SANDBOX Site Herbert von King Park History
On Tuesday we posted a sneak video preview into the site we'll be tackling for our first SANDBOX project - Herbert von King Park in Brooklyn, New York. Today we’ll be introducing you to our first site and its unique qualities!
Herbert von King Park in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn
Ever been to Central Park in Manhattan NYC? The iconic and world-class park was designed by Frederick Law Olmstead who is also responsible for other green assets of the city such as Prospect Park and Fort Greene Park. Olmstead is widely heralded as the progenitor of modern parks and the reason we societally put such an emphasis on open public spaces in our cities today.
Lesser known of his work is this little gem in East Brooklyn. Herbert von King Park was originally named Tompkins Park when it was first implemented in 1871 and changed in 1985 to honor a community leader. Its first iteration was an elegant and symmetrical rectangular plan with four corners serving as the diagonal entrances that brought visitors to an inner path.
Life in the late 1880s. Paintings by William Merritt Chase
The park is fairly petite, combining the footprint of two small city blocks. It served as a quaint getaway from Manhattan island.
Today, very little of the original layout remains. The main entrance on the southern side leads to a now unoccupied cultural center with a carved out amphitheater on the western side. A similar rectangular walkway surrounds the central building but paths now go every which way in order to accommodate a baseball mound, dog run, children’s playground, and other smaller subsections.
A vibrant stomping ground but in need of much repair and attention.
Unfortunately the park isn’t maintained all that well. As a lesser publicized New York City park, only one maintenance officer comes through once every few weeks. As a result, the plants are left mostly untended and the popular plots inside the park have been scraped away of any grass. The generic rails around the interior mostly hang off disjointed from one another and current public benches only allow more observational seating rather than anything communal. At the southwest corner, a makeshift dog run accommodates pets in the area but does little to minimize waste and smell.
See Spot Steem
Programmatically the site is lacking as well. Though it is a wonderful spot for community members to spend a nice day in, there are very few activities or program throughout the year. As a new conservancy is developing for the park, local leaders are looking to implement unique schedules to make the park stand out above the rest.
That’s where we come in.
The World’s First Steem-Powered Park
Wouldn’t it be AWESOME to use the engagement of the Steemit community to really transform this park into more of a community asset? That is precisely what we will strive to do in Herbert von King Park.
Video expertise provided by Steemit's community liaison @andrarchy
Our current ambitions are twofold -
1- Channel Steemit’s involvement, ideation, and fundraising to execute a series of ongoing public projects that engage the community and collaboratively develop public assets for the neighborhood.
2- Establish an effective model to fuel public-interest and impact work through blockchain technology.
The preliminary idea we’ve developed is an interactive and generative community garden that will effectively beautify the area in an innovative way as well as offer a string of public workshops, lectures, and hands-on activities.
Over the course of next week, we'll be presenting to you the exact ways you can engage and contribute to the project, our short and longterm goals, and all of the local storytelling along the way!
As always, please upvote, comment, and resteem to show your support for the project! 100% of the raised funds will go towards the park and its project development.
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