Placemaking Week 2024

West North Avenue Development Authority (WNADA) is an independent state agency with dedicated funding that will serve a key role administering and organizing community support to catalyze housing, transportation, and economic development with an emphasis of creating a Blue Zone from the 600 to 3200 Block of West North Avenue. To reach this goal, we collaborate with each development partner to improve the environmental health by increasing canopy cover, active and passive green spaces, and rain and pollinator gardens.  WNADA has identified six focus areas that will encourage restaurants, grocers, and local food markets to display the importance of food and land justice along the West North Avenue corridor. During our panel we plan to introduce our neighboring change agents like No Boundaries Coalition who redefines community with organizing; the Fresh Food Factory providing local and ethnic food; and the Urban Oasis challenging development through food and social spaces. We encourage collaborative efforts to bolster the work already happening along The West North Avenue corridor. We provide sessions for neighbors to meet, contribute to the comprehensive plan, and discuss projects with one another inclusive of our board members and government leadership. Our strategies include:  •Reinventing The Avenue as an anchor destination that offers affordable and healthy food and acts as a hub for economic development and local entrepreneurship.  •Recruiting a chain Grocery Store to the corridor to provide healthy affordable food to residents.  •Creating a Farmers Market to support community events and increase Urban Farmer or Arabber market accessibility.  •Identifying a solutions system that creates end-to-end surplus food recovery to partner with our new commercial restaurateurs and local grocers.