Public Space

Scenes From an Airport Restaurant

Randall Amster | Posted 05.07.2012

Read More: Sharing, Public Space, Privatization, Airports, Community, Travel, Commons, Technology, Private Space, Public Open Space, Mindfulness, A Public Space, Presence, Unplug and Recharge, Healthy Living News
Randall Amster

The convivial ethics of the picnic table, park bench, bus stop kiosk, and similar exemplars don't exist very much inside the spaces of consumption and conveyance that increasingly dominate our daily lives.

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Turning Off the Lights: Democracy in the Dark

Benjamin R. Barber | Posted 03.11.2012

Read More: Government, Entitlements, Public Space, Democracy, New Hampshire Primary, Austerity, Politics News
Benjamin R. Barber

There is no more dismal metaphor for America's abandonment of the public sphere than the decision by Highland Park, Michigan to rip up a swath of its street lights in the name of public parsimony.

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People Places: What If We Used Parking Spaces for Something Else?

Jennifer Gennari | Posted 11.14.2011

Read More: Public Space, Parking Spaces, Parking Day, Video, San Francisco News
Jennifer Gennari

Instead of endless pavement for cars, our limited land could be used for something else. Imagine! Public art, benches and trees, café tables. Places people want to go.

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Will Open-Air Reading Room Transform Public Space?

Posted 11.09.2011

Read More: Public Space, Books, Uni Project, Sam Davol, The Uni Project, Teaching, Reading, Cities, New York, Mit, Open-Air Reading Room, The Impact of 9/12, Books News

In July this year, a curious project appeared on the website Kickstarter, asking for donations. The Uni Project was described as "a portable, open-air...

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Lessons From Brooklyn for the LADOT

Joel Epstein | Posted 10.25.2011

Read More: Jaime De La Vega, Complete Streets, Michael Bloomberg, Nycdot, Brooklyn, West LA, Bundy Triangle Park, Los Angeles, Frederick Law Olmsted, Prospect Park, Eastern Parkway, Grand Army Plaza, Ladot, Public Space, Calvert Vaux, Bill Rosendahl, Iris Weinshall, Marty Markowitz, Bike Lanes, New York News
Joel Epstein

New York under Bloomberg and his DOT is remaking itself into a city known for its parks, open space and complete streets philosophy that recognizes the role the roads play for drivers, buses, pedestrians and bikers.

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WATCH: Surreal Sculpture On A Farm

VernissageTV | Posted 10.14.2011

Read More: Pablo Bronstein, Public Space, Public Art, Switzerland, Museums, Farm, Sculpture, Monument, Contemporary Art, Psychedelic, Drugs, Performance Art, Zurich, Countryside, UK Arts, Video, Arts News
VernissageTV

The Garden of Forking Paths is the title of an outdoor sculpture project, which the Migros Museum für Gegenwartskunst is staging on the Blum family e...

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Field of Change

Reverend Billy | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: East New York, Walmart, Nyc, Consumerism, Public Space, Social Movements, Brownsville, Social Change, Protests, Impact News
Reverend Billy

We are lucky to have change come looking for us lately. Tunis and Cairo and Yemen, and the brave public space crowdings in that part of the world, and Wisconsin too... We've been shown what it takes.

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Exhale Pavilion At Art Basel Miami: Interview With Phu Hoang And Rachely Rotem

Jacob Slevin | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Design, Architecture, Public Space, Art Basel Miami Beach, Arts News
Jacob Slevin

Rendering courtesy of Phu Hoang Office and Rachely Rotem Studio. For perhaps the perfect synergy between familiar Arts content and what one might ...

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Gardening for Strangers in Tokyo

Jared Braiterman | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Neighbor, Public Space, Seasons, Crowded, Nature, Environment, Community, City, Livable Streets, Gardening, Tokyo, Culture, Green News
Jared Braiterman

Spending several weeks in Tokyo on a business trip in 2008, I was startled and enchanted to discover its human scale and its streets alive with people and plants.

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On the Waterfront: A New Park Rises in Brooklyn

Joel Epstein | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Bike Paths, LA Times, Mayor Bloomberg, Subway, Brooklyn, 30/10, Subway to the Sea, Janette Sadik-Khan, Nimby, Metro, New York, Times Square, Public Space, Gowanus, NYC DOT, The High Line, Red Hook, Central Park, Frederick Law Olmsted, Los Angeles, President Obama, Infrastructure, Economic Stimulus Package, Los Angeles News
Joel Epstein

There's so much new public space in NY that even a tourist magnet as big as the City can afford to let the public know about some of its new gems.

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Aesthetics and Happiness: How Space Affects Well-Being

Dylan Kendall | Posted 11.17.2011

Read More: Public Space Design, Public Space, Beautiful Space, The Inner Life, Aesthetic Space, Public Spaces, Healthy Living News
Dylan Kendall

If we know that space influences how we feel then why don't we make more effort to create "beauty" in places where feeling inspired is key to community?

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Running in Great Cities

Reverend Billy | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Public Space, Consumerism, Celebrity, Shopping, Advertising, Amsterdam, Green News
Reverend Billy

Today I jogged through Amsterdam from the Royal Palace on Dam Square to the mouth of the river. Like many European city centers, Amsterdam has evolved...

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Taking a Stand to Keep Sitting Legal

Randall Amster | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Public Space, First Amendment, Gavin Newsom, Criminalization, Homelessness, Free Speech, Youth Homelessness, Homeless, Criminal Justice, Sitting, Helping the Homeless, Sidewalks, San Francisco, Compassion, Politics News
Randall Amster

San Francisco is poised to become the latest in a string of cities to adopt a law making it a crime to sit on the sidewalk. While it is the case that ...

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A New Route to a Better LA

Joel Epstein | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Kpcc, Occidental College, President Obama, Blue Line, Los Angeles, Orange-Line, New York, Eric Garcetti, Bike Culture, Times Square, Public Space, La Marathon, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, Metro, Expo Line, Ciclavia, 30/10 Plan, Health Care, Janette Sadik-Khan, Los Angeles News
Joel Epstein

Lately it does seem as though LA has turned a corner in the quest to leave behind its car-obsessed past.

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Avatar and the Commons

Reverend Billy | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Public Space, The Commons, Reverend Billy, Avatar, War, Entertainment News
Reverend Billy

John Wayne's shoot-em-ups helped the American public learn to handle imperial war. Avatar is an inverted western.

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How the Right and the Left Destroyed the Public Option

Frank Schaeffer | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Left, Health Care Reform, Right, Public Space, Puritans, Public Option, Politics News
Frank Schaeffer

The United States of America is one of the only places on earth where all sense of a public space, let alone public duty, is off the table as a matter of faith. Privacy, ownership and profit are what we are about.

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The Singing Manifesto (Dedicated to Joan Baez)

Reverend Billy | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Public Space, Nyc, Revbilly, Michael Bloomberg, New York City Mayor, Joan Baez, New York City Mayor Race, New York News
Reverend Billy

The corporations and their politicians are watching where we put our bodies and how we raise our voices. They come running with renta-cops at the slightest suggestion of freedom.

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Village Green: Security Measures Are Degrading the Urban, Architectural (and Human) Experience

F. Kaid Benfield | Posted 05.25.2011

Read More: Architecture, Public Space, Urban Planning, Homeland Security, Cities, National Security, Politics News
F. Kaid Benfield

One of the ways in which city life isn't what it used to be is that so much of what used to be public is no longer public. As a result, some of our humanity is lost, to say nothing of efficient travel.

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Freedom and Broadway

Reverend Billy | Posted 11.17.2011

Read More: 1st Amendment, Public Space, New York City, Free Speech, Healthy Living News
Reverend Billy

Our neighborhoods are healthy, better for children and for families, when citizens are not afraid of tickets and fines, of stops and intimidation.

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The Case of the Compassionate City

Reverend Billy | Posted 11.17.2011

Read More: First Amendment, Consumerism, Public Space, Compassion, Healthy Living News
Reverend Billy

If the bull-horn is seized, the old diner is bulldozed. But if the bull-horn has its free speech, the diner stays. Compassion needs the voices. We solved the crime.

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