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When people think of placemaking, they often thing of big projects with dramatic before and after photos. While we certainly love an empty lot turned into a vibrant community park, it's also fun to highlight the small projects that bring a smile to your face.
This week, we wanted to share a blog post from the archives outlining the 5 key principles that helped create a little free library movement in the Canadian cities of Kitchener, Waterloo, and Cambridge. Read more. |
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September 19, 2021 • Award: 2021 Farmers Market Celebration, American Farmland Trust & Farmers Market Coalition
September 21–24, 2021 • Placemaking Week, Flint, MI USA, PlacemakingUS & What’s Up Downtown FLint
September 27–October 3, 2021 • Porch Placemaking Week, Fourfold Studio
November 4, 2021 • Call for Proposals: A National Initiative for Green Space, Health Equity, and Racial Justice, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
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Opportunity Hoarding, Neighborhood Edition. Sheryll Cashin, the author of White Space, Black Hood: Opportunity Hoarding and Segregation in the Age of Inequality, has written an op-ed about the urgent need to disrupt the racial boundaries of neighborhoods. She notes that "through income and other taxes, people of all racial and class backgrounds who live [in low opportunity areas] help pay for the roads, sewers and other infrastructure that make low-poverty, resource-rich places possible." (Politico)
Sharing (Schoolyards) is Caring. A new report from The Trust for Public Land shows that if every public K-12 school in the country would share their schoolyard with the public when it's not in use, it would give 20 million more people access to a park within a 10-minute walk of their home. (Grist)
On a similar note, last week Project for Public Spaces' Interim Executive Director Ellen McDermott and Senior Director of Programs Kelly Verel made the case for every school in New York City to have an open street by default. (Streetsblog)
Participatory Design in Russia. You might not have heard of Kazan, the capital of the semi-autonomous Russian republic of Tatarstan, but you should pay attention. This city, 450 miles away from Moscow, is garnering excitement for putting participatory design front and center, resulting in hundreds of public space projects. Their public space development program is asking people "what they want done, what they want preserved, and what they want to go." (CityLab)
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As always, here's a roundup of five placemaking projects and ideas that inspired us this week:
- We might have to share our sidewalks with delivery robots (Next City)
- States can improve opportunity outcomes for places in four key ways (Brookings)
- The elevated cycleways of the late 19th century had it right (The Drive)
- A government-subsidized apartment building in Chattanooga gets a beautiful community-led street transformation (Blue Zones)
- A pedestrian bridge Minneapolis becomes a site for art and community. (Next City)
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