Drake, Des Moines- Home of Drake University and a comfortable early 20th century walkable neighborhood

The Drake Neighborhood is an early 20th century diverse community centered around Drake University. Drake forms the backbone of the more affluent early 20th century neighborhoods in Northwestern Des Moines north of I-235. Drake has many components of a comfortable walkable neighborhood including decent public transit access, excellent sidewalk and ADA infrastructure, a decent commercial district along University Ave, and a well integrated University campus with its surrounding urban neighborhood. Drake also boast great racial and economic diversity and offers a hosts of rental and for-sale housing options with lots of affordable options.

For Drake to become a premiere urban district it needs better bike infrastructure as there are essentially not dedicated bike lanes in the neighborhood, more public green space and well rated schools, and more urban density which will help foster many missing retail amenities (i.e. supermarket and more local unique shops).

Click here to view my Drake Album on Flickr

URBAN STRENGTHS:

• Decent public transit access and convenient access across all modes to Dwtn only 3 miles away.
• Several dedicated bike stations in and around Drake University but surprisingly no dedicated bike lanes in the neighborhood.
• Good diversity metrics especially racial thanks to Drake University’s demographics.
• Good for sale diversity but with limited 1-bed condos homes and on the affordable side 2-beds sell btwn 100K-270K. 3 & 4 bed sell btwn 100K-450K.
• Lots of rentals but also on the affordable side. 1-beds and studios lease btwn $700-$900. 2-beds btwn $850-1.5K and some 3-beds for a bit more.
• Overall excellent sidewalk and ADA infrastructure.
• Overall a very safe community with blight limited to the Northeastern edge of the district.
• Attractive historic residential and decent urban infill with a mix of autocentric and urban infill surrounding Drake University.
• Decent urban form especially the three urban biz blocks along University by Drake University. Solid Streetscaping throughout the neighborhood.
• Good tree canopy.
• Good cultural amenities including several restaurants, bars and especially cafes, an art museum at Drake University, a couple live music venues, a historic theater, local performing arts center, and the cultural amenities typical of a university.
• Retail amenities include a health food store, drug store, several banks, a university bookstore, a couple dessert joints, several salons & barbers, several churches, a post office, and a couple medical offices.

URBAN WEAKNESSES:

* Decent but not great density for an urban area.
* Several schools on the outskirts of Drake but poor or mediocre ratings.
* Parks amenities are a bit  disappointing limited to a couple medium sized parks on the edges of the neighborhood. Lots of greenspace in Drake University but only semi-open to the public.
* Missing a full service supermarket & local public library. There are also few boutiques and unique gift shops, and not as many overall retail services as you would expect for a stable neighborhood hosting a college.