Ripley Outdoor Plaza
Consultation has concluded
From Drab to Fab!
Help us design the Ripley Outdoor Plaza
The Township is looking for community feedback regarding the gravel parking lot and grass area on the corner of Jessie St. and Huron St. We want to know what you want in the space.
Why are we doing this?
This project is a small piece of a much bigger economic development project to increase investment in Ripley, to create a Downtown that the residents enjoy, to recruit and retain businesses that residents and visitors can support, but most importantly to ensure our beautiful village can remain a vibrant, spirited community for decades to come.
Far too often, we hear stories of village downtowns dying because there are no businesses, youth leaving because there is nothing to do, and service clubs disappearing due to lack of volunteers; we don’t want the same fate for the communities in Huron-Kinloss. Economic Development is an important driving factor for thriving communities and includes many projects to achieve this; business recruitment and retention, development (commercial, industrial, residential), streetscape beautification, tourism and more! The Ripley Outdoor Plaza is one piece of the Township’s Economic Development puzzle.
What is an outdoor plaza?
An outdoor plaza is a central gathering place for a community that acts as a foundation for revitalization of a downtown area. Just imagine a place in downtown Ripley where entertainment, farmer's markets, art shows, street vendors and other programming exists. Plazas encourage private investment and development and provide a "third living space" for the community, somewhere to just hang out together.
Public Plazas can take many different forms, this project page has been designed as a way to ask the community what they want the space to look like, feel like and be used for. We will be engaging with service clubs and other groups in Ripley to get a full picture of what the community needs and wants but encourage everyone to contribute to this project through our ideas tool. Share your ideas about what you want the space to be used for by registering and submitting an idea - no idea is too big, too small, or too crazy! We want to hear them all.
The photo library provides some insight into how outdoor plaza's are used by other communities.
Partners
We have partnered with Fanshawe College’s Landscape Architecture program to assist us with community engagement, design ideas and construction/tender documents. Students from the Landscape Architecture program will be collecting and analyzing our community feedback this fall and from that feedback, they will develop a number of design ideas and neighbourhood plans to be considered. The neighbourhood plans will include design ideas for the plaza but will also provide us with a comprehensive plan to beautify the entire downtown.