Laramie Main Street Alliance Earns 2022 Great American Main Street Award For Excellence In Holistic Downtown Revitalization
Main Street America announced today that Laramie Main Street Alliance
(LMSA) in Laramie, Wyoming has received the prestigious Great American Main Street Award (GAMSA),
which recognizes communities for their excellence in comprehensive preservation-based commercial
district revitalization. Selected by a national jury of community development professionals and leaders
in the fields of economic development and historic preservation, Laramie Main Street Alliance is being
recognized for driving local economic development and historic preservation through effective
grassroots community building and creative placemaking activities.
“Laramie’s creative and thoughtful approach to development has been inspiring to witness,” said Main
Street America President and CEO, Patrice Frey. “Their longstanding commitment to economic vitality
and community-driven change ensure a promising future for the historic city.”
Sitting along the Union Pacific Railroad Line, Laramie is Wyoming’s only university town. In the 1980s, a
group of concerned business and property owners adopted and implemented aspects of The Main
Street Approach. Unfortunately, this early work lacked coordination among the various downtown
groups until 2005, when Laramie Main Street Alliance was founded and joined the Wyoming Main Street
program. Over the span of the following 17 years, and in partnership with the city, LMSA’s revitalization
efforts have created a climate that has resulted in more than $21 million in public and private
investment, 398 private rehabilitation projects, and the creation of 148 net new businesses and 689 net
new jobs.
“Laramie Main Street Alliance has shown that it takes perseverance, support from all areas of the
community, and tireless work from volunteers and staff to make downtown thrive,” said Kayla Kler,
Main Street Program Manager at the Wyoming Business Council. “For Laramie to serve as a leader in
downtown accessibility and entrepreneurship is incredibly encouraging for the future of our Wyoming
communities.”
Laramie Main Street Alliance’s success is credited to the organization’s strong culture of lifelong
learning, service, and community connection. One example of this ethos in action is evident in LMSA’s
volunteer program, which is guided by a desire to facilitate mutually beneficial opportunities that
support the organization’s transformation strategies while allowing volunteers to achieve personal
goals. As a result, LMSA volunteers—from board members to University of Wyoming students—have
logged 59,024 hours of service valued at over $1.2 million since 2005. The return on investment of the
LMSA volunteer program also includes robust intern and mentee programs, whose participants remain
engaged and successfully contribute to the community as graduate students, employees at local
businesses, and as entrepreneurs themselves.
The development of the Empress is perhaps Laramie’s proudest achievement to date. Completed in
2018, this mixed-use retail and residential building replaced a large vacant lot in the center of
downtown with Big Hollow Food Co-Op, a locally owned grocery store. In addition to being the first infill
project of its kind in downtown Laramie, the project is on the vanguard of the community’s efforts to
increase access to fresh produce and affordable housing.
LMSA is poised and ready for their next large infrastructure investment, a streetscape project called
“3,2,1… Third Street!” that will remove the biggest barrier to downtown revitalization by enhancing the
eight blocks of US Highway 287 that runs through the district. When complete in 2026, the businesses,
residents, and visitors will benefit from a pedestrian-friendly Third Street that features public art, new
lighting, improved wayfinding, and ADA-upgrades.
The next phase of transformation will build upon LMSA’s successful collaboration-based strategies, such
as the Laramie Mural Project, which has facilitated 27 mural installations, and the Cowboy Cash
program, a pandemic-response initiative that offered University of Wyoming students gifts certificates
for downtown businesses and injected $40,000 into the local economy.
“We are thrilled that our work is being celebrated at a national level,” said Trey Sherwood, Director
at Laramie Main Street Alliance. “We intend to leverage our GAMSA win to engage a broader audience
in the Main Street movement and cultivate new customers for our businesses. We share this recognition
with our partners, donors and volunteers who have invested in downtown’s beautification,
preservation, economic and social vitality.”