Blooming Saint Paul is a comprehensive initiative to revitalize Saint Paul's downtown and neighborhoods through lush and colorful landscape elements. It focuses on creating an attractive, safe, and healthy city where people choose to live, work and play. Investing in Saint Paul's urban environment must go beyond basic engineered solutions for Saint Paul to succeed in becoming the 'Most Livable City'. The community and City departments must work together to make sure greening concepts are included and promoted in key public spaces and facilities, neighborhoods and private development. These includes roadways, parkways, parks, plazas, pedestrian and bicycle ways, commercial corridors and public buildings. Private developments are encouraged to retrofit existing facilities. New developments are encouraged to include greening concepts in their design plans whenever possible.
Infrastructure and development, through aesthetic and environmental solutions, create safe streets, healthy communities and quality infrastructure, and reflect the soul of Saint Paul. Studies have found that improving the urban environment through the use of attractive landscape elements positively affects neighborhoods by decreasing crime and developing stronger neighborhood relationships. Removing existing pavements and increasing green space reduce urban heat island effects and carbon monoxide, while increasing oxygen production.
As of 2009, Blooming Saint Paul's seventh year, the plan encompasses 60 sites.
