By 2005, increased rates in childhood obesity and a lack of green space were becoming a concern for the residents of Baldwin Park (80% Latino). The city seemed to lack parks and places of recreation, so the community came together to develop a Parks and Recreation Master Plan. One strategy mentioned in the plan was the shared use of land between schools and the city, as a cost effective method to increase active spaces. When Parks and Rec. officials learned of a community development grant which could provide funding for shared use projects, they entered discussions with Baldwin Park Unified School District (BUSD), to see about developing a shared use agreement, to keep school property open during after-school hours. Plans for the 2010 shared use agreement were approved by the ...
Parks, plazas, and bike racks are all a part of the City of Los Angeles' new People St initiative---a program created to get the community's input on affordable ways to improve the built environment. Launched earlier this year as a way to involve the community in designing healthy public spaces, People St allows residents to submit proposals for three project types: Parklets;
Bike Corrals; and
Plazas. In a statement on the People St webpage, Mayor Garcetti said: "Fundamental to People St is its bottom-up, community-based approach." Community groups like neighborhood associations and business districts are eligible to submit their proposals to LA DOT after getting support for a project. However, the projects must be located in areas with high pedestrian traffic to be ...
Jeff Anderson, a parent at Wolftrap Elementary School in Fairfax, Va., wanted his daughter to bike to school. Unfortunately, the school had no bike racks. He went to the principal and the school installed bike racks. Anderson then joined other parents, school officials, and community partners to improve one of the school district’s transportation policies. Now parents from all over the community, including those with large Latino populations, have created safe routes for kids to walk and bike to district schools.
EMERGENCE
Awareness: In Spring 2008, Jeff Anderson noticed that there were no bike racks at Wolftrap Elementary School in Vienna, Va., a city with a 12% Latino population. An avid bicyclist, Anderson wanted his then-first-grade daughter to learn biking’s sense of ...
A group of Latina women in the park poor city of Santa Ana, Calif., were desperate to have a safe place for their children to play. One mom, Irma Rivera, saw a child almost get hit by a car while playing in an empty parking lot, and she vowed to do something about the lack of safe active spaces. She and other moms went to non-profit group Latino Health Access (LHA) for support and found that the group was willing to champion the cause. Through teamwork, determination and perseverance, LHA and the moms managed to get land and funding to build the area’s first-ever public park and community center for Latinos in south Santa Ana.
EMERGENCE
Awareness: Latinos in Santa Ana, Calif., struggle with poverty, language and cultural barriers, obesity, and disease—despite being part of Orange ...
Travis Park in San Antonio, TX has gone from "barren to beautiful" according to the Project for Public Spaces. In a recent effort to revitalize the park, the City of San Antonio's Center City Development Office (CCDO) partnered with the Project for Public Spaces (PPS). PPS, a non-profit organization dedicated to building stronger communities by creating safe public spaces, recently launched a national placemaking campaign called Heart of the Community. As part of this initiative, the PPS and San Antonio's CCDO worked together on an action plan to revitalize one of San Antonio's formerly run down parks. They envisioned Travis Park as a place where people could gather to relax, have fun, be active, and socialize. Now with some teamwork and careful planning they've ...
Boosterthon Fun Run has been promoting healthy fundraising across the United States since 2001. This Atlanta based company has worked with over 1000 schools in 22 states to bring healthy, active fun runs to students as a form of fundraising for schools. Their services provide a nine day program including three main components; a pep rally, Team Huddle days, and a Fun Run. These activities give students ways to be active and have fun at the same time, while doing character building and school pride activities. Fundraising occurs at these events when parents, families, and friends pledge money to students, giving them a set amount for each lap they take around a track set up by Boosterthon on the day of the Fun Run. A Mom's Rising Blogger from the Tampa Bay Area, Denise ...
The Hispanic Access Foundation (HAF) and the National Park Service are working to spread the word to Latinos about the natural beauty of the nation's national park system. In a blog from HAF, National Park Service Director Jonathon Jarvis said: “one approach to building a stronger connection with the Latino community, particularly young people, is telling the story of the Latino historical and cultural heritage preserved by the parks.”' In an effort to get more Latinos to national parks, Maite Arce, president of HAF and her family (the Arglebens) embarked on a four stop tour of some of the nation's finest parks. During the tour which took place in July of 2013, the family created a video blog and used social media to speak about national parks in Colorado, Utah, and New ...
Construction is underway for a new 62-acre park in New Braunfels, TX, a 35% Latino city just north of San Antonio.
According to the San Antonio Express News, the new park will provide a much needed resource for locals, especially those living east of Interstate 35 (I-35). Once complete, the park will be the largest in the New Braunfels park system.
Amenities for the park will include: hike and bike trails, fishing ponds, playgrounds, a splash-pad, picnic facilities and an amphitheater.
At an October 2013 groundbreaking ceremony, members of the Fisher family, for who the park is named after, expressed satisfaction with seeing the land where they grew up be used for something positive.
The park is scheduled to open in October 2014.
See the full news article here.
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A demand for walkable communities is on the rise in Texas, the second fastest growing state between 2010-2013, according to a March 2014 article from the Texas Tribune. Recently, investments in pedestrian friendly projects have found their way to some of Texas' largest cities like Dallas, Fort Worth, Houston, San Antonio, Austin, and El Paso. Even suburbs are trying to incorporate mixed-use town centers to get residents outside. As reported in the Tribune article, urban planners like Patrick Kennedy of Dallas, believe that this increased demand for walkability comes partially as a result of the growing millennial population in Texas. Kennedy said: "millennials are very interested in urbanism and walkable communities as well as being active in trying to create ...
