Fixed Parks
This Park offers only a bench to sit on for most age groups
I was talking to a fellow in my neighborhood who was in a wheelchair. We talked about the activities offered in the fixed equipment outdoor parks in our neighborhood, we agreed they essentially offered none for him as a person who uses a wheelchair, and none for me as a senior citizen.
Loose Parks
I then pointed to the library that was right across the street from where we were talking. It functions as an "indoor park" with seating and "loose parts" (aka books, DVDs, laptops etc). It was far smaller then any of the outdoor parks in our neighborhood, yet offered us and the rest of the community a choice of thousands of "loose parts" to choose from .
Loose Parts (DVD's left, books right) at the Muhlenberg Library
I said to him rather then outdoor parks being based solely on installing a small number of fixed equipment features, what if they additionally offered a library style facility stocked with all sorts of "loose parts" so as to offer something for everyone? He agreed with me this would be a good idea.
Here are several ways to offer a great deal of Loose Parts in our parks using the public library as a model.
1- Place a Staffed "Play Library" in a Park
Rockefeller Park
-Park goes borrow loose parts (aka equipment or content) from the play library(l) to use in the park (r)
-Scores of different items are available
-New content (equipment) can easily be added to meet the play needs of all ages and abilities
When I was a child my neighborhood playground had a staffed play library. Due to budget issues many parks departments often can no longer afford dedicated staff to lend equipment in neighborhood parks.
What follows are affordable ways to offer Play Libraries
2-Partner Parks and Public Libraries
As it turns out thousands of public libraries already have staff and have a park nearby:
-Libraries are already really, really good distribution channel for lending objects to use in nearby parks- but those objects are currently usually limited to books and other information oriented materials.
 | ||
Borrow books from library...
|
-What if the libraries in your city near a park would also lend sports equipment?
"We are lucky that we have a park right outside our windows. Staff have been known to tell a bunch of rowdy kids to take a ball, go out to the park and work off their excess energy before they come back inside and sometimes the youth staff will start or join in the game for a little while - its all part of building good relationships".
“Our Library checks out basketballs to be used on the courts near the library. We also have frisbees, jump ropes and hacky sacks available to borrow. The balls have been replaced many times through the years and have resulted in much good will with the kids after school. When they (the kids!) start bouncing off the walls, we suggest they bounce a basketball instead. .” Maine Library
-Though only a small number of libraries in the United States lend sporting equipment, the concept is far more common elsewhere...
"Sports collections do exist in a large proportion of the[130] public libraries"[in Western Australia] . " -Ann Pascoe West Torrence Library, Australia
see NYC Libraries Near Parks
3-Transform Library Outdoor Spaces into Loose Parks
Libraries often have indoor children's play areas that offer toys and games. These actually are small indoor loose parks. .Why not add outdoor Loose Parks? Here's how. Libraries often have lawns, and these lawns look wonderful, but are otherwise not used .
This is the lawn at the Salem Library in Salem, VA. The library building acts as an adjacent Play Library for this Loose Park.
Libraries can either develop their lawns into parks on their own, or work with parks departments to do so. The San Antonio Parks System received a Communities Putting Prevention to Work grant, It partnered with the San Antonio Library to place fitness equipment on the lawns of 5 libraries. Doing so added 5 new "fixed equipment parks" to San Antonio without the city having to build 5 new parks. Adding recreation equipment lending to these libraries would create San Antonio's first Loose Parks.
see Libraries that use their outdoor spaces for recreation
see NYC Schoolyards to Playgrounds/Libraries to Loose Parks
Shared use
4-No room in libraries for recreation equipment?
No nearby Library?
-I talked to a branch manager of a rather small Carnegie Library about lending recreation equipment. She said to me something to the effect "look at this place, we have no room". Last week I came back to her and said, "What if you didn't have to lend the items, just keys to lockers holding the items". Her reply was "This we have room for"
Lend Keys to Lockers
Her's an idea- Each locker can hold items that relate to each other, such as toys for the visually handicapped, table games, puppets, , or art supplies Borrowing keys from libraries would utilize a well established citywide materials lending system. Keys to each locker may be borrowed by one person at a time, or multiple people (hey see whatever works!)
The Portage District Library system has Library Express lockers (below) at 9 locations that they use for book lending.
I spoke to library staff and asked if they would be any difference from checking out a book or a jump rope from the lockers . Their answer was no.
Her's an idea- Each locker can hold items that relate to each other, such as toys for the visually handicapped, table games, puppets, , or art supplies Borrowing keys from libraries would utilize a well established citywide materials lending system. Keys to each locker may be borrowed by one person at a time, or multiple people (hey see whatever works!)
The Portage District Library system has Library Express lockers (below) at 9 locations that they use for book lending.
I spoke to library staff and asked if they would be any difference from checking out a book or a jump rope from the lockers . Their answer was no.
At Hudson Beach in NYC's Riverside Park a community group stores its Play Library equipment in a locker at the park, that they purchased and filled with equipment...
On weekends, during good weather the community group opens the locker and creates a Loose Park available to all at this location. Here are some of the items from this small locker in use...
see Lockers , Trust, Theft at Loose Parks
5-Piggybacking on Existing Parks Staff or Hire Part Times
As I said before, most parks departments are not able to afford full time dedicated staff for Play Libraries . There are other ways to staff a Play Library in a park.
Bike lending at the Warren E Fox Nature Center
-About 50 parks in North Carolina lend fishing tackle(and at some sites adaptive fishing gear) under the states Tackler Loan Program. The N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission pays 75% of the cost of the gear. Someone at the commission got 50 parks in North Carolina to lend fishing gear. Great!. If you can loan fishing gear why can't you loan volleyballs or hula hoops? I gave a call to one of the parks who got the gear and asked if you can lend fishing gear any reason you can't lend other sports equipment. Answer was "I don't think so".
-Could maintenance staff at a park put out movable loose equipment in a park, and take it in at night? I talked to a parks maintenance supervisor who said yes. Ping Pong, pool, nok hockey and , foosball tables, exercise bikes, chairs, and pianos, are several movable objects that can be made available this way. (By locking this equipment to the ground it can help make sure the equipment dose not walk if unattended).
-Part Timers
In NYC our parks department budget cannot pay for full time animate Loose Parts(aka recreation staff) in our neighborhood parks. But where budgets permit I would think parks can hire part time employees to man Play Libraries and lead events in parks for the most popular day or days of the week(Saturday and Sunday) .
see -..Parks that lend recreation equipment
Exclusion and Inclusion
Philadelphia has the largest in-city park system in the world, which can serve as a tremendous resource for social interaction, relaxation and recreation. Yet 72% of older Philadelphians report they had not gone to a public recreation facility in the past year. link
link
Philadelphia's findings are not an aberration. A Rand Corporation study found that seniors seldom use Los Angeles parks.link
Why are seniors not using parks? One possibility comes from the authors of the book People Places they said "The natural environment of a park is not enough to attract some elderly users, but a park with many activities can simulate social exchange and provide a sense of belonging" link
Seniors are not the only groups with issues that cause them not to use parks...
Overall this is a great facility I just wish the community would use it for more activities other than the one concert in the park they have every summer because that's pretty much the only reason why I've ever gone here. link
I was visiting Manhattan's Union Square Park , I talked to a young skateboard enthusiast there who told me, “there's benches for seniors and a playground for the little kids but nothing for us.”
Contemporary American playgrounds don’t hold or inspire older kids...More and more, preteens avoid the playground altogether, choosing instead to spend time indoors, most likely sitting in front of some kind of screen...What teen will go to the playground to play a game when he has better graphics at home on his computer or anywhere on his cell phone? The Science of Play
link
What I think is happening is that many of our parks subtly include and exclude use by many groups through the features they offer and do not offer. link
Defining Inclusion
I was talking to a senior who uses a wheelchair, she asked me if I could let her know if there were any inclusive playgrounds in NYC. I asked her to define inclusive playground . She said a park that would have activities for her to participate in. Turns out there are not many parks in NYC that are inclusive for her.
On Further thinking I came up with a lot of "playgrounds" that might have activities to meet her needs
-the libraries in her neighborhood
-the senior centers in her neighborhood
-the college sin her neighborhood that offer senior scholar programs.
So there are a good number of locations offering senior playspaces. only they are not NYC parks
Philadelphia has the largest in-city park system in the world, which can serve as a tremendous resource for social interaction, relaxation and recreation. Yet 72% of older Philadelphians report they had not gone to a public recreation facility in the past year. link
Philadelphia's findings are not an aberration. A Rand Corporation study found that seniors seldom use Los Angeles parks.link
Why are seniors not using parks? One possibility comes from the authors of the book People Places they said "The natural environment of a park is not enough to attract some elderly users, but a park with many activities can simulate social exchange and provide a sense of belonging" link
Seniors are not the only groups with issues that cause them not to use parks...
Overall this is a great facility I just wish the community would use it for more activities other than the one concert in the park they have every summer because that's pretty much the only reason why I've ever gone here. link
I was visiting Manhattan's Union Square Park , I talked to a young skateboard enthusiast there who told me, “there's benches for seniors and a playground for the little kids but nothing for us.”
Contemporary American playgrounds don’t hold or inspire older kids...More and more, preteens avoid the playground altogether, choosing instead to spend time indoors, most likely sitting in front of some kind of screen...What teen will go to the playground to play a game when he has better graphics at home on his computer or anywhere on his cell phone? The Science of Play
link
What I think is happening is that many of our parks subtly include and exclude use by many groups through the features they offer and do not offer. link
Defining Inclusion
I was talking to a senior who uses a wheelchair, she asked me if I could let her know if there were any inclusive playgrounds in NYC. I asked her to define inclusive playground . She said a park that would have activities for her to participate in. Turns out there are not many parks in NYC that are inclusive for her.
On Further thinking I came up with a lot of "playgrounds" that might have activities to meet her needs
-the libraries in her neighborhood
-the senior centers in her neighborhood
-the college sin her neighborhood that offer senior scholar programs.
So there are a good number of locations offering senior playspaces. only they are not NYC parks
If a "park" offers enough activities to attract you to use it, then it is an inclusive park for you, if not it isn't. Doesn't matter if 1 or 10,000 other people find activities at that park that attract them to it, if it doesn't attract you, it fails your inclusion test.
Think, what features would a park need to offer for so that you would want to use it on a regular basis?
The ADA guarantees accessibility to a park. It does not guarantee that you will have anything to do in the park.
Not So Special Special Needs Equipment
As it turns out much "special needs” recreation equipment need not be special, they just need to be available . Loose Park Play Libraries are meant to make recreation equipment more available for everyone including special needs folks..
Special, special needs equipment
Play Libraries can allows patrons to special order from a wide variety of adaptive special needs equipment to be used in Loose parks.
Audible ball(above) for the visually impaired
see Loose Parks and Special Needs Recreation
Loose Parks and Family Play
Studies have shown that parents’ participation in physical activity is
positively related to activity among children and adolescents link
In standard playgrounds I mostly see parents "participating" by watching their kids play or if not doing this they are often looking at their phones or otherwise keeping busy.
At Rockefeller Park, there are Loose Parts offered that allowed parents and children to participate together
Board Games
Nok Hockey
Reading
Family Ping Pong
-Distance to a Loose Park
Disneyland is considered an incredible park, but given the distance to it, most people rarely go to visit it. Distance to a park is a really important factor to how often it is being used. As this diagram shows if a park is more then a 3 block walk away, usage decreases drastically. link
So what we need are not only Loose Parks, we need Loose Parks as close to us as possible
Loose Parks and Space
Almost 70 percent of the activity took place in the really nice,
renovated playground area, even though it accounted for just 2 percent
of the total park size, link
In a fixed park, often most of the area is empty space with no equipment.
In a Loose Park you can take equipment and use it anywhere within the space and play with it.
Designing a Loose Park vs a Fixed Park
It is impossible to know which toys a child will connect with, which they will enjoy, which they want to continue to play with for hours on end. link
Fixed Park
Fixed parks offer a limited number of activities that are designed by professionals , once designed and built they tend not to change.
The park down the block from me, Penn Station South Playground, has benches, basketball, volleyball, jungle gym, and 4 sidewalk games. Total of 8 items. The sidewalk games were repainted in 2014, no new equipment has been added since 1998, almost 20 years ago.
Loose Park
" A single movie or show on Netflix and Amazon needn’t appeal to everyone; the key for both platforms is making sure they offer enough of everything to attract anyone." link
A Loose Park can offer score of Loose Parts. But what's really powerful is that the people who run a Loose Park can ask the community, "What items could we add to the park so that it offered enough to attract you to use it.?"
The nearest indoor Loose Park to me (aka Muhlenberg Library) has approximately 20,000 volume, millions more can be requested through interbranch loan.
Here's how the Sacramento Library designed their Library of Things as a recent addition to their Arcadia Branch......
The question of what exactly will be available for lending and borrowing will depend on what the community suggests. Community members have been able submit their ideas through the library’s website and will be able to continue to do so through next week. Once ideas have been submitted, they will appear as comments on the page. The most popular objects will be purchased. (Within reason, of course; the library has allotted a budget of $3,900.) So far, the two most popular ideas, tied at 150 votes each, have been a sewing machine and video games—clearly, a variety of demographics are being served here. In response, the library has already bought six sewing machines and expects to begin circulating them by mid-February" - Sacramento Public Library of Things
Unlike Fixed Parks, Loose Parks can be designed to be continually "designed" by their users.
see Designing and Stocking a Loose Park
-Paying for a Play Library
Starting a play library need not be expensive...
“Our Library checks out basketballs to be used on the courts near the library. We also have frisbees, jump ropes and hacky sacks available to borrow.
If you got $50 you can start with the items offered at the above library . A few thousand dollars will get an extensive Play Library that should cover the recreation needs of all ages and abilities.
No funds for a Play Library?
-Ask your local government officials
My council member said he could fund a Play Library for a Library adjacent to a Park through his expense budget.
-Ask the community to donate funds or recreation equipment.
The Los Angeles Department of Public Social Services Toy Loan Program has partnered with volunteer groups to offer Toy Loan Centers in 10 Los Angeles parks. These Toy Loan Centers get their equipment through a combination of DPSS budget and . community equipment donations.
-Allow people to donate equipment that they want to use in the Loose Park. By doing so:
-They get the convenience of no longer having to schlep equipment to the park
-Everyone gets to use the equipment.
The park down the block from where I live currently offers no features that would get me to use it. I have offered to donate equipment to the parks department that would transform this into an Inclusive Park for me.
Grants
- Canadian Sports for Life Kingston , Ontario received a 2 year grant to promote physical literacy through the creation of 68 Play Libraries. that could be checked out at community organizations.
An
example of some of the materials provided through the Physical Literacy
program being offered to Kingston East residents . link
-According to Anne Pascoe at the West Torrence Library,the Australian Sports Collections libraries were initially established through government funding via a 'Be Active' grant .
More grant money to help Australian community libraries purchase sporting equipment has become available at the national level, courtesy of the Green Party.
Other City and State Agencies Funding
| As mentioned before the North Carolina Carolina Wildlife Commission is a state agency that created the Fishing Tackler Loan Program placing fishing tackle and adapted fishing tackle in 50 parks.The Wildlife Commission pays 75% of the cost of the gear. |
The Ontario Tackle Share program, provides fishing gear to 140 sites, including Ontario Parks, and public libraries, link
-The Parks department in NYC work with the Queens Public Library System to hold Shape Up NYC exercise classes that are held in public libraries. If they can do this, I would think that there is no reason a parks department(or for that matter City Health Department) could not work with Public Libraries to fund their play libraries.
Advertising Loose Parks
And there was kind of an insider mentality too — you had to know what programs were offered because nothing was ever publicized. No effort was made to draw people in. One woman called her local park to find out if a program was still being offered only to be told that the information was “confidential.”Forrest Claypool,, CEO, Chicago Parks district
Commissioner Claypools statement seems rather amusing , but I learned similar situations are not uncommon in Parks systems...
-A local park has a $5,000 concrete ping pong table. Park Rangers do lend paddles if you happen to see a Ranger in the park and ask. but no signs in the park indicate this fact.
The park above needs a banner like this to hang near the table...
To participate in an activity that is occurring, it helps to know about the activity...
Sacramento's Belle Cooledge Library lends Ping Pong paddles for use in adjacent Belle Cooledge Park.
Map of Belle Cooledge Library and Park, Ping Pong Table in Park
The paddles were donated by one of their city council members. A sign in the library lets patrons know about the paddles. They currently circulate around 52 times a year.
There is no signage in the park, letting people know about this service. It would be helpful to park goers if the parks department put up a sign, letting people know that paddies were available at the library.
Remember the Maine library that lends several pieces of sports equipment...
“Our Library checks out basketballs to be used on the courts near the library. We also have frisbees, jump ropes and hacky sacks available to borrow. .” Maine Library
Adding a sign like the one below to the park and library , would help let community residents know that this equipment is available from the library.
One really nice thing about this banner is that it both lets park goers know that sports equipment is available at the library to play with in the park, and it also advertise that books are available from the library for reading in the park.
see Co Marketing Parks and Libraries
Theft, User Friendliness, Trust, Liability
Theft/User Friendliness
Branch libraries are Loose Parks that accept loss as part of their business model. Closed stacks would be safer then open stacks, but they would also have books used less. Offering materials for in library use only would be even safer, but once again would decrease usage. The closer libraries move to a zero tolerance for loss, the less user friendly libraries become.
What would a library look like with a zero tolerance for loss? It would look a lot like the park down the block from me. The few items it offers are "bolted" to the ground. This model may achieve a zero loss rate, but it also
-limits the number of possible items offered
-implicitly excludes use of the park by many groups
-greatly diminishes the ""user friendliness" of the facility
Surveying a few libraries that lend recreation equipment I found loss is no greater then for other circulating collections. For details on how to keep theft to a minimum see here
Trust
Not all items in a Loose Park have to be "checked out" . At Rockefeller Park, many Loose Parts are left on their lawn for use by park goers.
Historically, the main attraction of Totland, for the tots, are the dozens of push toys and ride-ons that have been left by families who have outgrown them. There was no need to bring your own toys — the place was covered with them.. link
'As Bryant Park's Barth sees it, movable seating should not be viewed as a fixed asset like a statue or a park bench, but instead as a commodity such as garden mulch or toilet paper that must be regularly restocked. "These chairs increase the social life of the park," Barth says. "You can't quantify that financially." ' link
Bryant Park
Liability
see Objections to Recreation equipment Loan: Theft, Breakage and Liability
Loose Parks- Increase access to Physical Activities Opportunities
People may have the necessary knowledge,skills, attitudes, and motivation to be physically active, but if they do not have access to the necessary opportunities, they may be restricted or prohibited from being active. Having access to places and opportunities for physical activity and knowing these opportunities exist is critical. Efforts to increase access may not lead to increased use unless community members are involved and aware of the efforts
-The CDC Guide to Strategies to Increase Physical Activity in the Community linksee The Soda Can and the Hula Hoop, why distance to recretion equipment is important
Loose Parks- Increase access to Literacy Opportunities/Books
Research
consistently shows that children who live in low-income neighborhoods
have little access to reading material in
their public libraries, in their schools, and at home...
... the first
step any literacy campaign needs to take is to make sure children have
access to plenty of books. link
Marcus Garvey Park
The installation of Little Free Libraries in the park [above) provides children and young adults free access to books and a wide variety of reading materials to help encourage early reading. -Michell Silver NYC Parks Commissioner
This library in the park is one of about 47 in
various neighborhoods of Bogota, Colombia. They were established by the
Paradero Para Libros Para Parques (PPP), a program created to promote
literacy across the country. www.bilinguallibrarian.com
Loose Parks and Types of Recreation
In her book “The Right Stuff for Children Birth to 8” Martha B. Bronson talks about five different ways of playing.. link:
More and more, preteens avoid the playground altogether, choosing instead to spend time indoors, most likely sitting in front of some kind of screen
I think in NYC our parks are acting like specialty retailers... for kids they specialize in "selling" active play, for adults what they 'sell" is passive recreation bench seating .For the most part the offerings in these neighborhood park "speciality stores" are pretty slim. If a specialty retailer doesn't sell the type of goods you're interested in you have no reason to go into his store, you will take your business elsewhere and buy from a store that has the goods you do want.
So how to attract more people to your store. Well if instead of a store that offered few items (passive seating for adults, active play for kids) , you had a store selling a wide range of merchandise I would think that would attract more people.
link
see Five Types of Play Starter Kit
-Loose Seats
Movable chairs and tables are great loose parts. They afford parkgoers a far greater range of activities then parks with only benches.
link
Here are two senior citizens who are playing a game of Scrabble at a community garden.
Given a simple addition, a table and chairs this Community Garden has transformed from an area where the seating arrangement would only allow reading and awkward talking to where the seating arrangement will facilitate social interactions.
Loose Art, Using art to create Active Recreation
A fixed mural is being considered for a local park in my neighborhood. The park is underutilized by teens, adults and seniors.
This park has a lot of benches, and attracts only a handful of teens, adults and seniors to use these benches
The mural will brighten up the park, and more people will come to the park because of it. A while back a Lego man was placed in the park, and far more people came into the park to take pictures with it.
However there is a limit to the number of times people will come into the park to specifically view the same object, for most people it will probably be one time.
I think there are art alternatives that will add so much more to the usage of this park for people in the neighborhood . Rather then a static painted mural in this park , how about the park gets art exhibits of limited duration . Every time the exhibit changes it gives community residents a fresh reason to visit the park. And rather then just do exhibits in isolation at one neighborhood park, how about all neighborhood parks get coordinated exhibits.
What this hopefully does is gets people in the neighborhood to go to ALL the parks in the neighborhood to see this "distributed" exhibit.
And here's the really interesting thing. Walking to these " loose parks" to see these exhibits is active recreation. So if these exhibits are mounted properly, adding art exhibits (loose parts) to a park will increase active recreation, in the community. (see Loose Parks and Health Trails below)
Loose Programming
Offering programmed events in a park is a way to temporarily transform a Fixed Park into a Loose Park for the duration of the event. Yes events programming is a form of looseness , however unlike other forms of looseness, this not available on demand.
Loose Parks and Health Trails
Activities like bicycling, skiing , and swimming are non ordinary realities and fun to do ways to excercise. Walking is great exercise but not in and of itself a fun thing to do. By adding fun rewards to walking you get people to walk more and that means excercise more.
Creating Health Trails where walkers find rewards at points on the trail will get people to walk more. -Loose Art
-Loose and Fixed recreation equipment in our parks
-Loose Programming
-Getting to Loose Parks
There are good reasons for Parks departments, Public Libraries and local governments to work together to create loose parks in their communities
Parks Departments
Hula hoops on lawn
-"A recent study of daycare-center playgrounds found that when kids had access to items like balls, hula hoops, and jump ropes, they were more active than when they had only stationary structures to play on.." link
“Sports Equipment libraries can provide resources for individuals and families to utilize equipment that they may not be able to afford or, they may wish to 'try before they buy'. It also enables individuals and families to actively participate in sport and recreation in areas where they encounter difficulties. Victoria Australia Dept of Health ” -link
- Libraries
There's a place for you and a place for me,
it's the local public library.
They have books and things that they lend for free
It's the latest, it's the greatest, it's the library.
Educational, informational,
entertainment that's sensational.
It's a way of life, it's for you and me
It's the latest, it's the greatest, it's the library.
They have histories, they have mysteries
And for mothers, books of recipes
See a movie show, hear a symphony
It's the latest, it's the greatest, it's the library.
There’s a place for you and a place for me,
it’s the local public library.
They have books and things
that they lend for free.
It’s the latest, it’s the greatest, it’s the library. - See more at: http://hildygottlieb.com/2013/10/27/its-the-latest-its-the-greatest-its-the-library/#sthash.obKGx7F0.dpuf
-The Library Song (click for tune)it’s the local public library.
They have books and things
that they lend for free.
It’s the latest, it’s the greatest, it’s the library. - See more at: http://hildygottlieb.com/2013/10/27/its-the-latest-its-the-greatest-its-the-library/#sthash.obKGx7F0.dpuf
Libraries are great community Loose Parks, but they have challenges for the 21st century...
Eli Neiburger, deputy director Ann Arbor District Library which offers a Unusual Stuff to Borrow Collection
To paraphrase Eli,Libraries are an incredible resource to allow communities to borrow and share scarce content. Print media used to be the scarce content that was the reason for libraries to exist. As the abundance of information on the Internet transforms print into a legacy media , our libraries need to find other scarce content to offer our communities.
This NYPL poster shows some of the scarce content the New York Public Library is touting.
Our branch libraries are already Loose Parks, adding Physical literacy equipment will help make them into Looser Parks.
More and more libraries are looking at adding additional services as they continually strive to meet the needs of their communities (Bryant and Pengelly, 2008). McNicol (2003) found that joint use libraries can work extremely well and have the potential to be an integral part of the local community. In many areas, they enable a better standard of library service to be provided than would have been possible otherwise. Victoria Australia Dept of Health ” -link
...After all, a library is a place where people find out that the things that seem utterly impossible – really are possible after all-Jessica Candy New York Public Library
Local Government
“With research showing that obesity is rising and life expectancy is
decreasing, a new dialogue around the provision of physical activity
programming, education and opportunities is needed,” Denita Arthurs, City of Kingston, Ontario assistant supervisor for recreation
Our Parks and Libraries are communities major providers of recreation content. Adding information resources to parks and recreation resources to public libraries, are low cost ways for local governments to add to the usefulness of their existing public spaces without having to incur major capital expenses.
for more partnerships see Getting Libraries and Parks to Cooperate
Loose Parks as Intelligent Systems
This one is heavy so I have left it to the end...
The
concept of involvement and participation
underlies
this whole report. It seems central to the
comments
of all our consultants. Rand has
summarized
the point when he says, "Designed
environments
which are thought out. formalized,
and
complete are usually lifeless' and
unapproachable
because (a) they do not invite
interaction
and modification to suit immediate
human
needs; (b) they are unable to grow, develop
and
become extended through human use. Human
habitation
merely fulfills (for better or far worse)
the
designer's conception of their potential
meaning
rather than leading to the discovery
of
new functions and new forms of interaction.
Oddly enough [he goes on to say] many environ-
by designers."
." From New York, New
York (1968)Oddly enough [he goes on to say] many environ-
sents
which 'work' well for people meet few
if
any, aesthetic criteria ordinarily employed
by designers."
by Lawrence Halpern and Associates.
When
Artificial Intelligence research first started. computer scientists
designed fixed algorithms to mimic intelligence. This approach did not
work very well. and was pretty much considered a dead end Later on
computer scientists started creating systems called Neural Networks,
rather then . fixed algorithms, this approach used systems that mimicked
how neurons in the brain learned from their environment . This
approach worked far better, because the system would learn to become
intelligent at a task rather then someone programming in how to do the
task.
In creating a fixed park parks designer(with the possibly assistance of members of the community) have to anticipate what peoples future recreation needs will be, Just like the fixed algorithm artificial intelligence systems this doesn't work very well. If instead you create a Loose park system that can, over time, learn from it users what their needs are, then this system will work like a neural network and actually show intelligence and learn how to program itself to meet the communities recreation needs.
NYC's Libraries are actually Loose Parks they learn to meet the community information needs, by allowing community members to choose the books they want. The Internet is a better Loose park, it allows it''s users to also be it's authors.
The design of Loose Parks is meant over time to allow a parks users to actually create their own park that meets their recreation needs. Loose Parks are intelligent systems.
see also
Loose Parks as Intelligent Systems
How NOT to Cheat Children The Theory of Loose Parts, Simon Nicholson
Specialized Recreation equipment Lending Libraries
The Theory of Loose Parks and Looser Libraries
Some of the ideas shown here have been working for years, others need to be tested. If you implement something please pass back details so it can be shared with others
wtgichelsea (at) gmail.com
