The Fitness Park

Quick look: The fitness park is a poor substitution for a playground, and an insult to our teenage and adult populations. Reflections on the Fitness Park in NYC.

In 2012 NYC opened its first official ‘adult playground’ and has plans to build two dozen more by the end of 2014 (3). However, calling them playgrounds is a gross exaggeration. That ‘adult playground’ is nothing more than an outdoor gym, with isolated stations and plastic signs telling you what you should be doing and where and how. Pull-ups here, situps there, balance on this one beam and this one beam alone. No problem solving required, no creativity needed, no room for exploration or collaboration… no fun, no freedom. The only two benefits I see is that it is free to use and smells significantly better than a box gym.

Teenagers are faring a little better, but just barely.  There is the development of a playground at Hudson Yards, but its completion is set way out in 2015, and what it ends up offering is yet to be seen.  For those who enjoy skateboarding, there are numerous skateparks open to the public, though it should be noted that their use is contingent upon the signature of a waiver and specific equipment requirements.  But if skating isn’t you’re thing, then you’re as well off as the rest of the adult population.

Thus there is no denying that in the City and Society today, there is a unacceptable and near complete lack of designed and designated opportunity for teenagers and adults to engage in free, unstructured, creative play.

When you go to a park, your free options are to walk, on this path or that one, or to sit on a bench, in the shade or the sun,  or to people watch. You can also roll around in the grass (some of the time).  Pull out your wallet, and there are tons of bike paths if you’re able to afford a bike, or you could throw a ball in the field, assuming you have the equipment, so long as you don’t disturb your neighbors.  If you wanted to organize a game of soccer or tennis, you have to compete with the hundreds of others looking to use that space, or possibly even purchase a permit.

And, well, with those as your best options, it should be no surprise to hear that in NYC more than 1/2 the adult population is either overweight or obese(4)(5).  One could easily link obesity to the fact that the opportunities that are available to get moving are too expensive, difficult, competitive, or, to put it plainly, not a whole lot of fun.  

Fitness & play needs to be more than gym workouts, expensive specialty classes, long walks in the park, and competitive team sports. And, even if there WERE opportunities for play that met this criteria, there would additionally need to be guidance and support, as we as a society and population have been conditioned into systems thinking and to be fearful of 'play'.

To put the long story short–we don’t need more gyms and classes in our city; we need more playful, adult infrastructure.  We need infrastructure that is complex, inter-generational, and flexible, that both guides and allows for adults & teenagers to develop and explore their own open-ended challenges.  We need a place that is safe, welcoming, accessible, and fun. …And We need to stop looking at play as a distraction or diversion from reality, but rather as an integral element of our continual, healthful development.

3 “New York Introduces Its First Adult Playground.” New York Times. Winnie Hu. Web. 20 Mar 2014. http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/01/nyregion/new-york-introduces-its-first-adult-playground.html?pagewanted=all

4 “Obesity.” New York City Department of Health. Web. 20 Mar 2014. http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/html/living/obesity.shtml

5 “BRFSS Brief: Overweight and Obesity, NYS Adults 2011.” New York State Department of Health. Web. 20 Mar 2014. http://www.health.ny.gov/statistics/brfss/reports/docs/1304_overweight_and_obesity.pdf

Park Hill Estate by Lynn and Smith

Park Hill estate, Sheffield, 1963. Part of the Park Hill estate, designed by Jack Lynn and Ivor Smith, who were tutored by the Smithsons – the founders of new brutalism. The estate was famous for its experimental ideas, like walkways in the sky, and that approach was reflected in the playground. Photograph: Arch Press Archive/RIBA.

Park Hill, Sheffield - 1963. Image © Arch Press Archive RIBA Library Photographs Collection

Word Vault

Urbanism, Public Space, Programming

Rarely does a resident of any of the world’s greatest metropolitan areas pause to consider the complexity of urban life or the myriad systems that operate round the clock to support it. He or she wakes up in the morning to turn on a tap, switch on a light, flush a toilet or perhaps grab a banana—little knowing how much effort, on the part of how many people, goes in to making the simplest morning routine possible. …. Even the most mundane domestic tasks would be impossible without the far-reaching complex, and often invisible network of infrastructure that supports them.
—     Kate Ascher

It is in cities where it is still possible for public space to work as a place of meeting and contact, indispensable for mutual recognition, which is the basis for any form of truly possible coexistance.
—     In favor of public space

How can we imagine a public discussion in the contempoary dispersed city? Can we address its inhabitants as citizens? Are they party to the same debate? Is there a common media landscape and correlative public field? Is there a publicly shared understanding of what is good, of what is in the public interest? What determines the moral order of the in-between-city? Where are its public spaces? Where can one appear in public: in half-empty churches? On the old village square? In the public swimming pool? In the supermarket?
—     Michiel Dehaene

Within the context of the modern metropolis, we have already witnessed the loosening of the relationship between public space and the public sphere.
—     Michiel Dehaene

…constructing the public dimension of systematic insight into interrelated, interdependent, and co-evolving conditions.
—     Michiel Dehaene

Whatever space and time mean, place and occasion mean more.
- Aldo van Eyck

Playgrounds & Play

Art & Architecture Misc

I prefer drawing to talking. Drawing is faster, and leaves less room for lies.
— Le Corbusier

General

It concerns us to know the purposes we seek in life, for then, like archers aiming at a definite mark, we shall be more likely to attain what we want.
—     Aristotle

Zen comes closer to science than any other religion for the simple reason that it does not require any faith. It requires of you only an intense inquiry into yourself, a deepening of consciousness, not concentration – a settling, a relaxing of consciousness, so that you can find your own source. That very source is the source of the whole existence.
—     Osho

Anyone who is in love is making love the whole time, even when they’re not. When two bodies meet, it is just the cup overflowing. They can stay together for hours, even days. They begin the dance one day and finish it the next, or—such is the pleasure they experience—they may never finish it. No eleven minutes for them.
—     Paulo Coelho (via mindofataurus)

On the whole human beings want to be good, but not too good, and not quite all the time.
—     George Orwell

Gods die. And when they truly die they are unmourned and unremembered. Ideas are more difficult to kill than people, but they can be killed, in the end.
— from American Gods by Neil Gaiman