Assess the atmospherics of College Hill and recommend a strategy to positively position this area for residential, shopping, entertainment, and recreational use. 

• Written consulting report due 28 NOV (75 points)
• Presentation dress rehearsal 28 NOV
• Formal presentation with hard copy hand-out, on 5 DEC (75 points)

The neighborhood association has been making headway with efforts to make direct improvements in the quality of life for College Hill residents - tearing down dilapidated buildings, decreasing crime, increasing activities in neighborhood centers, and such.  Our atmospherics assessment is intended to complement these efforts with an indirect approach; our assessment is focused primarily on the perceptions of visitors to College Hill.  With some tweaking of physical elements that are seen by non-residents who enter and travel through the area, we would expect that outsiders would be more willing to do retail shopping in the area, to go to the area for entertainment, to invest into property and businesses in the area, and such.  What physical elements need to be tweaked to accomplish such goals? 
 

General Issue:

The College Hill area of Texarkana, AR was at one time a prestigious part of Texarkana.  It currently, however, has the reputation of being a rough part of the city.  Using the assigned outline (below), you are to devise an atmospherics strategy that will induce more positive perceptions of people as they enter into and travel through College Hill.  Note that this is not a research report or a situation analysis; this is an atmospherics assessment that must be reported with the assigned outline and that must be based on concepts that we have used in this consumer behavior course. 

The original Texarkana College was located at the east end of College St., giving this area its name.  The area that we are calling College Hill is bounded by Dudley St. on the north, East St. (71) on the west, Forest St. on the south, and County Club Rd / S. Oat St. on the east.  The busiest streets in College Hill are East St., Division Ave. (196), Ferguson St., and Dudley St.  The major gateways into this area are East St. on the northeast corner of College Hill, Dudley St. on the northeast corner, and Division Ave. (196) on the east side coming off of Rte. 245 (the future I-49 corridor).  A Yahoo! map of College Hill (search on Bramble Park as the center point) can be found H E R E. 

The College Hill neighborhood association believes that this area's reputation of being a rough neighborhood is not based in fact and is undeserved.  As we have learned in this course, however, peoples' perceptions are often more important than actuality.  One concern of the neighborhood association, then, is that misperceptions are creating a barrier to economic development in the area. 

These misperceptions affect the behaviors and decisions of

• current residents,
• people who might potentially move to reside in the area,
• people who might potentially go to that area for shopping, entertainment and recreation, and
• people who might invest into businesses in the area.

Our Assignment:

In considering the "look and feel" of College Hill, our objective is to create an atmosphere that:

• encourages people to enter College Hill as they approach from gateways
• encourages people to explore the features of College Hill
• encourages people to stay longer (for shopping, entertainment, recreation, or even residency)
• encourages retail shopping, entertainment, or recreation activities while in College Hill (frequency and volume)
• encourages repeat business from satisfied customers or visitors
• encourages word of mouth promotion from satisfied customers or visitors

Your report must be structured as follows:

1. Introduction and Problem Statement / Objective

2. Situation Analysis
   • Consumer Segments (who goes?)
     • task definition (why are they there?)
     • antecedent states (why, when are they there?)
     • time (when, how long are they there?)
     • social surroundings (who with, who is around?)

   • Physical Surroundings (organized by spatial and non-spatial elements)
     • perception: exposure
     • perception: attention
       • voluntary attention
       • selective attention
       • involuntary attention
     • perception: comprehension

3. Conclusions (what is)

4. Recommendations (what should be and how to get there)

Neatness is considered a minimal requirement in your grade.  Neatness is defined here to include grammar, spelling, typos, correct use of paragraphs, and such.  Problems with these would not be acceptable in a "real world" consulting report and are therefore not acceptable in this assignment;

Please do not use any kind of report folders - they will be discarded if you do.  Just use plain white paper with a single staple in the top left corner.

You are encouraged to visit the professor outside of class to discuss your ideas. 
 

Background Reading:

Some background articles from the Texarkana Gazette are linked below. 

• Community hopes tear downs will clean up College Hill
• Neighborhood tired of being in the shambles
• College Hill woman praises ‘angels’ aiding neighborhood
• College Hill group proud of neighborhood development
• Project coordinator named for College Hill cleanup campaign
• Creating a fair view
• Letters to the Editor, Sept. 21, 2005, College Hill appreciates the police chief
• Cleaning up the community
• In Brief: Elvis impersonator to perform Labor Day
• College Hill hosting community cleanup
• Serving notice -Group alerts College Hill area to sex offenders
• Local group makes dream of home ownership come true
• Miller works to help neighborhood
• Classes focus on benefits of owning home
• College Hill residents upgrading neighborhood