In a recent walk around Toronto’s waterfront I took notice of the many projects happening within the area as part of the cities waterfront revitalization project. The Harbourfront project that was completed in June of 2005 is only one piece of the cities mission to improve the areas, foster economic growth, and create new sustainable communities as well as parks and public spaces.
Though the main goal of the revitalization is geared towards encouraging people to use the space for recreation I began to notice that much of the park and walkways had been built specifically to exclude various forms of activity. The image below is of the Wave Deck found along the Queens Quay sidewalk which has surely grabbed many people’s attention. Although the bridge like structure is attached directly to the sidewalks, the artistic piece quite obviously does not allow for any forms of recreation activity to take place there. The large metal bars prohibit people not only from skateboarding, rollerblading or bike riding but, does not even provide pedestrians an open path to walk on the deck. In addition to the Wave Deck, many concrete slabs located along the Harbourfront demonstrate this same exclusionary feeling to various forms of recreation. The slabs, that have been placed as a form of bench/resting area in the parks, were constructed with various pieces of metal along the edges to prevent skateboarders from using the slabs as rails for grinding and other tricks.
The waterfront area presents an interesting debate on the idea of true public space. Though the city states that the main initiative in their development is to promote open public space, it is quite clear that power relations plays a large role in how this space is actually used.
Waterfront info taken from: http://www.waterfrontoronto.ca/index.php?home=true
Wave Deck picture taken from: http://www.azuremagazine.com/newsviews/index.php?month=1243828801
Though the main goal of the revitalization is geared towards encouraging people to use the space for recreation I began to notice that much of the park and walkways had been built specifically to exclude various forms of activity. The image below is of the Wave Deck found along the Queens Quay sidewalk which has surely grabbed many people’s attention. Although the bridge like structure is attached directly to the sidewalks, the artistic piece quite obviously does not allow for any forms of recreation activity to take place there. The large metal bars prohibit people not only from skateboarding, rollerblading or bike riding but, does not even provide pedestrians an open path to walk on the deck. In addition to the Wave Deck, many concrete slabs located along the Harbourfront demonstrate this same exclusionary feeling to various forms of recreation. The slabs, that have been placed as a form of bench/resting area in the parks, were constructed with various pieces of metal along the edges to prevent skateboarders from using the slabs as rails for grinding and other tricks.
The waterfront area presents an interesting debate on the idea of true public space. Though the city states that the main initiative in their development is to promote open public space, it is quite clear that power relations plays a large role in how this space is actually used.
Waterfront info taken from: http://www.waterfrontoronto.ca/index.php?home=true
Wave Deck picture taken from: http://www.azuremagazine.com/newsviews/index.php?month=1243828801
No comments:
Post a Comment