This Place Is…

The Hidden Blessing of People’s Park

February 23rd, 2007

“What do you think of People’s Park?”. Most Berkeley residents will feel mildly tolerant of it, but would never advise anyone to visit. The grove of redwoods at the east end and the community gardens at the west shelter dozens of homeless residents and sometimes open drug activity. To most Berkeleyans, it is an area to be avoided. Some official maps still don’t acknowledge its existence. To others, it represents the triumph of the struggle of the “people” versus the Establishment. It is a place where someone can do most anything they want to do. It is a place of beautiful foliage, and for many it is home.

This sovereign piece of U.C. Berkeley property was slated to become a superblock of undergraduate residential dorms, administration buildings, and a parking lot in the 1960’s. But the protest of students, activists, and flower children kept the land tenuously free of such development for 38 years. People’s Park stands today as a stark example of a mild anarchy, free of much police interference, and governed only by loose values of tolerance and personal liberty. This contrasts other public spaces such as shopping malls or even city parks where security guards and police have greater powers to regulate a person’s right of occupation.

Now to be perfectly honest: I don’t like People’s Park. Nor do I think it should even exist. I live one block from the park and I pass it on my way to many places. It feels unsafe. Too much illicit activity is tolerated there. It’s not an appealing place to visit. The park is kept in a scruffy, disorderly, and in a “Berkeley-like” appearance. The park was illegally seized from the University and there is a perfectly good park two blocks south.

The very existence of People’s Park in such near proximity has been a continual, unwelcome reminder to me of our society’s chronic homeless and drug problems. Since I’ve lived here, I have had to deal with the tension of my more than sufficient life juxtaposed with the more meager lives of those down the street. My response has been to ignore this scene.

When at last I took up an opportunity to distribute bagged lunches to homeless residents in People’s Park, my perspective of this place changed completely. I met genuinely nice people, most of a sound mind. I met people who worked hard: collecting cans, tending community gardens. I met people who cared and looked out for others. But unfortunately most of all, I met vulnerable people: people exposed to the elements; exposed to predators and drug pushers; exposed to disease and rot. In most respects, I met people a lot like you and me.

People’s Park is not some abomination, a refuge of strange people, or catastrophic failure of government. People’s Park is a TRANSPARENT place. There are a lot of normal people living in a home without walls. We can see everything that goes on and we don’t like it. First, we don’t like the fact that there are people living such miserable lives in this age of wealth and technology. But second, we don’t like to see the common struggles of society, such as substance abuse, disease, and violence in such plain sight. These things happen to people in all walks of life - in nice neighborhoods as well as bad - and perhaps in more subtle ways. But is it any better to have abuse or violence happen behind the facade of a cozy bungalow? Do we prefer to pretend that the cute porches of a traditional neighborhood represent the harmonious and happy existence of our society?

These are difficult questions to face, and if you have been able to face them without jadedness, I applaud you. Personally, I am content to believe that attractive urban form has its place and represents our aspiration as humans to live in a rich, harmonious existence (i.e. a desire for heaven). Why should we aspire to live or see people live in a dwelling other than one that reflects each person’s own sense of dignity?

However, the redemptive quality of People’s Park is that we see our society for what it is: not without its struggles and flaws. It is better to see the truth, however uneasy to face, than to hide it. If we see our blights in plain sight, and face up to it, we can perhaps tackle a real problem. And if we look a little harder, we can see a whole lot of good things happening in a place where we least expect.

Entry Filed under: Bad Places, Good Places, Underrated Places, Aesthetics, Urban Design