Make a Place for People is a component of our Active Places, Healthy People project and is based on the idea that community participation is key to the creation of vibrant and healthy public spaces.
8-80 Cities issued a call for partners in December 2011 to communities across Ontario to nominate currently underperforming public spaces that they would like to see transformed into more people-friendly places.
We were thrilled to have received over 30 applications from communities from all across Ontario.
The 8 sites that were selected to participate are...
Breakwater Park, with partner City of Kingston
Silvercreek Park, with partner City of Guelph
Main St. Pedestrian Mall, with partner Town of Wasaga Beach
Patterson Park, with partner City of Thunder Bay
Dundonald Park, with partner Centretown Community Health Centre, Ottawa
Streetsville Town Square, with partner City of Mississauga
O’Keefe Laneway*, with partner ING Direct, Toronto
Berczy Park*, with partner St. Lawrence Market BIA, Toronto
The Make a Place for People process aims to tap into the imagination of the diverse people who use a public space in order to create a vision and cultivate a culture of community participation in the space. By developing a community-led plan for the sites, our goal is to develop vibrant public spaces that encourage physical activity and promote mental health while contributing to more sustainable and people friendly communities.
The process involves four distinct phases:
- Participatory Planning with the local project partner to identify stakeholders to be engaged in the project.
- Site Assessments of the existing site, including both ‘hardware’ (physical infrastructure) and
‘software’ (uses, activities, and management).
- Community conversations and engagement with diverse stakeholders through workshops,
focus groups, online learning, site tours, and place evaluations/assessments. There will be
a specific focus on youth engagement and engagement of vulnerable groups including older
adults, newcomers, women and low income persons.
- Data collection and analysis to inform the creation of a community vision for the site.
- Reporting and action planning that synthesizes the data collected and assembles it into a
palatable and user-friendly format including eye-catching renderings that reflect the community’s vision of the space.
8-80 Cities has selected two sites (O’Keefe Laneway and Berczy Park) to work with celebrated Danish architecture firm, Gehl Architects.
Working on different continents, 8-80 Cities and Gehl Architects are united by a simple and shared idea about public places –places should be built for people. Rooted in empirical analysis techniques developed by Jan Gehl’s 45+ years of research into how people flourish in public space, Gehl Architects bring a unique global perspective and allows us to blend our two complementary approaches to the project.
Make a Place for People Design Pro follows the same process as Make a Place for People but also includes a site visit by Gehl Architects, and a site specfic version of their Public Space, Public Life Survey.
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