Projects

If Chicago is chosen for the location of Barack Obama’s presidential library, Illinois taxpayers could be on the hook for $100 million. Are the benefits that come with presidential libraries…

This presentation outlines the theoretical framework for market-based community economic development, including a discussion of how market-based strategies work and when they are most effective. The presentation also provides examples…

This document is the culmination of an innovative, two-year effort to develop an integrated and mutually reinforcing set of strategies and initiatives to drive growth in four contiguous Chicago neighborhoods:…

Delivered by RW Ventures, Chicago TREND and the Columbus Metropolitan Housing Authority, this pair of training sessions were designed to help communities pursuing retail, industrial land use, small business or…

Originally developed as a two-day training for HUD Choice Neighborhood program grantees, this presentation was delivered to grantees from NeighborWorks America’s Catalytic Grant Program. The training presents the rationale and…

Chicago TREND (Transforming Retail Economics of Neighborhood Development) combines innovative predictive analytics, deal brokering and financial products to support “retail on the leading edge” of emerging neighborhood markets. The new…

Chicago TREND (Transforming Retail Economics of Neighborhood Development) combines innovative predictive analytics, deal brokering and financial products to support “retail on the leading edge” of emerging neighborhood markets. The new…

Developed as part of a two-day training for planning and implementation grantees from HUD’s Choice Neighborhoods program, this presentation walks through the logic and structure of a new approach to…

Bob Weissbourd delivered these remarks as part of the “Connecting to Markets” series sponsored by the Institute for Comprehensive Community Development, the Urban Institute, and the Federal Reserve Banks of…

The Institute for Comprehensive Community Development (ICCD) released the inaugural issue of its journal, including a paper entitled “Lessons from the Field: How 21st Century Community Development Can Inform Federal…

RW Ventures’ analysis of the impact of foreclosures on neighborhood property values has garnered attention from civic sector stakeholders. Bob Weissbourd and Michael He presented the findings of the firm’s…

The Dynamic Neighborhood Taxonomy (DNT) project provides new analysis on how urban neighborhoods operate, how they change over time, what factors determine their success and how these dynamics vary across…

The Dynamic Neighborhood Taxonomy (DNT) project provides new analysis on how urban neighborhoods operate, how they change over time, what factors determine their success and how these dynamics vary across…

This presentation, prepared for the Aspen Institute Roundtable and Funders’ Exchange on Community Change, Poverty Reduction and Prosperity Promotion, presents a new framework for thinking about neighborhood change, as well…

This paper, published in the Williams Review, presents selected results from the first phase of the Dynamic Neighborhood Taxonomy Project. In particular, the paper investigates two key questions relating to…

The Dynamic Neighborhood Taxonomy (DNT) project provides new analysis on how urban neighborhoods operate, how they change over time, what factors determine their success and how these dynamics vary across…

The increasing attention paid to the region as a key unit of economic activity has given rise to powerful new economic development strategies. By focusing on economic rather than political…

These two complementary papers written for the Brookings Institution’s Urban Markets Initiative examine the role of information resources in spurring markets and creating investment strategies to boost urban neighborhoods. The…

These reports exemplify a line of work conducted with MetroEdge for the Annie E. Casey Foundation and other community development institutions across the country. RW Ventures conducts specialized market analysis…

In planning its activities for the next decade, Living Cities commissioned RW Ventures and the Brookings Institution’s Metropolitan Policy Program to undertake the design phase for a ten-year project that…

This paper examines how current information, primarily dependent on federal data sources, fails to accurately convey the opportunity in inner-city economies. It then suggests how building business-based data and models…

Prepared by Kansas City Neighborhood Alliance and Bob Weissbourd (when at Shorebank Advisory Services, Inc.), this Start-Up Business and Implementation Plan describes a project to open a loan production office…