In February of 2006 the City of Ithaca Common Council adopted a resolution authorizing the establishment of a taskforce to prepare a vision statement for the future of Collegetown. The work of the task force took place over a 10-month period, between May 2006 and March 2007. Development of the vision statement included an extensive public process, in which the comments of individuals, members of civic groups, and elected officials were gathered and incorporated. On June 6, 2007, Common Council endorsed the Collegetown Vision Statement as a guide for shaping the growth and form of Collegetown. The resolution also authorized the establishment of the Collegetown Vision Implementation Committee (CVIC) to develop a strategy for implementing the ideas of the vision statement. Preparation of an urban plan and design guidelines was a high-priority recommendation, as it served to bring together many ideas and recommendations of the vision statement.

Further, the City Planning and Development Board recommended additional modifications to the plan, described in a preface to the Goody Clancy Document, and the two documents, considered together as: "The 2009 Collegetown Urban Plan and Conceptual Design Guidelines" were endorsed by Common Council in 2009.

Lastly, Collegetown Area Form Districts were approved on March 5, 2014.  Since then, the City has focused on implementing the plan's recommendations. Over a decade of extensive planning went into the creation of the plans that now serve as a guide for shaping the growth of Collegetown.