After the last bell rings, cities explore options for vacant school buildings

Urban school districts are seeing schools close due to population declines, the buildings’ age, and other factors. The trend is particularly pronounced in cities that have faced the decline of large industry and subsequent hard times. Elaborate, sometimes multi-structure facilities once cherished as neighborhood centers – built to provide thousands of kids with an education…

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From problems to possibility: Collaborative teams reshape brownfields planning in West Virginia

Kathy Wittner didn’t realize exactly what she was getting into when she agreed to be part of a small-town revitalization team organized by the West Virginia Redevelopment Collaborative, a subsidiary of the Northern West Virginia Brownfields Assistance Center (BAC). “I came in cold,” says Wittner, a professor of landscape architecture at West Virginia University. “We didn’t know who…

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