, translating that into, you know, all those technical specifications and jargon that people, you know, don't sit through planning hearings to listen to. So I think that's really awesome that you take what's actually on the ground, people's lived experiences, and then, you know, make that a reality through the, you know, codes that we have to. To abide by.
- [08:43]
B
For sure. Well, that's the cool thing about, I think Highland Planning's approach to just our work is really centering community voices and honoring and listening through the process of our planning and thinking through how are we utilizing projects or plans or just community and local government more generally as that trust building, capacity building process? And that's really what, what drives me.
- [09:03]
A
Yeah, that's cool. Okay, so let's get into why I wanted you on today. What is a community walk audit? What does it achieve, and how can you use it as a tool to transform a community?
- [09:18]
B
So super excited to dive into this topic to kind of set the scene. Imagine that you're a community leader or municipal planning staff or elected representative, and you want to dig in to how someone might experience this street. So say you've been getting a lot of reports of speeding or heave sidewalks or crosswalks, and so you want to have an opportunity to dig a little bit deeper and understand what really is the challenge happening here. Is it an urban design issue? Is it a community asset issue? And so a walk audit is a tool that helps you to do this. And so kind of at its most bare bones definition, a walk audit is when an individual or group decide to. To walk along a designated route to observe, document and map predetermined environmental conditions. And so kind of why we like to utilize walk audits here at Highland Planning is they're a really cool customizable tool that we can use with the communities that we work with to dig into. Well, what are you actually trying to understand? Is it a street skate audit? Is it a community asset inventory? Is it a revitalization project where you want to get a lot of community engagement? Is it a urban tree canopy inventory? They're really customizable, which is why they're such a cool tool to be able to transform communities based on needs.
- [10:40]
A
That's awesome. Okay, so I thought this was so fascinating because, you know, we, we live in a car centric society here in America, and I think we lose things when we experience our communities through the lens of being in a car. So I just wanted to hear from you, like, what do we lose when we primarily have that framework and that lens of being in our cars as we go through our communities? And how does a walk audit help change that perspective?
- [11:11]
B
Yeah, so that is a great question. Really gets to the heart of what a walk on it helps to do. And it's to my kind of hypothetical scenario earlier of depending on your goal of the walk on it when helps you understand the pinch points of either a road or a commercial corridor or even a whole neighborhood that you wouldn't necessarily uncover if you've only ever driven down it through a personal vehicle or on a bus or in a truck. You really have to kind of experience it from the pedestrian standpoint of what does it feel like to try to cross at this particular intersection? Is there enough walking lead time? Are there cars whizzing by you in the summertime? Is there enough trees so you don't feel the heat? All of those things you'd lose if you only experienced it through a car. And so that's, I think the, the beauty of the walk audit is it's a great way to feel, facilitate that experience and get people to understand what is it like on the ground walking in your study area. And I'd say kind of slight tangent, but related. One of my other favorite planning books is the book Walkable City by Jeff Speck, which talks about the benefits of a walkable environment. And I think one of the coolest things from a walk audit perspective as it relates to walkability is creating a better understanding of the spontaneous interaction that can take place through the process of the walk audit. But also just having a walkable environment and so being able to run into a friend or stop into a shop, all things that help to create the social fabric that makes great places. You need that through a walkable community. And only being in a car centric society really tries it kind of negates that.
- [12:54]
A
Awesome. Okay, so you and your team did a walk audit recently. Take us through how and why you use a walk audit in Rochester.
- [13:05]
B
Yes. Love to talk about this. And so the walk audit specifically that we helped to support was for the Monroe Avenue Revitalization Coalition, which, which is a really cool grassroots coalition of neighborhood associations, the Monroe Avenue Merchants association, the City of Rochester and Highland Planning. And they all kind of came together a couple years ago based on the desire to create a better quality of life for residents, business owners and visitors all along this two mile stretch of Monroe Avenue in the City of Rochester, New York. And so I first got involved with the, the Monroe Ave Coalition from a personal standpoint by attending a couple focus groups just as an engaged community member. As I said, I'm very much a planning nerd, and so was attending focus groups in my free time in addition to my other planning work. And so at those focus groups, the topic of a lock audit came up because the leaders of the Monroe Ave Coalition wanted to kind of better understand, well, what assets do we have along the avenue, what are kind of our pain points, and then utilize that information to help advocate for the future. And so, given my background as a planner, I kind of raised my hand and said, I would love to help support you in this work. And then lo and behold, a couple months later, I joined Highland Planning as a. As a community planner. And Highland Planning had already been involved with the organization, helping to support them for some of their other outreach efforts. And so it was just kind of a perfect combination of my personal interest and then professional technical expertise through Highland Planning that allowed me to help support the coalition with this project. And so it's just a really cool opportunity to get people involved. And it has gone on from there.
- [14:54]
A
Okay, so yeah, take our listeners through. Okay, what are the core steps of a walk? On it. What does the process look like so we can better envision start to finish, what it takes to do a walk audit?
- [15:08]
B
Yes. The coolest thing about walk audits is that they are really a collaborative and iterative process. That's why there's something that we really love to do here at Highland Planning because we really focus on that collaboration and that iterative process. And we don't believe in a one size fits all model approach to any type of project. And so through our work with the Monroe Avenue Revitalization Coalition, we were able to kind of dig a little bit deeper into that process and create a tool that served their needs to do this asset inventory for the avenue. And so we typically break our walk audit process into three phases. First phase is essentially preparing to do the walk audit. And so this is when you're building and testing the walk audit tool. And there are a variety of mechanisms to do that. But before you build your tool, you need to define your goal, right? What is your purpose of doing the walk audit? And so for the Monroe App Revitalization Coalition, their goal of the walk audit was to complete an asset inventory of a variety of assets along that two mile stretch. And so after you define your goal, why are you doing the walk audit? You then want to get into what is your study area? As I mentioned, it could be a singular street, it could be a whole commercial quarter like it was for Monroe Ave. It could even be a neighborhood. And so that's the nice thing is depending on the scale of your project, you can customize it to your needs. Then after you identify your study area, you want to think about, well, what are you going to map? Like, what is the purpose of the walk audit? And so, for example, for the Monroe Ave Coalition, we I think focused on 11 different asset categories since our walk audit was more focused on that kind of asset mapping strategy. And so we mapped everything from trees to benches to fire hydrants to vacant commercial buildings, kind of the whole gamut of things that the leaders wanted to know about to then help inform their future advocacy work. And so depending on what you decided to map, that then feeds into what type of tool you want to do to then conduct the walk audit. And so there are two major or two different options here. One is your more traditional hard copy or hard paper walk Audit. AARP has a lot of really cool Walk Audit resources and tools here that the communities can utilize. Or there's also some really cool online tools like ArcGIS Survey 123 or, which is what we used as more of an interactive online mapping tool. And we found that to be a really dynamic process. And so once you decide on your tool, then you need to test it, right? Because no matter what your best intentions are, the first go round is never quite right. And so that comes into the iterative process of with your core project team or with a handful of community volunteers. Once you've developed and created your tool, you need to go and actually practice walking the area that you want to map. And then that helps you refine the kinks and figure out what you might need to tweak before you actually can do the audit. And so once you're good to go, you know your goal, know your study area, you have your tool developed. The next phase of the walk audit process is then actually conducting the walk audit. And a critical piece of that is engaging stakeholders who are involved in the study area. And so for the the case of Mark, that was the neighborhood associations, that was the city, various other community organizations in the area. Because for Walk Audit to be, I think the most successful and most community driven and most impactful, having that stakeholder buy in is a critical piece. You can do it as a top down approach, but then it loses that collaboration and kind of community driven impact. And so stakeholder engagement and volunteer recruitment is huge. Then you gotta pick a date and time. So based on availability, you need to actually get it on the calendar and organize and promote the opportunity to participate. And then once it comes day of, you then need to organize and train your volunteers. And so depending on how many people show up to map, you might do it all in one group as say, a handful of people all walking along the study area, or you might have 20 people show up. And so you need to break people into smaller groups and then assign the particular areas. And in our case, since we utilized the ArcGIS Survey 123 tool, there was a little bit of a learning curve there in terms of how to utilize the Survey123 app. And so we were very intentional about developing the tool, recognizing that various volunteers would have more familiarity or less familiarity with that type of technology and comfortable comfortability with using a smartphone. But through being very intentional in the customization of our survey and mapping process, it was really user friendly. And so the training was not particularly difficult. And people who came in a little apprehensive were then pleasantly surprised that it did not take a IT genius to help us with that process. And then once the training's done, then you do the audit. And it can last from anywhere from half an hour to two hours, depending on the size of your study area and what you're trying to catalog. And then after you've conducted your walk audit, the last phase is then taking action and so turning all of the volunteer work and the observations and data that you collected into action. And so some of the key sub steps of that phase are then debriefing on the actual walk audit process. I think that's a, that's a huge part of learning is what went well, what didn't go well, what would you change last next time? And then once you've had that debrief, then the project team or whoever is kind of leading the project will then review and analyze the data. And so in our case for Monroe Avenue, we had collected over 1,000 data points. So then that was my job, was going through all of the collected data, sorting through, figuring out do we have any gaps, are we going to have to go out again, that kind of thing. And so thinking and then doing that analysis of where are the assets, cloud clustering, where should we be focusing on next time, that kind of thing. And then once you've analyzed your data, then it's time to take action and so translating your findings into a usable format for community. And so we utilized an ArcGIS story map to Showcase our findings, which is how Tony found this project that we worked on. But I think that's a critical component too, is it's not just collecting the data, but it's how are you using it? And then how are you. How are you showcasing it and using it as a tool for future work?
- [21:45]
A
Yeah, I really love that. A question I have that sparked for me as you were talking about this is identifying the assets in your planning phase. And I imagine there might have been a conversation around the current state of the walk area and then a future state that. That Mark wanted to envision, and then maybe having a conversation about what assets you would want to see versus what assets that currently are. So was there a conversation around that about kind of a theory of change? Well, for our desired community, we would expect to see these things in the study area.
- [22:28]
B
Yes. It's almost as if you were in the room with us having that conversation, because that was. We've met with the Monroe Ave leaders a couple times as we were really developing the structure of the audit, and we had to essentially hammer out some of those details because a lot of the leaders were really focused on the future of, well, what do we want? But I think somewhat of the beginning steps of the walk audit is really taking the time to think about, well, what. What are we at? Where are we at presently? What assets do we have? And so I think that was what I had to kind of instill within the group is, at least at this phase of the process. The walk audit was mapping where our conditions as they are presently. So then through the analysis, we can then identify, well, where are we missing public art? Is there a cluster of benches in this particular neighborhood and then zero benches in another neighborhood? Because then we can utilize the data that we collected for that future visualization. And how do we want to kind of better improve the conditions of our study area?
- [23:30]
A
I gotcha. That's really cool. Okay, so you did the walk audit. What were some surprising things that the community discovered when you conducted the audit and in your initial analysis? And did any of their perspectives change as they actually went out and did the audit?
- [23:50]
B
Yes. When reflecting on the project, I think I kind of broke my reflections into five themes. The first of which is that community engagement aspect. And so I was pleasantly surprised by the number of people who showed up to help us map the avenue. We did four official walk audits, and then I did a couple on the side to fill in some gaps. But we had over 40 volunteers across the various neighborhood associations and the city and community orgs show up and want to participate. And it was just generally inspiring to see how excited people were to be there. And they told me, oh, well, I saw the flyer on social media and I figured, like, might as well come and see what all this is about. And then they get there and then they get to see and be involved. And the cool thing about the walk audit and the data collection process is since we were using the Survey123 tool, people could literally see how many data points they submitted on their phone. And so there was that immediate feedback loop of, oh, my participation isn't just going out into the universe. I can see where it's going. And so that was a really cool piece of the project. And then similarly, on that engagement perspective was seeing the volunteers build confidence in their ability to participate in the walk audit. I think, as I said before, there was a little bit of hesitancy from some of the volunteers in terms of utilizing the Survey123 app, but through practice, and it only took a couple minutes of people submitting data points to really get the feel for the flow and then get super excited that, like, oh, this is a fantastic tool for me to be able to use and participate in the process. And I think from a planning lens, I think so much of our work and traditional engagement creates these barriers between the technical experts and then the communities that we're working in. Whereas this walk audit and this project was a really cool blend of empowering community members to utilize the tools and techniques to be actively engaged in that planning process. And then another theme that emerged was from the data collection. And so the analysis of the results was a critical component of this. And really the foundational goal for the Monroe Ave leaders was understanding, well, where are the clustering of the amenities within the study area so that they can better advocate for future investment from the city. And so, for example, something that surprised me and the volunteers was that almost every crosswalk that we mapped needed to be re striped, which is not surprising given that we're in upstate New York and there's a bunch of salt on the roads. But that was just like, who would have thought that there'd be that volume compared to. Kind of a pleasant surprise was the volume of public art along the study area and between the murals and really cool sculptural light post banners. That was a really fun humanistic impact. That really has a fun element. And so I think folks are really surprised by what the data showed and then very excited to be able to use that for their future advocacy work. And Then I would say the last thing, Harkening back to your earlier question about the car centric society, I think just the process of doing the walk audit was really critical for the volunteers and the community members to experience what it's like being in the study area on foot. Monroe Avenue is a very high traffic commercial corridor in the city. And so you get a lot of cars that are going maybe a little too fast and, and the pedestrian environment can be a little intense. And so I think that was something that was a reflection point for a lot of folks, was, okay, we live here, we have businesses here, we want this to be a really thriving environment. And so how can we utilize our resources to slowly start to change that and make it more inviting and less car centric?
- [27:51]
A
Yeah, I really love that. Another thing that kind of came to me as you were talking was I'm doing a lot of accessibility work in my current job right now, and doing a walk audit made me think about is there any conversation or frameworks around providing perspectives of people doing walk audit who might be differently abled or have different abilities because they might see something that impacts them in terms of an asset that someone else know might not. So how do you incorporate those kind of frameworks and perspectives in thinking about conducting a walk audit?
- [28:33]
B
That's a great question. I think it's a twofold answer in terms of volunteers and also stakeholders who are involved in that process. And so all the way from the beginning, having that input to help kind of guide perspectives and make sure that you're not falling into, or rather making assumptions based on experiences. And so kind of casting that diverse perspective all the way, starting at kind of development of the goals and the walk audit tool. And I will say in that perspective, we're trying to be very intentional about the scaffolding of our questions. And so particularly our assets that were focused on the street specifically talked about, well, like, how wide is it in terms of, does it meet kind of the ADA accessibility requirements? What is the crosswalk, distance, timing and how does that feel from a, do you feel rushed? And those kinds of things? And so we did try to bake some of those questions into the information that we were collecting because it wasn't just about, oh, where is this particular asset? It's about, well, where is the asset? What is it? What's the condition? Additional information. And so some asset categories had kind of additional layers of questions that the volunteers were answering. But I think that's a critical piece, Tony, of the utility of block audits as a planning tool. Is thinking through that accessibility and inclusivity lens is a very important part.
- [30:00]
A
Yeah. Can you remind me how, what was the study area distance? How many miles?
- [30:04]
B
Two miles.
- [30:05]
A
Two miles. And I think you said that you collected over 1,000 data points. I mean that's kind of, that's very dense in terms of like in my mind, how many assets you think you might encounter over a two mile stretch of a community. So I think that's just kind of really powerful to think that again, you may not see these things in your car, but there are thousands of different touch points that you can quickly pass into miles that you just maybe not think about or might just be invisible to you that impacts how people experience a community.
- [30:40]
B
Exactly. Well, and part of those numbers where we were mapping trees, we were mapping light posts, we were mapping security cameras, public space amenities like benches. And so we were just the whole gamut of anything that existed in public space we were trying to catalog because City of Rochester has a great GIS portal in and of itself and they have a very robust urban forest GIS database. But Mark specifically, or the Monroe after revitalization coalition was really focused on some of the conditions of the existing assets. And so that was also the benefit of the survey123 tool was it wasn't just mapping the amenities, it was what is the condition? Is the trash can where it needs to be? Is it looking okay? Are the light pole banners falling off or do they look pristine? So it was all of those combined because they really do signal either investment or distress in an area. And that was some of the intentionality there.
- [31:38]
A
Awesome. Okay, so you did all, you did the walk audit, you mapped all the assets, you categorize and you themed them. What were, what were, what was with the data now what are you doing with the data now? Where's Mark now in terms of how they're leveraging that walk audit and the findings and their current work?
- [31:57]
B
Yeah. So kind of after the walk audit took place place, we then did a really fun kind of showcase of the data results with the team. And our plan is to then do later, or hopefully in a couple weeks a showcase of the results to the community and the volunteers who participated to kind of reinvite them into the process and like, hey, here's the showcase of all of your hard work and then start to get their ideas about implementation because the, the coalition is really focused on that implementation side and so not just this is a one off project, but how are we leveraging the data for the future? And so they are finishing up kind of a strategic planning process about getting their ducks in a row in terms of prioritization of their focus areas. And this walk audit was a kind of a critical piece to help them identify, well, where are our greatest challenges and opportunities? And then building on that, getting themselves together, and from an advocacy standpoint and then utilizing the data to work with the city, the county, and various other organizations to start to identify funding opportunities or partnerships to leverage to really start to have an impact on the area.
- [33:07]
A
Yeah, that's really cool. In. In doing the walk audit, I'm just really curious. Did you see people correcting things as you went through them? If. If there were some, like, you said, a trash cans, like, out of place, did you see someone, like, put the trash can back in place? I'm just really curious if it was purely, like, the power of a walkeye and kind of engaging and sparking people to maybe, like, take deeper ownership over that. That space that they're in and just fixing something for. For their. For their fellow human beings as like, oh, this needs to be fixed. I could do this quickly.
- [33:42]
B
That's a great question. Yeah. And I saw it a little bit in terms of maybe not exactly trash cans, because they're very large and heavy, but from, say, a trash perspective, that was one of the questions about, like, neighborhood aesthetics. And so I did see folks, when we were out there, would occasionally, like, pick up a bottle if it was on the street or just do a little bit of that kind of community maintenance or as part of the asset mapping, we had people take a photo of each asset they were mapping. So we have a whole, like, thousand pictures cataloged of these. Of these assets. And so, folks, if there was a tree or branches kind of obstructing a sidewalk, there'd be kind of, depending on the volunteer group, a really funny picture of someone, like, walking into the branch. And then that helped to then inform, I think, a couple neighborhood groups that went back and say, kind of trimmed those branches on their own to. To solve that issue?
- [34:34]
A
Yeah.
- [34:34]
B
And I do think from a. We'll get into a little bit later, but from a ownership standpoint and a kind of a community pride standpoint, that is another massive benefit of the walk on it process.
- [34:45]
A
Yes, absolutely. All right, so you've done the walk audit. You're. You're in a strategic planning phase, and now you're thinking about kind of re. Engaging some stakeholders. When I first saw the. What you talk about, the walk audit, it seemed on their surface to be primarily kind of a corrective tool. Like something to do after the fact that some a decision had been made. But I'm curious, how can local governments and communities potentially incorporate this kind of idea of a walk audit into their regular planning procedures? So maybe we can be more proactive in solving problems for our communities?
- [35:27]
B
Yes, totally. From a local government perspective, walk audits are a really great way to invite people into the planning process in a proactive way and really experience firsthand and be a part of that data collection and ideation about what is the type of community that you want to build. And so I think at their core, from a, from a local government lens, there are great opportunity to build trust and create opportunities for collaboration. And so it's not the tail end of we're having a public hearing about a project that's already been decided. It's how can municipal government, municipal governments, community leaders, stakeholders come together and really work together to identify, well, what are the challenges and opportunities that we want to address and how can we create strategies to do that and what tools do we have at our disposal to start to move the needle. And so I think from a technical expertise side, municipal governments are in a great position to leverage their planning staff from access to ArcGIS as a platform or staff who are familiar with the planning process and can help to train and empower volunteers to do this on their own. And then from a community side, the neighborhood stakeholders and residents are then there to help kind of guide the process because municipal staff and local government leaders have a great understanding of their communities, but they're not the ones who live there day in and day out. And so I think that's the beauty of this process is taking local knowledge and, and then pairing it with professional expertise to do some really cool planning projects that help to transform communities. And kind of on that note, I'll highlight that I think the beauty of the walk audit is that it's both a process and a product. And so it's not just the thousand data points that you collect, it's the actual process of doing it, of engaging with stakeholders, of developing the tool and starting to build those relationships. I think that's almost the more critical piece than the data that you collect because it's starting to build that relationship and create those face to face connections. And then on top of it, you get really great data to then leverage for future advocacy work. But it's, you can't have one without the other.
- [37:42]
A
So yeah, I would really, for our listeners who might want to know how to do a walk audit, you know, where, where should they go, where can they find inspiration to do walk audit and how might they learn more about your work and the walk audit themselves?
- [37:58]
B
You can learn more about our walk audits and our work at highland planning@highland-planning.com if you're a local government leader thinking about how to better engage your community or partake in participatory mapping projects, I'd love to connect and you can connect with me on LinkedIn.
- [38:14]
A
That's awesome, Emma. Thank you so much for being here today. We ask all of our hosts. All right, sorry, I'm gonna Start over. 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Emma, thank you so much for being here today. I really enjoyed having this conversation with you about walk audits, how powerful they can be as a tool not only for, you know, our local governments and their planning efforts, but also in our communities as well. We ask all of the guests that come on if they could choose one song as their exit song. If you could be Gullov DJ for a day, what would be your exit song for this episode?
- [38:53]
B
Keeping with today's theme, I would choose Walk With Me by Belle.
- [38:58]
A
I love it. It's so poignant. On and on the nose. Okay, that ends our Gov Love episode for today. Thank you again, Emma for coming on and talking with me. Gov Love is brought to you by eogo and the best way to support support govlove is to become an ELGO member. You can reach us online@elgo.org govlove or at govlove podcast on LinkedIn, Instagram and X. Subscribe to govlove on your favorite podcast app. New episodes drop every Friday. If you are already subscribed to GovLove, go tell a friend or a colleague about this podcast or share on social media. Help us spread the word that Golov is the go to place for local golf government stories. Thanks for listening. This has been Gov Love, a podcast about local government. Share this face and Walk with me.