Public Parks

New York City is developing a handful of new parks on industrial lands and otherwise underused spaces. Urban Omnibus talks with Adrian Benepe, the city's commissioner of parks and recreation about the new projects.

A historic airfield in Berlin will be transformed over the next year into the city's largest park.

Outside Magazine ranks the top 10 U.S. cities for people who like to exercise and be outdoors.

Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar has said he wants to bring park programs back into the lives of urban dwellers. This piece argues that a good place for him to start is one of the few urban national parks at St. Louis' Gateway Arch.

Chicago's river has often played second fiddle to its lakefront. A new riverwalk hopes to change that.

Dense Cairo has few sanctioned public spaces. So residents make do wherever they can.

The Sundance Channel has produced a series of short films profiling the landscape architects, officials, activists, writers, and Ethan Hawke and Kevin Bacon about how the High Line park came to be.

This post from Governing looks at the long planning process of the Orange County Great Park, a 1,347 acre public park that's been in the works for 7 years. Comprehensive design plans were recently approved and construction is set to begin.

Researchers in Scotland have concluded that areas without parks and green space have an increased risk of death and illness.

A supreme court judge in British Columbia has ruled that homeless people can legally camp on public property such as parks.

Viviana Franco became a planner so she could reform a park 100 ft. from her childhood home in Hawthorne, CA. But her quest has become mired in local politics as the site was sold in a local auction.

This article from LA Weekly looks at L.A.'s parks deficit and what some are trying to do to address it.

Architect David Rockwell has some new ideas about what makes a good public playground. With movable, buildable foam blocks, his experimental playground in Brooklyn gets kids actively and creatively involved in their play.

Stakeholders in Austin debate the future of a public golf course in the center of town while the University of Texas, owner of the land, debates whether to seek greater profits off the land. Neighbors champion the course as vital open space.

Landscape architecture firm dlandstudio is taking the stench out of the Gowanus Canal by building a new public park that is beautiful as well as functional.

This commentary from the Los Angeles Times calls for creation of a central park for the city, made by putting a "cap" over a section of freeway.

Cairo's first new green space in more than 100 years has opened -- on top of a 500-year old garbage dump.

A former bus and rail yard in park-poor South Los Angeles will be converted into an "urban wetland park".

Short on funding, Toronto's waterfront parks agency is considering a plan to sell the naming rights to the park's amenities, allowing corporate sponsors to add their name to such public features as walkways and play areas.