I saw a notice by the entrance to my lovely local park the other day, announcing, slightly ominously, ‘Your park is changing…’ Reading on, I learnt that the car park, children’s play area and some other facilities were relocating. I wanted to know more – but could I find any details Read more…
Imagine a brand new tree-top adventure play area in an urban park, with state of the art climbing features, rope bridges, and super-long ziplines high above the ground. Imagine beneath it a conventional children’s playground – standard swings, slides, a little climbing frame. Up in the trees, children whose parents Read more…
Public space is a fascinating place. I wrote my MSc dissertation on an urban town square and the ways people use it. The space in question was Peckham Square, originally designed as a new civic heart for Peckham, that scruffy, maligned bit of south-east London that I once called home. A lengthy co-design process was Read more…
Phil Jones in his column ‘View from the top’, (Pro Landscaper, August 2015) looked at the threat to parks from ongoing budget cuts to local authorities, offering the startling conclusion that ‘privatisation is the least of our worries’. If that’s so, I can’t imagine what he considers the worst case Read more…