Gathering Neighbors’ Dreams for a Shabby Playground

By CARA BUCKLEY, The New York Times
Published: October 27, 2006

If 11-year-old Shuwen Li had her say, which she does, her local playground would be radically different from its current sorry state. It would have swings. It would not smell like urine. Its ground would not be patchy and uneven, nor would it trip up children, twisting ankles and bloodying knees.

Perched on peeling playground equipment, students from Middle School 131 collaborated on ways to improve the public space.

Indeed, the Hester Street playground in Sara D. Roosevelt Park, a long, skinny park running through Chinatown, has known better decades. It was built in 1987 with TimberForm, a type of wood once popular in playground making, but which splinters over time. Over the years, as other pockets of the park were overhauled, the Hester Street playground succumbed to the perils of aging, cracking and chipping until it was finally deemed obsolete.

But now the Hester Street playground is about to undergo a major overhaul, using $4.75 million allocated by the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation. Nearby ball courts will be renovated as part of the project, too. And just about all those who use the park — schoolchildren, longtime residents, new immigrants unused to making their voices heard — have been urged to weigh in on what they envision for the space.

To continue reading the full article text, visit: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/27/nyregion/27park.html?ex=1162875600&en=3a702e88bbba3846&ei=5070

The Hester Street Collaborative is a 2005 Grants for Art in Public
Spaces grantee and a 2006 Promotion Grant recipient.