Planning is an act of optimism. It is the process of gathering all of the creative ideas and hopes that exist for a community and comparing those to economic realities and existing opportunities. By initializing the planning process, Riverside’s leaders and citizens recognized the need to establish a strategy for future development. The primary goal of this Plan is to create a map of improvements for today and for the next twenty years that reflects the desires of citizens and business leaders. The Master Plan lays out strategies for preserving the core characteristics that make Riverside unique, while improving the portions that detract from the community’s vision for a better future.

The City of Riverside has tremendous potential. The amount of community support demonstrated throughout the master planning process makes this a very promising moment in the City’s history. We have clearly seen momentum gather in support of shaping development pressure into a powerful force for beneficial change. By creating a Comprehensive Master Plan, Riverside establishes the rules of the game for potential development. The Plan will also provide leverage against unwanted or unwise developments and create incentives for projects that accomplish the goals identified by the citizens of Riverside during the planning process. When taken together, all of the recommendations in this plan may appear overwhelming. It is important to remember this is a long journey and over the last eight months good progress has already been made. By building on recent successes and identifying low hanging fruit—projects that are easy to carry out and have the most noticeable impact—Riverside will improve its appearance and achieve a higher quality of life.

A VISION FOR RIVERSIDE'S FUTURE

The Riverside community is unique in the Kansas City metropolitan area. The small town feel, proximity to the core of KC, unique funding resources, and scenic natural areas create a mix of characteristics and amenities that are not replicable. Despite these advantages, there is significant potential for further improvements that will greatly enhance the appearance, reputation, and efficiency of the City.

Riverside has been largely bypassed by many of the growth booms in the Northland of Kansas City. While Riverside would have liked to benefit from some of the new amenities built in neighboring communities, the development lag allows the City to learn from others’ mistakes and to organize a strategy that effectively promotes growth without disrupting the elements of life that Riverside’s citizens cherish.

Riverside is now on the verge of extraordinary new development opportunities. With proper consideration and guidance from City officials Riverside can have more amenities, provide a greater variety of shopping choices, protect its natural resources, and build a community that is proud of its character.

INTENT OF THE MASTER PLAN

By undertaking the Master Planning Process, the City of Riverside made a commitment to evaluate its strengths and weaknesses and to take a step back from the day-to-day operations to envision where the City should be in twenty years and beyond. This Master Plan document is a memorial of the countless interviews, meetings and analyses carried out by the team and the Riverside community. It should be used as reference for City officials and as a road map toward a vision for the future of the City. The plan can also be used to measure the City’s progress by testing the established goals and recommendations against the implementation timeline.

It is important to note that every recommendation within the Master Plan came from the citizens of Riverside. There are no recommendations within this document that were not supported or promoted by the larger community. There were, of course, differing opinions and life-perspectives on many issues, but even where there were disagreements the challenges often times lifted the dialogue to a more thorough evaluation. It is the intent of the Master Plan to synthesize the hundreds of pieces of good advice into a comprehensive strategy for governing Riverside in the coming years.