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Arlington's Creative Community


Benchmarking the Creative Class

As counties and cities compete to build the best communities to live and work, economic development experts look for new ways to understand how some cities and counties excel far beyond others. According to economist, researcher and author Richard Florida, the answer may lie in our ability to build a “creative community” – one in which talented and creative people want to live, work and play.

What does it mean for Arlington? Based on eight measures selected to reflect the attributes of Florida’s creative class from his best-selling book, “The Rise of the Creative Class,” Arlington Economic Development undertook a study to determine how Arlington stacked up against the rest of the region. AED found that Arlington is a creative class community by any measure, topping the chart within the Washington D.C. metropolitan area on four of the eight studied measures and ranking second on three more.

The creative community status of Arlington results from the values and mission of the community itself, and a focus on community building has served Arlington well in creating a place where people want to both live and work.

Read the study conducted by AED on the theories behind Florida’s creative communities and about Arlington’s place within the Washington, D.C. region. (PDF document; 1.9 MB - Adobe Reader required).


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