Community Showcase Tours

The Bold Plans, Big Dreams Community Showcase program is a collaborative, capacity-building program designed to generate local pride and build momentum for implementing bold plans in Chicago's diverse neighborhoods. The program will incubate new tours, train community residents to tell their stories, and introduce a wide variety of new local, professional, and regional audiences to the exciting on-the-ground plans and initiatives that showcase Chicago’s rich and diverse neighborhoods.  Participating communities include Albany Park, Auburn Gresham, Pilsen, Quad Communities, South Chicago and West Ridge.

Components of the Burnham Community Showcase include:

• Three (3) tour design workshops on tour design principles, theme development, storytelling, route mapping, collateral development, and tour operations;
• One-on-one consulting to provide communities customized technical assistance;
• Marketing collateral, such as tour maps, tour profile sheet, community tour booklet;
• Developing tour audiences, include visitors, students, professionals, other groups, and members of the real estate community;
• Evaluation, including surveys and debrief meetings to solicit feedback and discuss lessons learned; and,
• Sustainability planning to assist interested communities in identifying and recruiting long term audiences for your tours.

Tours will be debuted on May 5, 2009 a s part of the Mayor's Office of Special Events Great Chicago Places and Spaces Tours and also featured as part of the Chicago Public Library's One Book One Chicago programming.

The Community Showcase Tours program is made possible by the generous support of the Boeing Companty and LISC/Chicago.