WPA and Ray Gindroz are serving as advisors to the City of Norfolk and the St. Paul’s Choice Neighborhood Initiative (CNI) development team as they undertake a 5-year HUD grant to redevelop the area.
Prior to the award of the CNI grant, WPA and Ray Gindroz spent two years with the residents of St. Paul’s, the City of Norfolk, and the NRHA to synthesize the guiding principles for the design of development:
- Create a park system to protect from flooding and provide recreation amenities.
- Create a community-wide campus with educational opportunities for all ages.
- Restore Church Street as the heart of the community, with shops, food stores, health and medical facilities.
- Create pedestrian-scale connections to opportunities in the larger community.
- Build a pattern of neighborhood streets and blocks to create a framework for a mixed-use, mixed income community.
- Provide a diverse mix of residential developments, ranging from single-family and town homes to small and large scale apartments.
- Provide employment opportunities at the edges of the community.
In In July 2018, WPA participated in a community-wide charrette for the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative HUD Grant with the City of Norfolk, NRHA, The Communities Group, and the lead architect and planner, Torti Gallas + Partners. Together, we worked to advance a plan that creates a framework for new development that meets the needs of the community. In May of 2019, WPA organized a follow up charrette that advanced the CNI design and focused on connections to the larger St. Paul’s area, Downtown, and beyond. In 2020, WPA and Ray Gindroz have continued to work with the team on streetscape and public realm design. Additionally, we are building a 3D model of the full St. Paul ’s area so that the developers, architects, residents and others can understand how each site-specific design relates to the whole and adheres to the overall guiding principles.
