After makeovers from Depot Town to Michigan Avenue, Ypsilanti is rebuilding and renovating its core. And the march continues. Ypsilanti DDA director Tim Colbeck discusses what else he'd like to see in terms of a more perfect downtown.

How do you create a downtown that accommodates the current character and changing needs of the community? How do those choices impact our cultural institutions? Concentrate and the Ann Arbor DDA present the last in our "Great Places" speaker series. Melanie Piana of the Michigan Suburbs Alliance will talk about building a redevelopment ready community, and local cultural leaders will weigh in on what they desire from Ann Arbor's downtown. Sign up now for tomorrow's event!

With the arrival this week of a 17-member delegation from Tübingen, the first of Ann Arbor's "sister cities", it seems like the perfect time to rerun our reflections on that German college town's approach to high-density land use and innovations in sustainability.

How do we build a local knowledge-based economy? Richard 'Murph'  Murphy has a few ideas... and they're not what you might expect. Murph is an urban planner for the City of Ypsilanti, seasoned blogger and U-M grad who was recently profiled as one of Concentrate's "masterminds."

Our guest blogger for this week is Tracy Koe Wick. Tracy is Principal of The Kirkwood Group, a real estate consulting firm that markets and promotes new mid-rise and high-rise condominium and loft communities.