To be really well used parks and other public spaces must be really close to you. After 3 blocks usage of green spaces decreases drastically
That's why even though the Upper East Side is adjacent to Central Park, its residents complain they don't have enough park space, It is not the lack of park space they are complaining about, it is really the lack of nearby park space. Here's a Look at this issue from the past, future and present.
The Past
Actually in the past there was no problem to solve. Until sometime in the 20th century our streets were our parks. At that time we didn't need a lot of centralized park facilities, because you could just go outside your door and play in the street.
The Streets were our playgrounds
-C Edward Coop , Surgeon General US
-C Edward Coop , Surgeon General US
Dangerous high speed automobiles and the automobile industry ended that era.
Before the American city could be physically reconstructed to accommodate automobiles, its streets had to be socially reconstructed as places where cars belong. Until then, streets were regarded as public spaces, where practices that endangered or obstructed others (including pedestrians) were disreputable. Motorists' claim to street space was therefore fragile, subject to restrictions that threatened to negate the advantages of car ownership. Epithets—especially joy rider—reflected and reinforced the prevailing social construction of the street. Automotive interest groups (motordom) recognized this obstacle and organized in the teens and 1920s to overcome it. One tool in this effort was jaywalker. Motordom discovered this obscure colloquialism in the teens, reinvented it, and introduced it to the millions. It ridiculed once-respectable street uses and cast doubt on pedestrians' legitimacy in most of the street. Though many pedestrians resented and resisted the term and its connotations, motordom's campaign was a substantial success. link
The auto industry took over our streets for the essentially exclusive use of cars and parking, with human being use of streets relegated to crossing at crosswalks.
link
In return for the loss of the use of our convenient "street parks" we have been given a system of few and often far between centralized public spaces that are not anywhere as convenient as our street parks and playgrounds in front of where we lived were.
Tomorrow
20-30 years from now our streets in front of where we live will once again become our parks and playgrounds. The impetus for this will be the self driving automobile becoming the dominant form of transportation.
Every year, 1.2 million people die in car accidents, more than 33,000 of them in the US link
-Self driving vehicles are expected to be much safer. Human error accounts for around 90% of all car accidents.. Insurance rates will drop drastically for self driving vehicles vs driver vehicles making most people switch to using self driving vehicles. Transitions can occur quite fast....
.
Before the American city could be physically reconstructed to accommodate automobiles, its streets had to be socially reconstructed as places where cars belong. Until then, streets were regarded as public spaces, where practices that endangered or obstructed others (including pedestrians) were disreputable. Motorists' claim to street space was therefore fragile, subject to restrictions that threatened to negate the advantages of car ownership. Epithets—especially joy rider—reflected and reinforced the prevailing social construction of the street. Automotive interest groups (motordom) recognized this obstacle and organized in the teens and 1920s to overcome it. One tool in this effort was jaywalker. Motordom discovered this obscure colloquialism in the teens, reinvented it, and introduced it to the millions. It ridiculed once-respectable street uses and cast doubt on pedestrians' legitimacy in most of the street. Though many pedestrians resented and resisted the term and its connotations, motordom's campaign was a substantial success. link
The auto industry took over our streets for the essentially exclusive use of cars and parking, with human being use of streets relegated to crossing at crosswalks.
link
In return for the loss of the use of our convenient "street parks" we have been given a system of few and often far between centralized public spaces that are not anywhere as convenient as our street parks and playgrounds in front of where we lived were.
Tomorrow
20-30 years from now our streets in front of where we live will once again become our parks and playgrounds. The impetus for this will be the self driving automobile becoming the dominant form of transportation.
Every year, 1.2 million people die in car accidents, more than 33,000 of them in the US link
-Self driving vehicles are expected to be much safer. Human error accounts for around 90% of all car accidents.. Insurance rates will drop drastically for self driving vehicles vs driver vehicles making most people switch to using self driving vehicles. Transitions can occur quite fast....
. Using actual transportation data, our analysis
suggests a shared-vehicle mobility solution can meet the personal
mobility needs of the entire population with a fleet whose size is
approximately 1/3 of the total number of passenger vehicles currently in
operation.
If 2/3 of cars disappear , the space now used for car parking will be freed up to become linear parks, and many streets will be essentially closed to thru traffic and become our parks and playgrounds once again.
The cities will probably keep a few parking spaces around for cars that need to pause but most will probably be repurposed as parks or retail locations. The Atlantic
Today
Here's exceptional examples of today that will become the norm in the future...
32nd Street NYC 6th to 7th Avenue
Vornado Reality removes car parking on north side of 32nd St, replaces it with a park in the street
Boulevard 41
Bryant Park Corp has been approved to take all parking from both sides of street and will turn it it into "Parkland"
Bryant Park Corp has been approved to take all parking from both sides of street and will turn it it into "Parkland"
![While Vision42 might not happen soon, Boulevard 41 is more likely. The plan from the Bryant Park Corporation has approvals in hand but needs funding from adjacent property owners. Image: Bryant Park Corporation [PDF]](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/blogger_img_proxy/AEn0k_tC3e0OD_PmTHkgkveEetpYiLYKSHCrlUQsULWt432qGG5qxLoYUWK4LZxsa3hVSZEKBzbgQZVCTeniGPHzVyT7uYH-lhfWnkI39v9HNzzGw2kG2pkSq2cJ96sVHKcN1l0jKeBO1asvXadxn--2YBA77CI8MvfL5d4BdAwsWo7wYA=s0-d)
Potgieterstraat is situated in inner Amsterdam, in a context of 19th century buildings dating back to the first big enlargement of Amsterdam. The block typology of that time appears to the disadvantage of today’s public life, since the inner courtyards of these blocks are not open to public use and the streets were never designed for today’s traffic. In general there is a lack of public squares and public green. Streets here are dominated by cars and recently introduced bike lanes are a traffic solution, unfortunately claiming the available space from adjacent side walks.
The district as a whole was up to a refreshing new strategy for children and pedestrians to strengthen and vitalize the public realm. Local inhabitants were asked in a political enquiry to agree upon and formulate new guidelines and were also involved in the selection of an architect.
Whereas participation is seen as a process with all stakeholders positively involved this wasn’t the situation at all in this particular case. The participative processes could be more characterized by conflict than by cooperation. Conflicts with the city council with an ambitious demand that by written survey 70% of all residents in the housing blocks should agree on the plan, conflicts with residents that didn’t want their acclaimed public parking places to be moved around the corner, the appointment of a new political administration changing plans already agreed on between the residents and the former administration. Conflicts with retailers located on the street, the financial coupling of this small project to a bigger project. Lack of cooperation between the different city departments and the delay of the project in general. All these conflicts resulted in a process where the social bonding was actually already established before the realization of the plans because residents showed perseverance. Therefore the basis of the success of this public domain was a side-product of this design.
link
Pearl St Triangle
33rd St Madison Square Garden
link
Sports Parklet Los Angeles
