The City of Sioux City has announced that, thanks to a Downtown Sioux City Greenspace Plan completed last spring by four Urban and Regional Planning students (Varsha Borde, Ben Curtis, Katie Gandhi, and Parker Just), the City was able to obtain a $500,000 gift from Regina Roth to assist with the design of a downtown park. Roth is a local executive and co-founder of Beef Products, Inc. The students' May 2016 capstone project report was shared with Roth whose gift is being used to employ a landscape architect firm to fine-tune the students' recommendations for Pearl Street Park, which is currently a surface parking lot.  Please see the City's press release for details. The students' final report may also be viewed.

The students were supervised by University of Iowa School of Urban and Regional Planning faculty Lucie Laurian and Scott Spak and the work was completed under the auspices of the Iowa Initiative for Sustainable Communities (IISC).

Needless to say, we are very proud of the students' work, the education they received in the course of completing this project, and the positive impact their work is having in northwest Iowa. Our thanks go to the University for continuing to support IISC and the work that it enables our students to perform for the state of Iowa.

Image shows one of two conceptual renderings of a potential pocket park located at the corner of Seventh Street and Pearl Street featuring an amphitheater, playground, and gazebo. Source: URP Master's students.