The GREENLINE Eco-Economic and Community Development Initiative is a project of the Land Design Institute (LDI) in partnership with thw BSU Community-Based Projects Programs (CBP).  The intent is to implement the Greenline project as an Indianapolis-to-Muncie eco-economic and community development project along the multi-modal transportation corridor.  Since 2007, LDI and CBP have been facilitating studio design projects (more than a dozen) in the R. Wayne Estopinal College of Architecture and Planning as vehicles for moving forward in the pursuit of funding for the Greenline project.

The Greenline project has included studio classes in architecture, urban planning and landscape architecture.  Each class has engaged in a project that enhances eco-economic and community development in the multimodal transportation corridor (two rail lines and Interstate Highway 69) from Indianapolis to Muncie, Indiana; or from Muncie to Fort Wayne, Indiana (two rail lines).

Most of these Greenline projects have been sustainable neighborhood and community revitalization projects associated with commuter rail stations as triggers for pedestrian-oriented and transit-oriented development, smart growth, and eco-economic development.  These projects included, in one case, development and first-testing of a game that helps students learn how to maximize economic and community development and environmental and social benefits while minimizing the adverse environmental and human impacts of development.  The premise of the game is that residents of a “sprawl neighborhood” have a much higher impact than residents of a more sustainable neighborhood; and responsible citizens should not have to subsidize the costs of mitigating the impacts of sprawl.  To play this game, students conceptually design three urban alternatives to promote increased density, employment, and multi-sector capacity to build healthy community and reduce fossil fuel consumption and climate change. For a baseline “sprawl” neighborhood and each of their three “benchmark” alternatives, the game tells how much the sprawl neighborhood residents should pay (in higher taxes) compared to residents who would live in each conceptual design alternative.