The City of Danville has gone with the firm Bravura after interviewing three vying for the contract to develop a Downtown Master Plan. The cost of the firm’s services is $74,000, with an allowance up to $3,500 for expenses.

The city commission unanimously approved Bravura during a special meeting last week. The goal is to create a community planning process for an urban design, future land use and a transportation plan for downtown Danville, as well as highlight economic possibilities and strategies on how to implement them.

“All firms were very well-qualified,” said City Manager Ron Scott. Danville began interviewing firms two weeks ago with The Walker Collaborative; Bravura and CityVision gave their pitches Wednesday.

The firms all had partners involved in their proposals, like architects, landscapers and civil engineers. But Bravura is also a partner with RKG, the consulting firm which completed the city’s economic study.

Scott said the real difference to the commission is the community engagement Bravura has experience with. “They demonstrated how they’d done that in different communities, using different technology and other things …” like virtual reality goggles to show residents how a plan may be conceptualized, and what it would look like.

“The other two had somewhat similar approaches, but Bravura was more impressive with how they’ve done this,” Scott said, including “pop-up placemaking events.”

Scott said the firm also committed to completing the process in a shorter time-frame than the other two companies. The average range was about nine months, but Bravura says it can get the job done in 14 weeks, he said.

He said the firm also did a better job at suggesting “a better downtown plan with our vision and downtown master plan; it would incorporate up to Centre College and down to Fourth Street and some surrounding areas. It was a little bigger and in a more intertwined way than any of the other firms.”

Scott said another factor, but not necessarily the deciding one, is that Bravura has been in the community before. “They’re currently working on the (new downtown) fire department, helped develop the Hub building and parking lot, have had community conversations before and they worked through them in a good way.”

The next step, Scott said, is to get the contract signed and get Bravura here for a beginning conversation with the community. “Somewhere along the way there will be a steering committee appointed.”

The costs assessed from the two other firms were $75,000-$95,000 from CityVision, and The Walker Collaboration was $64,9441 with additional costs not to exceed $3,000.