If a former colleague hadn’t mentioned to Mario Gandelsonas over lunch one day that he should apply his theories and analysis to Des Moines, the city might never have had a thriving East Village, Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway could have been a massive, unattractive highway, Gateway West might not have happened and the land adjacent to the Des Moines River could have remained unappealing to pedestrians.

Although the New York City-based architect, urbanist and professor at Princeton University might attribute some of these projects to citizens’ ideas and efforts, much of Des Moines’ revitalization is a result of its first vision plan, which Gandelsonas facilitated in the late 1980s and early ’90s.

Now that most of the initiatives set forth in the first plan have been fulfilled, the city and county, under the leadership of architect Erin Olson-Douglas, have been preparing a second vision plan since June. This plan will establish a framework for unifying downtown’s amenities and making it a destination for residents, workers and visitors.

“Several hundred million dollars of improvements have taken place,” said Jim Cownie, who was co-chairman of the committee that worked on the initial plan. “Now it’s time to connect them. It’s time to decide how we might get to the next level.”

As part of Olson-Douglas’ contract, she planned to hire a consultant, and to fill that position, the city, county and business community selected Gandelsonas from two candidates this fall.

“There is a high level of trust and respect for the work that he had done here previously,” Olson-Douglas said, “so I think it is a logical evolution to bring him in now.”

The details of Gandelsonas’ consulting contract are still being confirmed, but he is planning to be in Des Moines for two days in mid-December to begin initial meetings. He intends to visit Des Moines four or five times in the next six months, and a draft of the vision plan could be created as early as late spring next year.

Gandelsonas will receive $45,000 from the Greater Des Moines Partnership through individual donations and around $50,000 from the city and county.

Mary Lawyer, president of the Downtown Community Alliance, will lead the business community through the process and will help form a steering committee of about 15 people who will work closely with Gandelsonas. The committee will be composed of leaders from the city, the county, area businesses and neighborhood associations.

Gandelsonas has visited Des Moines at least once a year since he helped complete the first vision plan to monitor the city’s progress. He believes that Des Moines has the potential to become “one of the prime medium-sized cities in America.” But, he said, “you have to be competitive.”

This is the right time to “take advantage of the momentum generated by the implementation of those [initial] ideas and to not just sit down and enjoy them and congratulate ourselves,” he said. “Use that [momentum] to now create new things and continue some of the ideas and propose new ideas. Fifteen years have passed. A new generation of people are there and they need new ideas.”

One of the aspects of this round of planning he is most excited about is the collaboration between the public and private sectors. During his first effort, he said he primarily worked with the business community and the Des Moines Plan and Zoning Commission rather than the city manager and county government. “What I think is important now is that the initiative really comes from the government,” he said, “because that could definitely facilitate things.”

Gandelsonas’ main role for this second vision plan will be to serve as a sounding board for new ideas and help prioritize the city’s next projects.

“He’s a great thinker about urban places,” Olson-Douglas said, “and so having someone involved who has considered similar challenges and conditions in other places will be a big benefit to the project.”

Olson-Douglas’ work so far has been to gather a background perspective of what is happening in downtown today, working with the city and county government staffs and a few major stakeholders. She hopes that Gandelsonas’ presence will lead to more community outreach. During the first vision process, Gandelsonas said the steering committee had about 100 people get together once a month to discuss different ideas and ask questions.

Although Olson-Douglas is keeping an open mind about the final content of the vision plan, she has what she calls her “10 working principles” after initial research. They are to support the residential sector; attract new businesses and a strong work force; develop the commercial sector; develop more transportation options; create a synergy among downtown destinations; provide more recreational opportunities; make downtown a hub of educational opportunities; create more civic presence; capitalize on historical and cultural resources; and follow sustainable practices.

Gandelsonas would like to focus on sustainability, but other than that, he has no set ideas of what Des Moines should do next.

“For me, the most important thing with the vision plan is that we didn’t come with ideas,” he said. “The ideas were generated in the dialogue and I think the most important thing we did was to sit down and listen and not just import ideas from other places. I strongly believe each city is its own place and the people who live there need to generate their own city.”