Is the lack of recreational space making us fatter? Probably. (Among other things)

Americans are getting fatter every day. I’m sure there’s a statistic out there pointing to how every x number of minutes, a person somewhere out in America is determined to be obese. Despite the fact that the City and County of Los Angeles are vast, there is a serious lack of parks to ensure that people have spaces to create community, stay active, and most importantly, stay healthy. Obviously, the problem of obesity in the United States, and especially in communities of color, will not be resolved by simply creating more spaces for recreation, as access to fresh, affordable food is also a key factor, but it would sure help if people in Los Angeles, and other urban cities throughout the country had places to run, walk and play.

In the meantime, as there is less and less available land in Los Angeles for parks, people that are able to get have easy access to open space (and can stay healthier) are those with large yards (keep in mind  that about 60% of City of LA residents are renters), can afford a gym membership of some sort, or are fortunate enough to live near open space (there’s very few of us).

As a kid growing up in South Los Angeles, it was much easier for me to get to Popeye’s and McDonald’s than to Rancho Cienega Park, which was about 4 long blocks from my house, but I had to walk across the train tracks (where the Exposition Line will soon run) and walk Exposition Blvd, where you found a wide assortment of furniture and trash dumped before you got to the park. Keep in mind, the 1990s were a tough time in South LA (i.e. 92′ Civil Unrest and and subsequent years of blight).

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London is one of my favorite cities, for its architecture, art, culture, history, diversity, grit, humour…and I am entirely in love with how all of these come together in its public spaces. I was thinking about the place I love most, an impossible question really, and realized that for me, public space isn’t quite a distinct category of plaza or building or park, but involves the flows along the street connecting them together and making them both accessible to, and used by, a wide variety of people in different ways. To me the city as a network of transportation, walkable streets, plazas, parks, and the unfolding of vistas forms the perfect public space. So I decided to give just taste of how this works in London.

I started at Embankment Gardens. I love parks that are also gardens, combining beauty with grassy spaces to sit and lie in the sun. Even on a day of light rain and sunshine like yesterday, these are full of gorgeous flowers and people: families, groups of friends, elderly couples, young lovers. And the city has recently set up a number of ping pong tables, which were in great demand and produced immense joy and laughter.

Only a minute away you find Embankment Station, across the Thames is Southbank, the Tate Gallery, the London Eye, I could have gone there but they are too shiny and new for me, I like old things. So I turned right and headed up the hill along a narrow street full of people. You pass small lunch places with a wide variety of food and businesses on top, and an array of pubs. They’re a bit dodgy here really, but there are some really nice ones in the area. I could write a whole other blog on the joys of pubs, but we’re about to arrive at the main attraction. You pass alongside St. Martin-in-the-Fields, a beautiful church with some of the most amazing classical concerts you can find, at the top of broad steps that you can always sit on to rest and enjoy the view. Because across the road you come up to the National Gallery

An amazing art gallery. Like most of London’s museums it is free to the public, which allows you to wander in for an hour and wander out again, gradually working your way through the wonders of the world without getting gallery overload. There are plenty of places to sit, eat, and chat outside. And if you turn left you see the square proper

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I spent a good portion of my childhood and college years in Paris and during that time, I spent many a day with my friends in parks and public spaces loitering, people watching, chatting, protesting… the top four favorite occupations of Parisians.

In Paris, public space abounds and is used for casual meet-ups, art happenings and street performances, for protests, playtime or for strolling with a loved one. The French love to occupy these places.

Public spaces are the perfect spots to eat a quick bite at lunchtime, to catch up with old friends and perhaps above all, to practice the favorite Parisian pass-time of voir et être vu, “seeing and being seen.”  It has always been my way to meet up with friends or family in a park, along a canal or on a square any place other than in a café, restaurant, orany other place where you have to consume (Paris is expensive and a lot of us are strapped for cash).

Public spaces are convenient half-way points and meeting spots that open up time and possibilities — the possibility of observing others and participating in street/city-life, the possibility of bumping into other people we know, or of hanging around longer than one would want to in a bar or a restaurant where your time is more or less contingent upon how much you consume. Public spaces open up the movement and size of a group, a flow of friends and acquaintances coming in at some points and leaving at others, and maybe returning later on. Public spaces exist solely for the purpose of being enjoyed and occupied by people…and that’s exactly what Parisians do. Public spaces are fully integrated elements of everyday city-life. And this is why, when I think of Paris, I think of lazing and people watching, of casual football passes, of being free to simply hang out.

This week’s assignment to pick my favorite public spaces was a tough call. I thought of my favorite lounging parks, such as the park in the center of the beautiful Place des Vosges where Victor Hugo once lived.

Place des Vosges

I thought of the Pont des Arts, a pedestrian bridge that links the banks of the Seine where I like to picnic with my buddies.  Its a hangout for young folks and sometimes a brass band shows up at night.

Pont des Arts

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I believe as I’ve mentioned previously, I’m not that into public spaces, though I have nothing against them personally.  But there is one such public space I dig, and at least sporadically, have enjoyed over time; the Grand Performances series which have taken place for some 24 years.  This has been a publicly and privately funded nonprofit enterprise bringing music and other arts for free to the downtown L.A. venue of the Water Court at the California Plaza.

Ordinarily the plaza is an open air dining and coffee drinking space set on a tier, that is you can park underneath or walk up to its plateau fronting an elevated Grand Avenue from lower Olive Street on its eastern side, where the plaza is set among massive office towers and the Omni Hotel.  Across Olive is the apex of Angel’s Flight, a funicular rail that goes up and down a short run of Bunker Hill.  Angel’s Flight (having re-opened recently after being shut down for a decade in the wake of a fatal accident) has been seen in noir films such as the lurid ‘50s masterpiece Kiss Me Deadly with Ralph Meeker as the best Mike Hammer ever, to the recent Our Family’s Wedding, a comedy about the misadventures of an African-American groom and his Mexican-American bride and their respective soon to be in-laws.

Back to Grand Performances.  Over the years a broad range of sound and visuals have been on tap at this space from the retro lounge/world beat band Pink Martini, the Guangdong Modern Dance Company, the Watts Prophets, the spoken word progenitors who came out o the Watts riots of ’65, the music of Battlestar Galactica (and this is not the time to delineate the current incarnation of Battlestar and its Caprica offspring on cable, but suffice it to say this sci-fi epic ain’t your daddy’s ‘80s Battlestar helmed by Bonanza’s Lorne Greene on network TV), the Dakah Hip Hop Orchestra, to the silent film, La Passion de Jeanne D’Arc with a live score accompanying it featuring strings and a choir.

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This week I read in the paper that the Los Angeles City Council was awarding $18 million to finish a project that has been a redevelopment site in my neighborhood for years. The goal? To build a Costco. Then to build a Costco with a Home Depot on top. Then when both of those pulled out, to build a Lowe’s home improvement store, which is a lot like a Home Depot.

And that same week I received an email from the Los Angeles Public Library (News You Can Use) with their new schedule consisting of shorter hours and no longer being open on Sundays and Mondays.

Libraries in my mind, are the last of the great public sector products. They are safe spaces for children, for homeless, for women, for families, and for the curious of all stripes — not to mention they are full of books. And they are free. You can stay there as long as you like. All day if you want. They are peaceful.

And as the public sector has crumbled around them, many libraries have stepped up to fill the gap. Last year I read a headline that was something like “Head Librarian Bans Shushing,” for an article about Chicago, I believe, where the head librarian acknowledged their last-public-sector-standing-role and explained “We are the last community centers. People need to talk. We can’t tell them to be quiet any more.”

Although I don’t generally follow architecture awards, which tend to favor the male divas of that profession, I am excited to see that this year’s European Prize for Urban Public Space, is shared, with one of the two winners being the inventive Open Air Library in Magdeburg, Germany that was created by the residents themselves, built out of the debris of a demolished building, and is open 24/7 for people to enjoy the space and borrow books.

The partner winner is an Opera/Ballet house in Oslo, Norway that includes a ramp up to the roof which serves as a public plaza.

It is still not too late.  Maybe our neighborhood Lowe’s can support a public plaza on its roof (instead of parking) or a public library at its base.  Or something else that engages the idea of a public in exchange for our hard-pressed public investment.  Something of value besides shopping.