Can we be friends with the public space?
Once or twice a week Jon and I play basketball in the morning at park close to home. It's a good way to jump start our sleepy brains. We often meet daycare teachers and the babies they care for in the playground beside the basketball court.
This morning they got me thinking. Our relationship to the urban public space is shaped by habits we acquire very early. Right from an early age, the kids in my neighbourhood learn that it is OK to go to the park to play. The teachers take their groups of toddlers there. In fact, they usually walk there, sometimes carrying the kids on a cart, other times, the kids walk holding a line so they don't go astray. They never drive!
No way this would happen in São Paulo. When I was a kid, I played in the playgrounds in the daycare yard, surrounded by tall fences with spears on top. My teachers never took the students outside the premises. Trips only started to happen when I was older, in primary school, and they usually required the parents to sign a consent form a long time in advance. They booked buses to take us to school trips. Nobody ever thought of using public transport.
Parks in São Paulo are to be feared! Walking is an undesirable, uncool activity. Riding a bike is equivalent to suicide. I recently saw a post on Facebook warning people about how dangerous Parque Villa Lobos is. "Never let your kids go there to ride their bikes", warned the parent of a teenager that got mugged during a "arrastão".
The park belongs to bike thieves, not to the kids who go there to ride or play. And the security guards are there to protect the public property, they can do nothing to protect the human beings who use the park. The parks in São Paulo have fences around them, and closing times. Don't ever thinking of hanging out at a public park after sundown; you'd be putting yourself in real danger.
This sort of advice is given with the best intentions, but in fact I am starting to realize that it contributes to the status quo. If I don't feel like the park is for me to use, I will not want use it. If I don't learn that I should be able to have fun at the park, I will not feel like I am entitled to that space. Doesn't it follow that, if there are fewer people using the park for healthy fun activities, then the park is going to be taken over by people doing shady business, like stealing bikes?
This morning they got me thinking. Our relationship to the urban public space is shaped by habits we acquire very early. Right from an early age, the kids in my neighbourhood learn that it is OK to go to the park to play. The teachers take their groups of toddlers there. In fact, they usually walk there, sometimes carrying the kids on a cart, other times, the kids walk holding a line so they don't go astray. They never drive!
No way this would happen in São Paulo. When I was a kid, I played in the playgrounds in the daycare yard, surrounded by tall fences with spears on top. My teachers never took the students outside the premises. Trips only started to happen when I was older, in primary school, and they usually required the parents to sign a consent form a long time in advance. They booked buses to take us to school trips. Nobody ever thought of using public transport.
Parks in São Paulo are to be feared! Walking is an undesirable, uncool activity. Riding a bike is equivalent to suicide. I recently saw a post on Facebook warning people about how dangerous Parque Villa Lobos is. "Never let your kids go there to ride their bikes", warned the parent of a teenager that got mugged during a "arrastão".
The park belongs to bike thieves, not to the kids who go there to ride or play. And the security guards are there to protect the public property, they can do nothing to protect the human beings who use the park. The parks in São Paulo have fences around them, and closing times. Don't ever thinking of hanging out at a public park after sundown; you'd be putting yourself in real danger.
This sort of advice is given with the best intentions, but in fact I am starting to realize that it contributes to the status quo. If I don't feel like the park is for me to use, I will not want use it. If I don't learn that I should be able to have fun at the park, I will not feel like I am entitled to that space. Doesn't it follow that, if there are fewer people using the park for healthy fun activities, then the park is going to be taken over by people doing shady business, like stealing bikes?
