What is PARK(ing) Day?

Casey Trees will be participating (for the second year in a row) in the PARK(ing) Day event that originated out west!

To give you a little insight into our interest in the event, we wanted to answer a few of the questions we knew you were sure to have about it – so today, and over the next two days, we’ll be presenting you with a series of blog posts designed to give you some background — not only into PARK(ing) Day itself, but about our big, BIG plans for this year’s event!

As defined by the PARK(ing) Day website, it is an “annual open-source global event where citizens, artists and activists collaborate to temporarily transform metered parking spaces into ‘PARK(ing)’ spaces: temporary public places.” More simply, the idea started in San Francisco when an art and design studio called Rebar converted a single metered parking space into a temporary public park.  They used a single roll of sod, a park bench, and a tree to transform the spot for two hours into a spot to relax, and read the paper. When a single photo spread across the internet and calls came for Rebar to replicate their innovation, they decided instead to develop a “how-to manual to empower people to create their own parks without the active participation of Rebar.”

This first park took place in 2005 – since then, the installments have taken on a variety of sizes and purposes: different inspirations have created “free health clinics, planted temporary urban farms, produced ecology demonstrations, held political seminars, built art installations, opened free bike repair shops and even held a wedding ceremony!”

Though the event receives global participation, the District has yet to fully embrace the movement. Rich Layman from Rebuilding Place in the Urban Space has detailed the few local attempts to create PARK(ing) Day spaces, which are mostly in Baltimore. That being said, Casey Trees has a beautiful space planned out for this year’s PARK(ing) Day, this coming Friday, September 21st, between 8 am and 6 pm at the corner of 12th & G Streets NW (located near the Metro Center and Macy’s). Be sure to check back with us tomorrow for more information on what the PARK(ing) Day movement speaks to, and why public green space is so important.

Photo credit: Casey Trees.

Comments are closed.