More from the Blog

The Recovery Will Happen in Public Space [4]
May 16, 2020 • by Phil Myrick

Communities in Nairobi Compete to Contribute to Public Space [5]
May 1, 2020 • by Miki Takeshita

Homelessness & Public Space During COVID-19: Seven Takeaways [6]
April 24, 2020 • by Nate Storring

More Events & Opportunities

Webisode Series: Fresh Brew: Placemaking on the Waterfront [8], San Francisco Center for Architecture + Design, June 2

Conference: Walk/Bike/Places 2020 [9], August 4-7

Missed our most recent webinar about equity in recovery from COVID-19? Watch the video. [10]
 

Race and Place: "Ready or not, life is returning to some sort of normal in the United States, and normal inevitably includes police officers killing an unarmed black man in their custody, followed by street protests. The country is working its way back into its familiar groove" (New York Times [11]).

That is how Keeanga-Yamahtta Taylor, a professor of African American Studies at Princeton University and co-author of "Black Placemaking: Celebration, Play and Poetry [12]," opened her essay on the protests this week across the country in response to the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Floyd was suffocated in public space on Monday by an officer's knee on his neck for nearly nine minutes, as he protested that he could not breathe and called out for his dead mother.

In the same week, Minneapolis landed #1 on the Trust for Public Land's ParkScore ranking—a national measure of park access (Trust for Public Land [13]). What does that tell us? It tells us that access to public space is multifaceted. It is certainly about the geographic distribution of green space. But it is equally about a person's right to personal safety in the street, as well as their more qualitative sense of comfort and welcome. As Brentin Mock writes, "The Jane Jacobian idea of 'eyes on the street' very easily becomes 'eyes on the black people'—which is why some African Americans disengage from public spaces like parks altogether" (CityLab [14]).

When working with a community to design and manage a public space, placemakers can strive to actively work against the racial violence that happens in those spaces and listen to the pain, fear, and trauma that people of color often experience there. If white placemakers are looking for resources on how to practice anti-racism in this moment, the five questions posed by equity advocate Tamika Butler in this gut-wrenching blog post [15] (also included at the bottom of this email) offer a good place to start.

A "Generational Catastrophy" for Farmers: A recent survey of 240 small, independent farmers found that nearly a third of them may be bankrupt by the end of the year (The Counter [16]). While selling direct to consumers has worked for some farmers so far, as the big summer harvest begins, they fear that they won't be able to keep up with the increased volume.

As we've written before [17], farmers markets could play a crucial role in staving off disaster, acting as the hubs that connect our regional food systems to metropolitan and micropolitan consumers. This week, Kelly Verel [18], Senior Director of Programs & Projects at Project for Public Spaces, spoke with The Lisa Show about the importance of public markets and how they have risen to the occasion of the pandemic (BYU Radio [19]).

Beneath the Pavement... The beach has become a flashpoint of political controversy in the United States. News media capture photos of crowds prematurely congregating on the sandy shores of Florida, and social media weaponizes this content in a false-choice battle between freedom and safety.

This may be partly because unlike parks and other public spaces, American beaches have become increasingly controlled by fewer, richer people. While 95% of the US coastline was privatized by 1970, as Meg Walker [20], Senior Placemaker at Project for Public Spaces, observes, a handful of free, public beaches are overcrowded by a much more diverse audience (The Guardian [21]).

Beyond Streateries: Portland, Oregon, may be one of the cities in the country to open its streets to a diversity of uses beyond restaurant seating, biking and walking (Bike Portland [22]). Their Safe Streets proposal will accommodate a wide range of business activities, from retail and personal service businesses, as well as restaurants. As Project for Public Spaces CEO Phil Myrick [23] commented in a recent article in the New Yorker, “We have a lot of opportunity to create open spaces we can use for multiple purposes that are accessible to everybody. Streets go everywhere. They’re 30 percent of our cities” (Grub Street [24]).

One group that has been largely left out of the current "al fresco movement," however, are the people who have been operating al fresco all along—street vendors (Salud! America [25]). Their exclusion from federal relief packages and expertise in in selling outdoors makes them a particularly important stakeholder group to accommodate in any open street plans.

A Surface Assumption: Emerging research suggests that touching surfaces infected by COVID-19 may pose less of a risk than previously assumed (New York Times [26]). While transmission is still possible, the vast majority of cases spread through close-quarters contact with an infected person.

While the hard science of transmission continues to evolve, that hasn't stopped designers from capitalizing on the fears and aesthetic of the pandemic—a phenomenon architecture critic Kate Wagner calls "coronagrifting" (McMansion Hell [27]). From artful sneeze guards that hang over your dining room chair to masks made out of lettuce, these paper projects are mostly PR stunts for designers and artists, and favor bombastic creativity over the genuinely simple harm reduction advice from health experts. Go outside, stay physically distant from others, wear a mask, and wash your hands—no flashy design required (Vox [28]).

Placemaking Playbook: Finally, here's a roundup of 12 recent innovative placemaking projects making headlines:

1. A new guide to center public health and city planning (WHO [29])
2. A permit-less reopening of businesses outdoors in Rotterdam (Modacity [30])
3. A roundup of resources for reopening libraries outdoors (WebJunction [31])
4. Six tips for supporting streateries (Bloomberg Cities [32])
5. A beautiful grid for social distancing in the town square of Vicchio, Italy (Architectural Digest [33])
6. An Eid celebration in Wetzlar, Germany, takes place in an Ikea parking lot (Abdirahim Saeed [34])
7. Pop-up professional floral displays for healthcare workers in New York, NY (CNN [35])
8. Pandemic-themed pothole fillers in Chicago, IL (Taras Grescoe [36])
9. Photos of daily life during COVID-19 across the United States (Esquire [37])
10. A history of the Bryant Park moveable chair (Metropolis [38])
11. A video of Better Block's parklet in Dallas (NBCDFW [39])
12. A call to remake our sense of place post-COVID-19 (The Conversation [40])

1. Do I understand that not being racist isn’t the same as being anti-racist?
    
2. Why am I so afraid to be brave enough to confront my power and privilege?
    
3. What am I waiting for to de-center whiteness and realize just because I have never experienced it (or seen the research to prove it) doesn’t mean it isn’t real?
    
4. What am I doing every single day to force myself to think about racism and white supremacy?
    
5. What am I doing every single day to stop the killing of black people?