Northside Forward

Overview

Opportunity

Solution

Impact

Team

Northside Forward is a 10-year roadmap created with North Minneapolis residents to shape inclusive growth, strengthen community prosperity, and guide future investment.

Location

Minneapolis, Minnesota

Client

African American Leadership Forum

Expertise

Cities & Urban Design Strategy

Opportunity

Major transit investment created a rare opportunity to grow North Minneapolis while ensuring longtime residents shaped and benefited from the neighborhood's future.

North Minneapolis has long been a center of Black culture, entrepreneurship, and community leadership. As the planned Metro Blue Line Extension promised new investment, residents recognized both opportunity and risk. Without a shared vision, growth could accelerate displacement, rising housing costs, and loss of cultural identity. Working alongside the African American Leadership Forum, Gensler helped facilitate a community-driven planning process that transformed hundreds of local voices into a long-term strategy for equitable development, economic mobility, and neighborhood prosperity.

Why This Matters

01
Community Ownership
Growth succeeds when residents help define the future, ensuring new investment reflects local priorities, strengthens neighborhoods, and builds lasting trust.
02
Equitable Investment
The plan establishes a framework for directing $1.5 billion toward housing, businesses, education, and infrastructure that benefit existing residents.
03
Future-Ready
As cities grow around new transit infrastructure, Northside Forward demonstrates how equitable planning can preserve identity while expanding opportunity.

This is not charity. This is strategy. This is repair. This is what our community has always deserved.

Solution

A community-defined roadmap aligns housing, economic development, education, and public investment around a shared vision for long-term neighborhood prosperity.

Rather than beginning with physical development, Northside Forward began by listening. Through extensive community engagement; residents, entrepreneurs, artists, educators, and neighborhood organizations identified the priorities that became the six strategic pillars guiding future investment. The resulting framework combines demographic research, market analysis, urban design, and policy recommendations to support more than 3,700 new housing units, expanded business opportunities, workforce development, and public realm improvements while protecting affordability, cultural identity, and Black wealth creation.

From brief to build: transforming hundreds of community conversations into a shared vision for equitable growth, neighborhood resilience, and long-term investment.

Through workshops, interviews, neighborhood events, and stakeholder meetings, more than 200 residents, business owners, artists, educators, and community leaders helped define the plan's priorities. These perspectives were combined with demographic analysis, economic forecasting, mobility planning, and urban design strategies to create an implementation framework grounded equally in community aspirations and data. The result is a roadmap that balances future investment with cultural preservation, accountability, and long-term neighborhood prosperity.

Listening Before Planning

Community workshops engaged residents, business owners, and leaders to define priorities guiding future neighborhood investment.

Impact

Northside Forward establishes a nationally relevant model for community-led planning that aligns equitable investment with neighborhood aspirations and long-term resilience.

The plan positions North Minneapolis to guide future investment through community leadership, strengthening housing, entrepreneurship, mobility, and economic opportunity.

What Changed Because of This

01
Community Voice
Residents shaped priorities, ensuring future development reflects neighborhood values, culture, and long-term aspirations rather than outside assumptions.
02
Economic Mobility
Housing, workforce development, entrepreneurship, and commercial investment strategies create pathways to generational wealth and neighborhood prosperity.
03
Shared Accountability
Residents and local organizations remain central to decision-making, implementation, and long-term accountability.

This is what it looks like when a community claims its agency and aligns its brilliance around a shared vision.

Recognition

01

Mpls. St.Paul Magazine

Covered the 10-year, $1.5 billion vision and community-led strategy for North Minneapolis’ revitalization.

02

Green Building & Design

Interviewed Gensler’s, Andre Brumfield, on how Northside Forward demonstrates a community-authored plan showing how trust, local leadership, and inclusive design can advance equitable development.

03

Urban Land

Uses Northside Forward as a case study to explore how urban design can bridge policy, capital, and community to address housing shortages, climate risks, and struggling downtowns.

Team

Project Leadership

Andre Brumfield

Andre is a Principal and Design Director with global expertise in urban design and planning. Nationally recognized for guiding transformative planning efforts for large-scale mixed-use districts and neighborhood revitalization, he helps clients turn complex sites and ambitious development goals into connected places that create lasting economic and community value.

Bill Baxley

Bill is a Design Principal in Gensler’s Minneapolis office whose work sits at the intersection of architecture, civic leadership, and urban transformation. He partners with public agencies, institutions, and communities to create places that strengthen cities and generate lasting social and economic impact.

[FPO] Devyani Jain

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FAQ

01

How can community engagement lead to better planning outcomes?

Meaningful engagement transforms residents from stakeholders into co-authors, producing plans that reflect local priorities, build trust, and create stronger long-term implementation.

02

How can cities encourage equitable growth around new transit investment?

By aligning housing, economic development, mobility, and community priorities before investment occurs, cities can reduce displacement risks while expanding opportunity.

03

How does strategic planning support long-term economic mobility?

Comprehensive planning connects housing, workforce development, entrepreneurship, education, and infrastructure into a coordinated framework that attracts investment while supporting existing residents.

04

Who helped create the plan?

Residents, entrepreneurs, community organizations, public partners, the African American Leadership Forum, and Gensler all contributed.

05

What makes Northside Forward different from a traditional master plan?

Rather than beginning with physical development, Northside Forward began with community voices. More than 200 residents helped shape the vision, resulting in a strategy centered on Black prosperity, equitable investment, and long-term neighborhood resilience.

06

How does Gensler approach equitable urban development?

Gensler combines community engagement, research, urban design, market analysis, and policy strategy to create implementation frameworks that support both inclusive growth and measurable economic outcomes.

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Related Expertise

Cities & Urban Design Strategy

Northside Forward is a 10-year roadmap created with North Minneapolis residents to shape inclusive growth, strengthen community prosperity, and guide future investment.

Major transit investment created a rare opportunity to grow North Minneapolis while ensuring longtime residents shaped and benefited from the neighborhood's future.

Why This Matters

A community-defined roadmap aligns housing, economic development, education, and public investment around a shared vision for long-term neighborhood prosperity.

From brief to build: transforming hundreds of community conversations into a shared vision for equitable growth, neighborhood resilience, and long-term investment.

Northside Forward establishes a nationally relevant model for community-led planning that aligns equitable investment with neighborhood aspirations and long-term resilience.

What Changed Because of This

Recognition

Mpls. St.Paul Magazine

Green Building & Design

Urban Land

Project Leadership

Andre Brumfield

Bill Baxley

[FPO] Devyani Jain

FAQ

How can community engagement lead to better planning outcomes?

How can cities encourage equitable growth around new transit investment?

How does strategic planning support long-term economic mobility?

Who helped create the plan?

What makes Northside Forward different from a traditional master plan?

How does Gensler approach equitable urban development?

Related Work

Avon Lake Renewable Master Plan

Reimagining North Michigan Avenue

Wichita State University Campus Master Plan

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