**5. Discussion and conclusion**

The Medical Mile including MSU College of Human Medicine is an established significant landmark for the city of Grand Rapids to revitalize the campus visionary aesthetics, exceptional functionality, and adjacent communities. The 98.5-acre design contains both campus area and abutting district employing a variety of green infrastructure and microclimate treatments. The design considers a master plan that utilizes innovative stormwater management system, creates a variety of use areas, focuses on reviving local business, and provides an elevated walkway network to tie different districts within our boundary.

It is apparent that the LID treatment has environmental benefits and that in the planning and design phases, it is possible to generate solutions that are more sensitive. But the costs associated with these benefits such as providing more land for green space and stormwater management are not evident. In addition, the design is just one idea concerning the spatial arrangement of the site. It is not necessarily an optimum design. The design is simply the ideas of the team. In the planning and design process, numerous other scenarios and ideas could be explored to refine the design. However, this case study illustrates how to evaluate a series of variables of environmental interest collectively and statistically. As an environmental impact assessment methodology, this process may be of interest to planners, designers, concerned citizens, and governmental agencies.

This case study addressed only a few of the variables that are possible to examine. The list of environmental variables could potentially be much larger and extensive, leading to different results. However, interest in environmental variables in urban design is increasing. This case study illustrates how these variables are measured and examined in the urban context.
