East Village was platted in 1854 but wasn’t settled in large numbers until the 1870s & 1880s primarily with Scandinavian and Eastern European Jewish immigrants.  East Village has undergone several transitions starting as a primarily residential immigrant neighborhood, transitioning to a largely commercial district during the turn of the 20th century, experiencing significant urban renewal in the mid 20th century as the Iowa Capital complex continued to swallow up more land, and more recently experiencing rebirth and gentrification.

East Village was well positioned for urban renewal sitting between Downtown to the West across the Des Moines River, and the Iowa State Complex to the east. Thankfully much of the neighborhood’s urban fabric, especially between Walnut and Grand Avenues remained relatively in tact, allowing several streets to form the best mixed-use district in Des Moines outside of Dwtn.  In the past decade urban in-fill has augmented the on-going restoration of historic mix-use buildings filling in dead spots and adding much needed population to East Village. The District also has a plethora of locally owned stores, great nightlife and food & beverage amenities, and is Des Moines’ most walkable neighborhood being only a 5-10 walk to Downtown. To advance to the next level as an urban district East Village simply needs more people and infill development to fill its many surface parking lots and dead spaces especially along its southern edge, which is still largely industrial. I’d also like to see better tree canopy, more walkable schools and important retail amenities (i.e. drug store, supermarket, etc..)

Click here to view my East Village album on Flickr

URBAN STRENGTHS:

• Great access to Dwtn being just across the river with easy access across all modes of transit.
• Solid public transit access and decent bike infrastructure including a couple bike lanes and several bike stations.
• Pretty good ADA and sidewalk infrastructure with most intersections containing modern ADA curb cuts.
• While about 25% of East Village residents live in poverty there is still a decent amount of economic diversity thanks to the most professionals living here.
• Overall a very safe community but a decent amount of dead spaces along the southern edge of East Village.
• Decent parks including the large riverfront park and the extensive mall around the State Capitol building and a couple plazas.
• Best urban core of East Village is between Walnut and Grand with Locust street as the most cohesive street.
• Good mix of historic and urban in-fill.
• Excellent food & beverage amenities, plenty of clubs, a couple live music venues, a couple art galleries, several museums and memorials (around the Statehouse). Also convenient walkable access to Dwtn cultural amenities too.
• Good retail amenities too including a couple grocerias, several banks & ATMS, plenty of boutiques and gift shops, several books stores, plenty of dessert joints, a several antique and home good stores, a couple bike shops, no local libraries but several State of Iowa libraries including a gorgeous one in the state capital bldg, and several churches.

URBAN WEAKNESSES:

* Density is pretty low for an urban district.
* Large college and young adult population but limited family households here.
* Some for sale product including a decent # of 1  & 2 bedroom condos selling between 150K-300K.  A medium sized townhouse development was recently constructed  Robert Ray Asian Garden called “The Banks”. These mostly 3-bed condos sell btwn 500K-800K. Not much else because these clusters.
* Some rentals here but not as paying as you would think. Studios & 1 beds lease btwn $800-1.3K, and 2 beds lease around 1.5 and some 3 beds as well.
* A couple schools on the edge of East Village but generally poor ratings.
* Tree canopy is spotty and completely missing in spits especially the more industrial southern edge of East Village.
* Outside of the Walnut-Grand core the urban form of East Village deteriorates and is spotty but more and more quality in-fill and being built.
* Several important missing amenities including a full service supermarket, drug store, post office, medical offices and gyms.