Urban Omnibus has a nice piece on public participation in the design of New York City’s Governors Island. There’s also audio of an interview with Leslie Koch, President of the Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation, which led the planning process.
Most intriguing is the creative (or incredibly simple) way of asking people to write down their thoughts for what they’d like to see in the new park on a 3M product most of use everyday. Says Koch, “We collected 1,500 Post-it Notes. People were really thoughtful, whether they were saying “don’t screw it up” or “I want a place to walk with the person I love” — that was a big part of our public input in 2008.”
Governors Island is a172-acre island in New York Harbor, off the shore of one of the densest cities in the world. An escape to this place can indeed provide a unique experience to New Yorkers. Any city looking to figure out how to design a large new park — a former military base, a large brownfield, a landfill might find some insight from this story.
Post-It Notes Were Compiled into a Weighted Diagram Showing Citizen Requests
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