San Diego alliance endorses smart growth projects

Move San Diego announced the MOVE Alliance, an endorsement program, designed to "support projects that create Mobility Options Viable for Everyone."

Development projects in San Diego that demonstrate a commitment to creating and enhancing sustainable, transit-oriented communities are eligible to receive the MOVE Alliance formal endorsement.

The MOVE Alliance brings together a team of local experts to review and endorse early stage development projects in the San Diego region. The diverse coalition of planners, transportation and walkability experts, with backgrounds in sustainable development, work together to evaluate each project using a comprehensive check list of smart growth principles.

Specifically, the panelists examine location efficiency, access to current and future transit, employment proximity, mixed-use opportunities, building design, and pedestrian and bicycle access and enhancements.

The MOVE Alliance will publicly support development projects that show they can successfully align transit, jobs, housing and other quality-of-life factors. Projects that pass the review receive a formal letter of recognition from the MOVE alliance and permission to use the Alliance's "seal of recognition."

Additionally, the alliance helps to support the project through publicity and recognition efforts and by providing testimony on behalf of the alliance at public hearings to help explain the sustainable transit-oriented benefits of the project.

Move San Diego is seeking applications for development projects that are still in the in planning stages, before or during the entitlement phase. An application fee of $2,500 helps support the program. Partners include Move San Diego, Walk San Diego, Council of Urban Design Professionals and the California Center for Sustainable Energy.

To learn more and to download application details, click here.