Today, Explained - The case for reopening parks

Episode Date: May 20, 2020

Reopening America’s parks could help fight the pandemic. It’s a good time to rethink streets, too. Transcript at vox.com/todayexplained Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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I woke up at 7 a.m., got on a bike, and whizzed across Washington, D.C. But I wasn't going into the office. That's still forbidden. I was going to a park. It's still forbidden to fully use a lot of parks in Washington, D.C. Tennis courts, basketball courts, playgrounds are out. But Montrose Park in Georgetown was wide open. So I went there to meet a person. Remember how we used to meet people?

Thaisa Way, and I am director of the Garden and Landscape Studies program at Dunbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. I met Thaisa to talk about reopening parks because parks are kind of her life. It feels like there's this movement right now pushing people to reopen parks. And that's what we're interested in, is why is there this movement and why were these parks shut down to begin with? And was that a mistake? So I'll start by saying I think it was a mistake, although I sympathize and empathize with the reasons.

And the reasons to me have really to do with conflating two different issues. And you'll see quickly why they're easy to conflate. The one is human behavior. How are people behaving in parks? And yes, it is true, not everybody is always adhering to the six feet, not everybody was always adhering to the less than ten people, less than six people, whatever your local. And then there is what do public parks do and how do they function?

And unfortunately, we chose when people weren't always behaving well to close the whole park. And I use that as equivalent to if we looked at streets and we said, oh, there was a driver who didn't obey the rules, we're going to close all the streets. We wouldn't. We would pull that driver aside and if it was bad infraction, we'd give a ticket or we'd socially say that's not okay. So to close parks because some people aren't behaving in the way that we want seems counterproductive. And then I would say it's also a mistake because, in fact, closing the parks does not help people who don't follow the rules, follow the rules. All you're doing is pushing it underground or pushing it away or shaming. You're not actually helping the public to understand why these rules and the CDC guidelines are so incredibly important.

So I'd argue open the parks. If you see too many crowds, then think about how you can expand the space, not how do you close it down. I guess it might seem obvious to some, but why are parks so necessary? Why is it dangerous to push people out of parks? Parks are really a response to public health and what it means to have a healthy city. And you could go back to Hippocrates, you know, way, way ancient history

and talk about the realization that the environment impacts your health having fresh air having sun ventilation all of that really matters we're very fortunate today in the 21st century is in the 19th century we began as cities got very dense and we had paid less and less attention to the health of cities with industrialism, we realized by the middle of the 19th century cities were not healthy places. They were places of pollution and sewage issues, the you know human sewage mixed with your drinking water. Not a good combo, which we know today. And we realized that that led to things like the cholera outbreaks and led to typhoid and led to all sorts of pandemics and epidemics earlier.

So we started to create parks as a way both to make cities healthier on a day-to-day basis, which meant that people could come out and get fresh air and get that ventilation, get that sun that they needed. But we also began to realize that physical exercise of getting out and walking, biking, hula hooping, whatever it is that people did, that they got outside and did that. And it was important in increasingly dense cities. We also began to realize that socially, and Frederick Law Olmsted, one of our earliest landscape architects as a profession, talks about this. It's important to democracy because public parks are the places where lots of people walk and talk and intersect.

I don't know where that woman comes from and what her background is, but I'm going to intersect with her if I cross on a path or if we're both walking our dogs. So public parks are important for physical health, mental health, they're important for democracy. They really make our cities the livable places and the safe and healthy places. So to me, to take the healthy heart out of a sick body seems counterproductive. And yet cities and states across the country did that, right? Yeah, and they did do it. And again, I want to be a little sympathetic.

They did it for two reasons. One is they were faced with how do you police it? So if people aren't behaving properly, what do you do? Are we going to give tickets to people? I'm sorry, you were four and a half feet apart. You know, that's a $10 fine. That seems a little absurd and has all sorts of issues with it, right? We've seen some issues in New York where certain people are being policed more than others, black people.

Exactly. There's also the issue, and this certainly was a problem with the National Park Service and other places the staff how do you protect our staff how do you make sure that the Park Service the people who have to work in parks who are working on the parks building constructing taking care of it are safe was part of the issue that you know that states and cities had never dealt with something like this before well they've dealt with it. 1918 flu is probably our most recent big memory. Many cities were putting in large park systems at that point. They were

actually realizing not only did you need individual parks and neighborhoods, but you needed connected parks, boulevards. You started to see networks of parks go in more and more so that cities were realizing what you needed. Essentially, what I would call the urban landscape web that sustains the city as a whole. And we so often think of cities as the skyscrapers, the skyline, but actually it's the ground on which we walk, right, and how we get between places. So they were looking at things like street trees. They were looking at small parks, big parks, park networks, boulevards. And the idea was social behavior. You had to wear masks.

We've seen, right, a lot of people have reprinted those images of you have to wear masks, you're supposed to stay far apart from each other, you have to clean your hands. They were putting in facilities for people to do that. They were actually putting in things like public bathrooms so that people could wash their hands, which is another piece that I would love to see more parks do. If you look around this park, no place to wash your hands, you know, if you sat at a table and then wanted to go wash your hands. Right now it mostly looks like a place where dogs go to the bathroom. Yes, exactly.

We have to take a little break, but why don't we talk about how cities should reopen their parks after it? Sounds excellent. Support for Today Explained comes from Ramp. Ramp is the corporate card and spend management software designed to help you save time and put money back in your pocket. Ramp says they give finance teams unprecedented control and insight into company spend. With Ramp, you're able to issue cards to every employee with limits and restrictions and automate expense reporting so you can stop wasting time at the end of every month. And now you can get $250 when you join Ramp. You can go to ramp.com slash explained. Ramp.com slash explained.

R-A-M-P dot com slash explained. Cards issued by Sutton Bank. Member FDIC. Terms and conditions apply. We're back here in Montrose Park, which apparently never closed down. Nope. Nope. As parks are reopening, what do you think the biggest barriers are for cities and states? I think the biggest barriers are for parks as they reopen, but even in cities where they haven't closed parks, to really think about how we're going to help the public understand what appropriate behavior is. And I'm going to be honest, I think one of the big challenges right now is the CDC is responding to research.

And so those things are changing. We've seen it, right? Initially, we didn't have to wear masks now they're recommending masks. So the big challenge initially is going to be how to help the public keep up to date and behave properly. Then I think for me it's going to be how to help people learn those guidelines without shaming. I feel very strongly that this is a moment of incredible anxiety and stress and the last thing we need is a lot of fingers wagging. I think the vast majority of us are doing our best. There are a few that aren't and we need to deal with that but I think even those who might not be are often not intentionally doing something to put themselves or other people at risk. So we need to think of generous and, it sounds so cliche, but

sort of loving, nice ways to help people learn and to realize that this is really important for all of us. And then I think the other piece is gonna be how to extend. So I noticed that New York, for example, Minneapolis has done this, Seattle's starting to do this. They're starting to close down the streets around parks to extend the space of the park, but also to make sure that people within walking distance can really walk. And so that you're encouraging people to use parks in their own district, knowing that not everybody has access

to beautiful spots like this, so you need to be able to let people move around. I think the other one which is much more long-term is has access to beautiful spots like this so you need to be able to let people move around. I think the other one which is much more long term is this is going to cause us to rethink I think design of parks. So we're going to have to think about things like how do we make paths that can naturally get a little wider when we need more space. You know how do we think about things like picnic tables that we're standing next to with the attached benches? Maybe tables with separate benches are better

so that we can move things around. I think there are going to be some ways we're going to rethink how to make parks a little more flexible. I want to dig into a few of those a little bit more, starting with just the reopenings. I mean, when you look at a state like California that had a heat wave, a nice weekend, and all of a sudden its beaches were flooded with people who weren't practicing safe social distancing, who were acting like it was just another day at the beach. And then, of course, the governor had to shut down some beaches. And then, of course, you had these massive protests where, again, no one was practicing safe social distancing. I mean, what did you see in that situation that

could have been done better? So first of all, I want to emphasize that some of the photos we've seen of mass groups of people, and they've done some highlights recently of like, depends on the perspective you're taking the photograph from and what kind of lens that can make people look much closer together than they actually are. Again, I think there's some interesting things, like there's some beaches that have opened up that said basically no sitting and resting. New Jersey, I think, the entire Jersey shore. Yep. And I think, you know, initially it was like, really? Like, if you're sitting by yourself, you really, you know, that picture of the cops giving the woman who was sunbathing a ticket. But I also understand what that allows is people moving, keeping their distance, lots of people get access.

You don't fill it up with the first 25 people who can get their social distance and everybody else is left out because people have to move. They're allowing surfing, right, because that's something you can go in and you can move apart. So I think that's part of it is thinking about ways like that to limit, helping people figure it out. I also think it's thinking about other public spaces it's again rather than closing down it's thinking about what are alternatives now let's be honest there's no real alternative to the beach and the ocean and the waves for those of us who really love that um so you know we'll have to think about how how we do that and and work it out and but it shouldn't be an all or nothing. Let's talk a bit about the opportunity here to rethink cities and parks. Is this an opportunity

to really rethink how much space we're dedicating to cars and how much space we're dedicating to pedestrians? And if so, are cities actually going to take that opportunity? So the answer is yes and yes. So yes, it is an absolute moment to rethink. The pandemic is horrible and I don't want to say anything good about it, but if anything good comes out of it, one of them may be that we actually rethink our public realm, which has incrementally been turned over to the cars and trucks. And I think we can really rethink that. Oakland was adding 74 miles of roads that are now for pedestrians, bikes, and other slow forms. You see New York doing 100 miles, Barcelona, Lima, Peru.

You see them all over the world, all of them in response to a decrease in cars. And we should be clear, the decrease in fatalities of pedestrians and bikes are because there aren't as many cars, right? Which is why our insurance, many of us, our car insurance, we got a little 20 cent rebate because, yeah. Congratulations. Because their claims have gone way down. So it is an absolute moment to rethink. And I think it's a very exciting moment to rethink because given climate change, given the inequities of our cities, given the challenge we have ahead, we've all known we need to rethink the city and the public realm in many ways and this kind of brought it right up to the surface

and said here's your chance. You think even with all of the economic strife that cities are going to have to deal with, and states, that they'll manage to prioritize things like public spaces? There's two parts to that question. So economically, are they going to invest in their parks in the way they should and invest in their public realm and make a beautiful pedestrian friendly 20 minute cities all over the place. I think some will. I think you get a mayor in Paris, for example, who is doing a remarkable job leading that city to rethink. Now they've been on a trajectory towards that. Same with

Minneapolis. So I think you'll get some cities that in fact will, but it's gonna be economically a really tough time and I don't think any arena however good it is is going to get the kind of investment at least in the near future so I don't want to sort of sit here and paint it oh yeah money will come pouring into the national parks but I do think the other thing we've learned is that the the things that make cities viable and healthy to live in are what ground the economy if cities are not places where you and I want to live and all of the people around here who work and live here feel healthy and safe to live in, then you can open all the stores you want and it's not going to help if we don't have a community and we don't have a

healthy community. I'm always an optimist but you know... know, six months ago, if you had said to people, Oakland's going to shut down 74 miles of road for pedestrians, you would have been laughed out of the room. There's no way. And here we are today. So it's being done by cities that have leaders who understand what it takes to create a healthy city and what they need to do. And I think that that is becoming more of the norm so yeah I think and I think there'll be also ways they do that that I have no idea and I can't wait to see well I hope you're right it's been it's been a pleasure talking about parks with you Taisa in a historic park yes exactly no no better place thanks so much thank you