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Reclaim Our Public Spaces

Eleven months ago, I started the Washington Square Park Blog, a writing project, an ecology project, an activism project, and a public relations project (pro bono – for the park) all rolled into one.

I hope to raise funds to enable me to keep this work going, and to expand it.

Examining the destruction and “redesign” of this one critically important park, I wondered how this redesign got pushed through by NYC government. What does it mean for the Park – this great public space – and the people of New York City?

While piercing this together, I realized this issue was not only happening to Washington Square Park but to other parks and public spaces including Union Square Park, Yankee Stadium (which ate up two Bronx city parks) Parkland, Highland Park/Ridgewood Reservoir, Randalls Island, more. The issues include lack of transparency by the government, privatization, loss of public space, loss of natural environment (cutting down of trees and use of materials like artificial turf), the encroachment on public space by corporations via business improvement districts(BIDs), and the misuse of Eminent Domain.

While I’ve wanted to highlight the problems that are ongoing, I’ve also wanted it to be a place for community activism and empowerment. Save Union Square activists came up with the great idea of establishing Community Improvement Districts(CIDs) as a parallel universe to the Business Improvement Districts. This concept grabbed my imagination and I think is very important to reclaiming our city.

What’s happening to our public spaces is representative of changes going on across New York City. The goal of the WSP Blog is to raise the awareness of what’s going on – to Washington Square Park and beyond – to people who might not know the extent of these dramatic changes.

The blog has been well-received and is frequently mentioned on well-trafficked sites such as The New York Times, NY Magazine “Intelligencer” page, Curbed, Eater, MSN.com, Gotham Gazette, Room 8, Channel 13, Project for Public Spaces, Idealist.org, and linked to by the NY Times, and numerous local and national blogs and web sites.

My goal is to transform the blog into more of a web site-format so the information is easily categorized and accessed by Park/Public Space, Issue, Category, etc.

With all of the above in mind — and the call to reclaim the commons — I am organizing an event involving multitudes of bloggers looking at how we can help challenge the changing face of New York City via the privatization of public (and all) space in New York City, through intense, focused research and promotion of Community Improvement Districts, among other ideas.

If you can help with money, ideas, etc., thank you! Email me at : cathryn.be -at- gmail.com

Cathryn.
WSP Blog

January 28, 2009