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This is an email that was sent to us by Nancy Mathison who was one of the coordinators for National Park(ing) Day.
It’s 5am and completely quite in downtown Sacramento except for the sound of sod being rolled out. While volunteers are biking in sod, carrying over trees and umbrellas, and making last minute print-outs for the day, Jason looks into the glaring lights from the Good Day Sacramento crew as he welcomes hundreds (if not thousands) of Sacramenteans to come out to play in the park!
At around 7:30am, a 10 or 12-year-old boy waiting at his bus stop to go to school runs over to the newly rolled out park to see what’s going on. Jason asks him what he thinks would make Sacramento a better place to live. His response: “One of these parks in every parking spot in the city.”
Throughout the morning, people stop by to read the paper, enjoy their coffee, or wait for their carpool.
At lunch-time, the park is beyond full capacity, as people crowd in the park to eat their lunch and enjoy the reprieve from business as usual. People chat, mingle, and make new friends. Two complete strangers even strike up a game of chess… our plan has worked! By now, the bulletin board clamors with responses to “what would make Sacramento a better place to live.”
Around 3:00pm the musician comes to set the tone for wrapping up the day. People lounge around, enjoy the mellow music, and play with Dante (a co-workers dog) as the day comes to an end.
When six o’clock rolls around and the park begins to disappear, Eric is literally almost in tears, and I start getting pretty cranky too! As we walk away from the space, we reminisce about the day’s events and come up with creative ideas for next year. None of us will ever be able to look at the 22×4 1/2 foot space at 14th and J quite the same way again.
In case you didn’t know, the city gave us an encroachment permit for the day, and were very supportive of the event. We could not have asked for a more positive experience!
Go to Good Day Sacramento to see a short video. Type in “Activists” in the video search box.
LJ Urban
7 responses so far ↓
1 Ben // Sep 26, 2007 at 1:22 am
I have not been following this national park day to closely but thought it was in may ways a bad idea. It seems as though energy would have been better spent focusing on bringing life to “parks” that have, for one reason or another, been forgotten. An action, not activism is what turns people on to a cause. Not just any action, but actions that have been thought-out and understand what the outcomes might be. Someone taking up a parking place my leave a bad taste in many people’s mouths. Picking up trash, or repairing an old swing might go a lot further. I would hope that a company focusing on making a community better would understand that.
Closing thought. I hope that all of that sod was not put in a land fill. I would think that would be counter productive. Think….not dream.
2 Levi // Sep 26, 2007 at 2:13 am
Ben,
Much discussion has gone into this topic around here. Your point is well taken. The parking day concept is way out there. If you watched the news video linked above you will see that their take was that we were a bunch of hippies trying to make a point.
I think the real point has been getting lost in the mix, its not so much that we need more parks because Sacramento actually has many great parks, and compared to many other cities is doing quite well in that regard. The bigger picture we are promoting is getting people to think about the space we take up parking cars. There are literally acres and acres of land dedicated to parking in downtown Sacramento.
When we choose to go out and “do something” we are going to push some buttons, get some people angry, We just hope to get even more people thinking, or even better doing something. Parking day was not a protest, it was not done to make our city leaders act, it was there to help people think. To get more of us out of cars and on to our bikes or into the public transportation system.
I know that I myself have a long way to go in the area of leaving my car at home. I only live 2 miles from work and much more often take my car.
In hindsight I think many people thought just as you do that we were staging a protest on the state of the parks in our city. And we need to think of that when we choose to head out and do these things. The real message is much simpler and even though we might at times get off a bit I am glad to have participated and to be able to explain to the people who walked by and asked us what this was all about that we want this city to be a better place and want everyone to be involved.
This is what I love so much about having a blog. We get real time feedback on the things we are doing.
Thank you, and keep it coming!
3 MOBS // Sep 26, 2007 at 6:23 pm
Well that just sucks. I just wrote up a big thing about the problems with reliability, cost and short operating hours of Sac RT and why there is more to it than just getting people to “think about” using public transportation here in Sacramento, went to post it and got this:
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I even included price comparisons with a select group of other metropolitan areas (including Austin’s .50 fare and $10 monthly pass), and stories of how short bus route hours affect ability to use RT, as well as the fact that they are making even more cuts to lines in January.
But it’s all gone…
To get people to ride, Sac RT has to be less costly and provide better, more dependable and later service all around. Other cities can manage it, but not Sacramento. Not sure (truly) how much you folks try to use RT or to what extent, but it can be fairly unusuable depending on where you are, where you are trying to go, and when you are trying to do it.
OK, let’s see if THIS post makes it. If not, I give up.
4 Central City // Sep 26, 2007 at 9:09 pm
Im not sure I liked the reporter , rather condescending I thought . . . Just me ?
Good work otherwise guys !
5 Charlie // Sep 28, 2007 at 4:42 pm
Our apologies to everyone who has encountered the “Whoops, comments not saved…” error report when attempting to post a comment. We love hearing from all of you so we are doing our best to resolve this problem as fast as we can. We are currently in the process of changing our blog software so appreciate your understanding.
Charlie
6 Steve // Sep 29, 2007 at 11:28 am
Jason,
Nice work in deflecting the snide and smug remarks of a reporter looking at a great story through a very jaded lens! Class act on your part.
I like his remark that you’re taking “his parking spot”!! It sure would be a shame if more people let go of 1/10 of their feelings of entitlement for the betterment of our communities.
Peace,
Steve
7 Shane // Oct 12, 2007 at 9:50 pm
I can’t stop laughing at that newscast. Just thought I’d do it out loud. You know, to share some of the medicine!! Keep on guys.
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