THE FUTURE OF URBAN PARKS IN PROVIDENCE: STUDENT RESEARCH AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR DOWNTOWN DEVELOPMENT

A report by students in ANTH 1236: Anthropology in and of the City (Urban Anthropology) Brown University, Fall 2015

Submitted on February 8, 2016 to Cliff Wood, Executive Director, Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy

Participating Students: Gray Brakke, Audrey Chisholm, Zola Doyle, Laura Durand, Greg Garcia, Tim Ittner, Alina Joharjian, Julie Kwon, Nadia Larasati, Cameron Osborn, Paige Parsons, Alexis Rodriguez-Camacho, Sean Scott, Monika Sobieszek, Khanittha Wang, Kayla Weststeyn, Jessica Zambrano

Instructor: Rebecca Louise Carter, Ph.D., Assistant Professor of Anthropology and Urban Studies

Teaching Assistant: Clayton Kindred

Special Acknowledgements and Thanks: Cliff Wood, Executive Director, The Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy Department of Anthropology, Brown University Urban Studies Program, Brown University The Swearer Center for Public Service, Brown University

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION 1

SECTION I - BACKGROUND Relevant History and Context 2 The State of the City 5 The I-195 Recovered Land: History and Development 7 Research Questions and Methods 9 Field Sites 11

SECTION II – RESEARCH FINDINGS Summary of Findings 12 Recreation 14 Aesthetics 15 Place Attachment and Memory 16 The Perception of Downtown 17 On Being Homeless in Kennedy Plaza 18 Participants’ Visions for the Future 21

SECTION III - PROPOSALS Student Ideas for Development of the I-195 Land: Summary of Overarching Themes 22 Student Ideas: Rethinking the Knowledge District and Subsidized Housing 23 Student Ideas: Multi-Purpose Use and Increased Connectivity 25

CONCLUSIONS AND NEXT STEPS 25

INTRODUCTION

To study the city is a complex endeavor, situated at the intersection of numerous overlapping networks of environments, cultures, and forces. Anthropology, likewise, is a people- based discipline, whose concerns lay in the holistic and comparative study of the past, present, and future of human life. When combined, these two inquiries create the discipline of “urban anthropology.” Much more than simply a subset to anthropology, urban anthropology seeks to understand the lived experience of the city while simultaneously taking into consideration the complexities of the city as a whole. With ethnographic fieldwork as a primary method, the urban anthropologist moves between the micro and the macro, constantly taking note of the ways in which change patterns and shapes (and is shaped by) lived experience. In the fall semester of 2015, a course on urban anthropology was convened at Brown University. Titled, “Urban Life: Anthropology in and of the City” (ANTH 1236), the course was cross-listed in the Department of Anthropology and the Urban Studies Program. The course was an in-depth exploration of the history, practice, and concepts of urban anthropology, providing students the opportunity to act as urban anthropologists themselves. As part of the “Engaged Scholarship” program at Brown University, run by the Swearer Center, the course had an interactive component in which students were invited to apply their knowledge of urban anthropological methods to the study of the local community. Our partner for this applied work was the Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy (DPPC), directed by Cliff Wood. In visiting the class early in the semester, Wood proposed a project focused on the continued revitalization and development of public space, particularly parkland in downtown Providence, Rhode Island. Wood expressed a desire to understand the ways in which local residents could establish and affirm personal relationships with the parks, particularly through knowledge of local cultural history and heritage. The research that students conducted over the course of the semester thus began with Wood’s suggestions as a starting point for exploring the role of Providence’s parkland in the city’s histories and memories, as well as its potential involvement in future memory-making. Before beginning this research, students engaged in an in-depth study of the history of urban anthropology as well as an overview of significant concepts within the discipline. We read important histories written by prominent figures in the field (Hannerz 1980, Mullings 1987), exploring the ways in which the definition and practice of urban anthropology has grown and expanded since its inception. Particular attention was given to understanding the “spatial turn”, a key moment in the discipline’s history, when scholars turned to spatial theories to better understand the political economy of place. The city was thus considered as a “space of flows” (Low 2014, 26). We then moved on to the exploration of key concepts and processes that affect and shape urban life -- issues of race, class, gender, and citizenship (Nonini 2014). This grounding was crucial in sensitizing us to the complexities of urban anthropological work. Donald Nonini writes, for example, that the “constant tensions” that underlie the work of the anthropologist—such as questions of the researcher’s positionality to cultural politics—are at “the heart of the ethnographic work that most urban anthropologists find themselves engaged in today.” As such, “[I]t is time for urban anthropologists to frankly acknowledge such tensions…if, that is, urban anthropology is to survive as a discipline into the twenty-first century” (Nonini 2014, 2-3). The next phase of the class required us to apply the knowledge we had just learned to the study and analysis of key ethnographies and films. Our readings included Ida Susser’s study

1 Norman Street: Poverty and Politics in an Urban Neighborhood, which depicts the ways in which New York City’s 1975-1978 fiscal crisis affected the lives of residents in a working class neighborhood of Brooklyn (Susser 2012 [1982]). Accordingly, we also viewed the documentary My Brooklyn, which maps the process of redevelopment, displacement, and gentrification in Downtown Brooklyn (Anderson 2012). These works were helpful examples of urban ethnography, and they served as comparative references for later discussions regarding redevelopment and urban life in Providence. Finally, the last section of the class focused both on conducting fieldwork and reading three recently published ethnographies by urban anthropologists, which took place in different cities around the world. Each book was paired with a fieldwork assignment that directly related to the individual methods featured within the books themselves, allowing us to compare our own research and fieldwork experiences with those that the authors encountered and related in their texts. The first, Dangerous or Endangered?: Race and the Politics of Youth in Urban America, by Jennifer Tilton, focuses on conflicting attitudes towards youth in the neighborhoods of Oakland, California, and how these conflicting attitudes have reshaped politics and the role of the state in contemporary America (Tilton 2010). Our first fieldwork assignment, drawing on Tilton’s use of archival and historical data, focused on the laying out of an essential historical context for our research in Providence, including the demographics of the Downtown area and its surrounding neighborhoods, as well as the history and continued process of urban redevelopment. The second book, In Search of Paradise: Middle Class Living in a Chinese Metropolis by Li Zhang, depicts the way in which an emerging middle-class became increasingly geographically spatialized and socially defined through widespread urban redevelopment and the privatization of housing in Kunming, China (Zhang 2010, 3). Inspired by Zhang’s effective use of field notes, interviews, and descriptive writing, the second fieldwork assignment asked each member of the class to visit a local park within Providence and interview a park visitor, in order to learn from local residents about their experiences within Providence’s parks and their visions for continued development, in the Downtown area and across the city. Our last reading, Reconstructing Beirut: Memory and Space in a Postwar Arab City, by Aseel Sawalha, details the large-scale urban-renewal project that occurred in downtown Beirut in the aftermath of civil war, and the conflicting responses of various groups in the community (Sawalha 2010). Sawalha’s work inspired our third field assignment, which asked us to create our own plan for Providence’s redevelopment based on research that we had gathered. Throughout this last part of the class, in which we concurrently read assignments and conducted our own fieldwork, the class discussed our findings in great detail and compared our own various interpretations of the current state of the Downtown area and the Providence city-scape as a whole. This writing, divided into three sections, is the culmination of all those discussions; a presentation of our findings from research and study throughout the semester. The first section provides a condensed history of the Providence “Renaissance,” an overview of the current state of the city, and a description of our research methodology and sites. The second section summarizes the overarching themes gleaned from our ethnographic fieldwork, and provides an overall sense of some of the concerns and interests of Providence’s park-goers. Finally, the third section is a cumulative description of our recommendations regarding redevelopment in the Downtown area, based on what the class determined to be key issues in need of further attention.

2 The work we have done this past semester would not have been possible without Cliff Wood’s invitation to work with him and the DPPC. We also received important support from the Swearer Center, who provided us with funds to support a TA for the course. We hope that this report will prove useful in providing a fuller picture of the current state of parks in the Downtown area, as well as the hopes, needs, and expectations of current Providence residents and park-goers. Though our class may have come to an end, there remains still more opportunities to continue studying our city and its parks. We hope that future students and scholars will continue to parse and explore, so that our parks may become (and remain) thriving centers of Providence’s urban life.

SECTION I - BACKGROUND

Relevant History and Context

Providence in the Early Seventeenth through the Nineteenth Centuries

Throughout the past four centuries, Providence, Rhode Island’s continual evolution and reinvention has made it the archetype for a “Renaissance City.” The theologian Roger Williams founded Providence in 1636 as a refuge for religious dissenters from the surrounding colonies. Established at the head of Narragansett Bay, Providence would quickly mature into a city ripe with sea commerce and local trade. Warehouses and wharves, manufacturing plants, and residences, both mansions and more dense residential developments, began to appear as early as the mid 1700s (Leazes and Motte 2004, 28-29). Even at such an early stage, however, Providence was prone to geographically separating its residents from one another. Prominent families, most notably the Brown family, engaged in trade with the West Indies, Africa, England, and other colonies (Woodward 1986, 42). This trade, part of the Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade, brought prosperity to the many Providence industries that relied upon exotic goods coming to port: candles, rum, molasses and iron (Bailey 1990, 373-419). These industries would fuel Providence’s economy during the late seventeenth century and into the eighteenth. In the late-eighteenth century, Providence pivoted away from sea commerce, focusing more on overland trade and commerce. This shift was facilitated by the development of railroads, whose construction would have a strong impact on the further development of the city. Steam locomotion allowed shipping efficiency to increase, enabling Providence’s lucrative textile industry to become the largest textile manufacturer in America. However, other parts of the city would suffer as a result. The Woonasquatucket and Moshassuck Rivers, along with the Great Salt Cove, were used as waste disposals for industry byproducts. They were filled in according to the needs of the expanding railways, whose placement had no consideration for the aesthetic deterioration it would cause (Leazes and Mott 2004, 29). Yet, throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the manufacturing of textiles, metals, and jewelry would propel Providence into a booming industrial and economic center (Woodward 1986, 50).

The Twentieth Century With the increase in production, the need for labor grew exponentially. Immigrant workers were willing to work for lower wages; thus, Providence became a melting pot for Irish,

3 French Canadian, Italian, Cape Verdean, African, Portuguese, Scandinavian, and Russian populations (Orr and West 2002, 400). As this diverse community group was settled into affordable worker housing, distinct tracts within Providence were created, delineated by ethnicity and socioeconomic status. Providence became not only ethnically bounded, but also further segregated by distinctions between “the rich” and “the poor” as it had been in earlier centuries (Leazes and Mott 2004, 35). In the mid 20th century, World War II negatively impacted Providence’s downtown economy. By this time, New England had lost much of its manufacturing industry to the South, who could produce similar goods at lower costs. In order to compensate for this, businesses and industry moved to the suburbs, where operation costs were more affordable. The city center was left empty and deteriorating; 100,000 people left Providence between 1940 and 1980. The domino effect of suburbanization required a redeveloped downtown that would accommodate automobiles, as independent methods of transportation were becoming increasingly popular. Parking garages and highways, which displaced and further segregated communities within Providence, were two important structural changes made in the mid to late 20th century (Leazes and Motte 2004, 36). With the mass exodus of businesses from downtown, Providence faced a major depletion of economic, social, and financial capital. In 1947, the Providence Redevelopment Agency attempted to fix these issues by building $250 million dollars worth of new housing, schools, streets, and Interstate Highway 95 (Woodward 1986, 64-65). In the 1970’s, Providence would again be negatively impacted when the Nixon administration closed the Naval Yard in Newport, raising gas prices and unemployment rates throughout the state. The development of the civic center and Majestic Theatre began to revitalize the community and arts scene in downtown, becoming a catalyst for the “Renaissance” period (Orr and West 2002, 402).

Making Providence a Renaissance City

City politics played a prominent role in shaping the emergence of the Renaissance period. Known for his frugality in an era of machine politics, Mayor Joseph A. Doorley was credited with halting further economic decline and preparing the city for renewal (Antonucci 2012). In 1975, Vincent A. “Buddy” Cianci, Jr. was elected mayor. Cianci ran on the notion of revitalization, campaigning that he would “bring business and life back downtown, stop neighborhood decay, and get [our] city moving” (Arnold 2005). An array of proposed development plans shaped downtown. Although many of them were not implemented when proposed, individual facets of them did come to fruition over the years. The most notable plans highlighted the need for: office space, commercial development, housing, relocation of the railroads, improved river quality and aesthetics, and the continued construction of highways. The need for better parks and public spaces recurred in many plans, but was never fully realized until the plan that created Waterplace Park was implemented. These plans were backed by various private, public, state, and federal funding agencies, including public-private partnerships (Leazes and Motte 2004)

The Renaissance City

4 The Providence Renaissance has largely been characterized by the emphasis on the “return to retail, financial services, higher education, destination city, arts and entertainment, and historic Providence” (Leazes and Motte 2004, 73). Some smaller projects, such as the construction of parking garages, bridges, better sidewalks and roads, and utility conduits were used to lure businesses back into downtown (Leazes and Motte 2004, 74). The reappearance of small and large businesses has boosted city revenue, generated social movement, making Providence a center for economic development. Several larger developments during the Renaissance significantly impacted the character of downtown. The development of Capital Center relocated the railroad to free up land for the Capital Building, Union Station, and Interstate Highway 95. It also widened roads to better support vehicular traffic (Leazes and Motte 2004, 96). The development created jobs, boosted the aesthetic appeal of downtown, and better streamlined transportation throughout the city. Eventually, part of this area would give way to Providence Place Mall, hotels, and a convention center, which continues to attract residents and tourists to the downtown area (Leazes and Motte 2004, 196-197). The most notable revitalization in downtown Providence was the uncovering of the river and the rebuilding of “4,300 linear feet of river wall” (Geake 2013, 147). The recovered riverbeds were returned to natural waterways and Waterplace Park was created. Additionally, large tracts of park space abutting the river were developed, lined with historic plaques and pedestrian walkways. This re-appropriation of space allowed the downtown area to become a venue for art, history, and entertainment. Actors such as Rhode Island School of Design, popular restaurants, and television series used this atmosphere to promote their own interests, which in turn has further increased the desirability and attractiveness of downtown Providence by creating an exciting city center (Leazes and Motte 2004, 74).

The State of the City

Today, Providence is an extremely diverse city in regards to its racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic composition. This diversity is certainly an asset, however, it is accompanied by a number of challenges and concerns. According to the 2010 United States Census, the population of Providence was 178,042. This represents about 17 percent of Rhode Island’s total population of 1,052,567. Within Providence, 49.8 percent of the city’s residents identified as White, 16 percent Black or African American, 1.4 percent American Indian and Alaska Native, 6.4 percent Asian, 0.1 percent Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, and 6.5 percent Two or More Races. Compared to the state of Rhode Island as a whole, Providence seems particularly diverse; indeed the population of Rhode Island was 81.4 percent White, 5.7 percent Black or African American, 0.6 percent American Indian and Alaska Native, 2.9 percent Asian, 0.1 percent Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, and 3.3 percent Two or More Races. While the percentage of the White population in Rhode Island was more than one and a half times that of Providence, every other racial group was the same or considerably less than in Providence. According to the 2010 Census, there were 71,530 housing units in Providence and the home ownership rate was 35.8 percent. The population density was just over 9,676 persons per square mile. This high density is characteristic of many other cities in New England which developed alongside Providence such as New Haven, Connecticut; Springfield, Massachusetts; and Hartford, Connecticut. The per capita income in Providence was $21,676, which is well below the Rhode Island per capita income of $30,469. The city’s low per capita income

5 coincides with the city’s high poverty level. According to the 2010 Census, 29.0 percent of persons in Providence were below the poverty level. Providence faces a number of concerns that are common in American urban centers. These concerns, which include poverty, homelessness, and racial segregation, affect different areas and populations to varying degrees. It is also important to note their complex and numerous intersections. For example, the neighborhoods of Olneyville and Upper and Lower South Providence face higher levels of poverty than most other areas of the city. These neighborhoods, located on the city’s South and West sides, are also home to more people of color and immigrant communities. The lack of economic activity in these areas severely limits these residents’ chances to secure stable incomes. Providence has struggled with poverty since deindustrialization in the mid-twentieth century and its associated urban population decline. As noted previously, nearly 30 percent of Providence residents live below the poverty line. Poverty affects children at disproportionately higher rates: 46.7 percent of Providence children live below the poverty line. This problem of childhood poverty is statewide although it is most severe in Providence. According to a January 2015 report in the Providence Journal, more than one in every five Rhode Island children live below the poverty line, a rate that is higher than anywhere else in New England. Living in poverty negatively impacts children by limiting their access to healthcare, education, and other opportunities. It also compromises their chances to succeed in the future. The organization Rhode Island KIDS COUNT recommends a number of solutions to childhood poverty including improving access to support for working parents, ensuring healthcare access for youth, and providing affordable housing and early childhood education (Salit 2015). Homelessness is another key concern in Providence. Homelessness intersects with poverty in a myriad of ways, so the two must be considered and understood together. According to the Rhode Island Coalition for the Homeless, 4,067 Rhode Island residents were homeless in 2014. Due to the high rate of poverty in Providence and the state, individuals need affordable, low-income housing. However, there is not sufficient housing to meet these needs. In addition, service programs such as health care, housing subsidies, and food assistance programs continue to be trimmed by legislators at the state level. This places an increased burden on individuals and families who are struggling to make ends meet and may be the catalyst that drives them into homelessness. The Rhode Island Coalition for the Homeless has proposed a number of solutions to the problem of homelessness in the state and in Providence. These include creating both affordable housing in the short-term and permanent supportive housing in the long-term. Intersecting with poverty and homelessness is the city’s segregated geography. Providence is highly segregated both racially and socioeconomically. The East Side of Providence, or the area of the city located to the east of the Providence River, is home to the city’s more affluent neighborhoods, which include College Hill, Blackstone, and Wayland. These highly residential neighborhoods boast higher property values, lower unemployment, and higher income levels than the city as a whole. In addition, the East Side is home to many private educational institutions such as Brown University, Rhode Island School of Design, the Moses Brown School, The Wheeler School, and Lincoln School. Providence’s West Side, the area of the city located to the west of the Providence River, is less affluent and more racially diverse. One major exception is Downtown, which sits just across the River from the East Side. The West Side of Providence includes many of the city’s immigrant communities and some of the highest rates of poverty.

6 The Providence city government plays an important role in addressing these key concerns. Mayor Jorge Elorza, a Democrat elected in 2014, heads the current administration. Elorza ran his campaign based on his prior experience in the Providence Housing Court; however, his campaign rhetoric has not completely translated into substantive change in the city’s housing concerns. According to his 2015 Legislative Agenda, his top priorities include Education, Economic Development, Revenue, Vacant and Abandoned Property, and Healthy Communities and Public Safety. His call to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour from the current $9.00 could help address the city’s poverty and, by extension, its homelessness rate. The administration must continue to address Providence’s pressing, key concerns and work in conjunction with the City Council and state government to achieve viable, stable solutions.

The I-195 Recovered Land: History and Development

One significant development in the ongoing revitalization of Providence, focusing in particular on the Downtown core and the development of public parkland, was the relocation of the I-195 highway. According to the Federal Highway Administration’s website on the I-195 relocation project, this interstate, which connects Rhode Island to Southeastern Massachusetts, was originally built in the early 1960s and formerly separated Providence’s Downtown from its Jewelry District. With age and the greater influx of traffic through Providence, the part of the highway that crossed through the city was determined to be unsafe. In 2004, therefore, Rhode Island Department of Transportation (RIDOT) began construction to relocate 1.6 miles of the interstate about 2000 feet southward. In total, the project consisted of “14 new bridges with a 1,200-foot, 8-lane mainline bridge over the Providence River, 25 lane-miles of new interstate, a new interchange with I-95, five miles of new city streets, and 4,100 feet of new pedestrian river walks.” The new Providence River Bridge (the “Iway”) was put in place in August 2006, and by late October 2009 the relocated interchange was completely open to traffic. In the spring and summer of 2011, the former portion of the I-195 highway was demolished, reconnecting Downtown to the Jewelry District areas and Fox Point to the Waterfront area (Providence Department of Planning and Development 2012, 30). In 2011, the city of Providence created the I-195 Redevelopment District Commission to manage the redevelopment and use of the newly opened up land parcels. The land transferred from the city to the Commission included 21 parcels totaling 27 acres. With 8 acres reserved for public park use and 19 acres open for development, the project followed in the footsteps of previous efforts to increase commercial, residential, and tourist activity in downtown. In the early 1990s, Downtown planning incorporated retail and destination city goals, highlighting the role of the arts, entertainment, and higher education in the city’s revitalization and “renaissance” (Leazes and Mott 2004, 256). Artist Barnaby Evans created Waterfire in 1994, which grew into a large, ongoing public art installation on the three rivers of downtown Providence. Projects like Waterfire contribute to the branding of the city and increase foot traffic and recreation on the waterfront. Likewise, the I-195 Redevelopment District has created plans for parks straddling the river, with the east side park connected to the west side park by way of a pedestrian footbridge. The land has potential to fit into the Providence Renaissance paradigm through the introduction of new businesses, housing development, and new spaces for Providence’s educational institutions. However, the Providence Renaissance has always faced the contradiction of mainly focusing efforts on downtown revitalization while politicians claimed improvement for the disparate parts of the city as a whole (Leazes and Mott 2004). Therefore,

7 the question at hand is how development of this newly opened land can continue downtown revitalization while also serving a large cross-section of the greater Providence’s population. The redevelopment of the I-195 corridor includes plans for a newly branded “Knowledge District,” which would encompass the Hospital Area and the Jewelry District (Providence Department of Planning and Development, 2012). The development and rezoning goals outlined in the Providence 2020 plan, commissioned in 2006 by the city and then Mayor David Cicilline, proposed growth through the knowledge economy, however the possibility of a cohesive district did not emerge until the I-195 land was opened up. The district is proposed to extend from “Pine Street to the northwest, the Providence River to the northeast, Public Street to the south, and Prairie Avenue to the west,” including a total of about 360 acres (Providence Department of Planning and Development 2012, 25). Growth of the knowledge economy in the area has already manifested in a new Brown University Medical School building, opened in 2011 in a former jewelry factory building, and a number of research projects supported financially by the Innovation Providence Implementation Council (IPIC), which is managed by the Greater Providence Chamber of Commerce. Additionally, the toy maker Hasbro moved into buildings within Knowledge District bounds (Abbot 2011). Other institutions such as Johnson and Wales University have committed to future development of the land into laboratory and educational space, and proposals have been made for creation of student housing. All of these efforts are geared towards creating “high-tech, high- wage” jobs to buffer the knowledge economy (Abbot 2011). However, the designation of this space as the Knowledge District is contested; since the knowledge economy exists throughout Providence amongst college campuses and other institutions, some residents have argued that its geographic concentration in downtown is arbitrary and see “no purpose to defining any area for the knowledge economy” (Providence Department of Planning and Development 2012, 24). The city’s goals of increasing economic activity and growing the Knowledge District extend into the parcels set aside for public space. The future parks were described in a Redevelopment District meeting as “an economic development attraction tool,” with the goal of promoting more movement to downtown buildings (195 Redevelopment District). Additionally, the proposed pedestrian-cyclist bridge will link College Hill to downtown, using the residual supports of the former I-195. The bridge design, created by inFORM design firm, aesthetically reflects the high-tech drive of the proposed Knowledge District, using a diverse mix of material such as granite and timber. The pedestrian and cyclist pathways are set to splinter into multiple directions on either side of the bridge, creating a dynamic landscape intervention. The bridge will be multi-leveled and will include common spaces to sit (Metcalf 2011). The proposed parks have multifold goals for use. The east side park plans feature a sculpture garden, indigenous plants, varied pathways and seating arrangements, and an infusion of cultural history through paved inserts and mosaics. The west side park, which is larger, is proposed to have a focal-point pavilion, which opens up into space for informal socializing and other uses such as temporary art installations, children’s programming, and farmer’s markets. Further potential has been expressed for building an outdoor theatre near Dorrance and Peck Streets (195 Redevelopment District). Other land use ideas have been proposed in the development process, including a recent and controversial proposal to build a new stadium for the Pawtucket Red Sox minor league baseball team, effectively relocating the team from Pawtucket to downtown Providence. As described in a February 24, 2015 entry on Eric Wilbur’s Sports Blog, opposition groups from both Pawtucket and Providence residents cited concerns for traffic and congestion, and the

8 potential for large social and economic losses in Pawtucket. The negative reaction even led to an organized coalition, named “Stop the Stadium Deal”, which petitioned to keep taxpayer money out of supporting the project (GoLocalProv 2015). Eventually the plan failed, shut down by Governor Gina Raimondo, in a statement released in late September 2015. Another significant project, adjacent to the Knowledge District, is the redevelopment of the historic South Street Power Station. The building, built in 1912, and operated by Narragansett Electric, was donated first to the Heritage Harbor Museum Corporation to be used as a maritime history museum. These plans, however, were abandoned in 2014 due to lack of funding. The building is now scheduled for renovation by Commonwealth Ventures, LLC. When complete, by Spring 2017, it will hold 120,000 square feet of offices for Brown University administration and 120,000 square feet for a nursing education center run by the University of Rhode Island and Rhode Island College. This plan furthers the expansion of the knowledge economy beyond the college campuses, although the space is outside of the proposed formalized district. As the repeated challenges to these and other projects display, making plans into reality is crucially dependent on funding.

Research Questions and Methods

In his presentation to our class, Cliff Wood introduced the broad goals of the Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy, “to preserve and revitalize Providence’s historic downtown core by transforming it into a lively, cohesive and prosperous economic and cultural center through the development and management of exceptional public spaces” (DPPC). This mission is illustrative of “creative placemaking”-- a concept that Cliff Wood heavily emphasized in Providence’s development. Creative placemaking “refers to a collaborative process by which we can shape our public realm in order to maximize shared value” (Project for Public Spaces). The concept essentially revolves around the idea that people can reimagine and reinvent spaces drawing on the physical, cultural, and social background of a place. People make new use of parks, waterfronts, buildings, etc. while strengthening their existing intimate connections to these places. In our class, and in regards to the work of the DPPC in Downtown Providence, Cliff Wood focused on the importance of the cultural history of a place. He argued that design and programming could help create a shared history among Providence residents, cultivating a sense of community. Furthermore, he said that by emphasizing the cultural history of a place, people might find or develop attachments to these places and would be drawn to spend time there. Examples of the programming he imagined were: incorporating and expanding commemorative tiles or historical markers into park landscapes, acknowledging the diverse social geography of settlement in the area, and inviting representative groups (such as Native American groups) to hold cultural events in Downtown spaces. He proposed that doing so would draw on and promote a sense of connection to the land, even for people who had no previous attachment. Wood also emphasized his desire to diminish “unhealthy uses of public space,” referring for example to the use of parkland for illicit and illegal activities, such as drug dealing. Creative placemaking, in Wood’s vision, had the potential to transform public space, its use and population. While the concept of placemaking is also prominent in the anthropological considerations of human dwelling, urban anthropologists operate with an expanded notion of place in regards to urban development. Some scholars, for example, view the city as a set of processes rather than a purely physical setting (Low 2014, 16-17). As such, places and their inhabitants are mutually

9 constituted, defined and shaped by human actions and interactions, which in turn shape and “make” place. In addition, beyond the particular local factors that shape a place, there are always larger acting forces at work. Thus, in order to understand the dynamics of a particular place and human dwelling within, urban anthropologists work to link “macro political economic analysis with the micro ethnographic reality of individuals” (Low 2014, 17). In addition to placemaking, urban anthropologists pay attention to the historical, political, economic, and social dimensions of places. This includes consideration of the ways in which notions of difference have been systematically inscribed into urban landscapes, such as the racialization of space, segregation, gentrification, marginalization and the impact of these processes on neighborhood development, settlement, or displacement (Low 2014, 22). Notions of class, citizenship, and gender and sexuality also play important roles, dictating where people can live, shop, work, and spend their time. Inhabitants of a city are thus constantly interacting and negotiating their “right to the city” given their social, political, economic and racial backgrounds (Susser and Tonnelat 2013, 107). Given the focus of our class on urban anthropology, we thus approached Cliff Wood’s questions and proposals with the theoretical frameworks outlined above. Charged with the task to explore how to draw people to Downtown parks, we turned to the methods of the authors and ethnographers we had read to understand the context of the city of Providence, the current state and use of public parks, and the potentials and challenges of their continued development. Inspired by some of the authors we read, we began by researching the context of our place of study (Susser 2012, Tilton 2010). In our case, it meant studying the historical and contemporary forces that are at work in Providence, paying attention to geography, settlement history, demographics, urban decline and development, governance, partnerships, and larger social and political processes (“Field Assignment #1”). Each student focused on a particular topic and used archival research methods to collect information. The findings were then compiled so that each student could access to the data to inform and direct later research. Drawing further inspiration from the ethnographers we read, each student went out into the city to collect ethnographic data (Susser 2012, Tilton 2010, Zhang 2010). Collectively, we conducted 17 semi-structured anonymous interviews in five different parks around the city: Burnside Park, the Downtown Riverwalk, Dexter Training Ground, India Point Park, Lippitt Park and Roger Williams Park (see Figure 1). The purpose of these interviews was to gather information on park use as well as residents’ opinions about park development. What draws people to these parks? What do users like/dislike about each place? What are their opinions about the current state and future development of Downtown parks in particular? The majority of the interviews were recorded and subsequently transcribed (“Field Assignment #2). While in the field, each student also made observations and produced field notes, describing the landscape, noting significant features and structures, and taking account of the characteristics of park patrons and their patterns of use. Following the lead of urban anthropologists like Setha Low (2000), these methods also allowed for reflexivity, with students also noting their own position within the field, their expectations and biases, and their response to their surroundings. Findings from interviews and field notes were compiled and shared, in order to give each student a more comprehensive understanding of park use. As a class, we discussed our findings and worked to draw out dominant themes. As the last component of our project, each student wrote a proposal for downtown redevelopment, focusing in particular on the I-195 land (“Field Assignment #3”). Each student drew on the archival and background research we had already conducted as well as our interview

10 data and field notes. We analyzed this data and proposed solutions for the space, considering the interests of residents and developers as well as the feasibility of their plans. This last step—plans and proposals—gave our work an essential applied component in line with the overall objectives of urban anthropology as a field. By considering historical, social, political, economic, and local factors, one can not only better understand the dynamics of an urban place, but one can suggest solutions and ways forward, developing a “social science and humanistic perspective for urban design” (Low 2014, 17).

Field Sites

Three students conducted fieldwork in Burnside Park, which lies adjacent to Kennedy Plaza and the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority hub, in the heart of downtown. This grassy park features the Bajnotti fountain – gifted by an Italian diplomat in 1902 to memorialize his Providence born wife – and a large bronze statue of Ambrose Burnside, Rhode Island Governor, Senator, and Civil War General. The statue was originally funded by a public campaign and unveiled in 1887. It was recently restored as part of the larger 2015 revitalization effort in Burnside Park and Kennedy Plaza spearheaded by the Providence Downtown Parks Conservancy. The Downtown Riverwalk – visited by one student from our class – is a cobblestone pedestrian walkway that runs from Waterplace Park along the Woonasquatucket River and ends between Williams Street and James Street just before the Point Street Bridge. The sloping, grassy amphitheater of Waterplace Park faces the river basin and hosts a summer long concert series as well as the summertime Waterfire event, which extends south to include the Riverwalk as a joint host. Waterfire draws the largest crowds to this downtown space, during which the Riverwalk and Venetian style bridges crossing the river are packed with families and spectators. However, the Riverwalk is also popular for its views and walkability. The Rhode Island School of Design campus borders a large section of the walkway, as well as a number of restaurants and shopping attractions. The area closest to the Point Street Bridge is largely undeveloped, part of the recovered land from the relocation of I-195. On the western side of the river, five students collected data at Dexter Training Ground, which is located in the West End neighborhood of Providence in the shadow of the castle-like Cranston Street Armory. The grassy park takes up nine acres of open space and contains a paved path as well as a playground. Dexter also has an off-leash area for dogs and hosts a summer farmer’s market. The park is popular and draws a diverse set of visitors, especially during the warmer months when it is a common location for food trucks and informal sports matches. Five students visited India Point Park, which is located in the Fox Point neighborhood on the more affluent East Side of Providence. India Point Park boasts unguarded river views, as it borders the shoreline where the Providence and Seekonk Rivers meet. A grassy hill slopes down towards the shoreline and a pedestrian (or bike) friendly path snakes along the water. A few trees, benches, and picnic tables scatter the park, and in the center, a large wooden dock. Farther north on the East Side, one student visited Lippitt Park, which is located at the intersection of Hope Street and Blackstone Boulevard at the Providence/Pawtucket border. Lippitt Park has wide-open green space, a playground for young children, and a small plaza with benches and a fountain. Blackstone Boulevard is lined with large houses and its tree-lined median is a popular spot for walkers and joggers.

11 Two students visited Roger Williams Park, the largest of our research sites as well as the farthest from downtown. Roger Williams Park is an expansive and attractively landscaped 427- acre park located in the southernmost part of Providence on the border of Cranston. It contains a number of gardens, roads, and bridges, as well as seven lakes, an accessible playground, the Roger Williams Park Botanical Center, and the Roger Williams Park Zoo. The park is car- friendly and attracts people from faraway distances as well as the neighborhoods nearby.

Figure 1

SECTION TWO – RESEARCH FINDINGS

Summary of Findings

Following archival research and fieldwork, our class looked for and discussed dominant themes that emerged across the data. Although we identified a plethora of interesting themes in our collective discussions, we selected six to elaborate upon in this section of our proposal. These six themes are: recreation, aesthetics, place attachment and memory, the perception of downtown, being homeless in Kennedy Plaza, and participants’ visions for the future. Overall, we felt that these themes encompassed the essence of peoples’ opinions of Providence’s parks and would provide valuable insight into improving the downtown park experience. The theme of recreation surfaced across many of our interviews and field observations. Broadly, recreation can be defined as an activity that people engage in for leisure and enjoyment. In our specific ethnographic fieldwork, recreation manifested itself in a variety of ways, and it became apparent that it was many peoples’ main reason for venturing to and spending time in these local parks. By tracking instances of recreation in our collective field notes and interviews,

12 we could pinpoint what kind of activities were the most popular, and which sites seemed to attract particular types of recreation more than others. Most importantly, however, our ethnographic work revealed what kind of parks—or, more specifically, which areas within parks—facilitated leisurely activities. Overall, we noticed that instances of recreational activities like family play, exercise, and sports, were almost exclusively confined to the parks located outside of downtown Providence. Accompanying recreation, the theme of aesthetics also emerged significantly in our ethnographic fieldwork. In the context of park experiences, aesthetics can be framed as the factors that contribute to the beauty of a park. This usually relates to a park’s scenic views and nature. Across our interviews, we observed a general trend of park-goers being attracted to spaces that boast spectacular views of nature or green space, like India Point Park. On the other hand, there was also a trend of people commenting negatively about trash and poor cleanliness in park spaces. A park’s overall arrangement can also affect peoples’ experiences, as the layout of a space can encourage division or congregation (Low 2000, 15). Another theme that emerged across our field observations and interviews was that of place attachment and memory. This theme can be defined within the framework of our research as a fondness people have for parks in which they have formed valuable memories and attachments. We observed that these emotional links can be the main reason why people return to parks, or prefer some parks over others. This idea of place attachment and memory is incredibly relevant in urban anthropology, particularly when it comes to the temporality of urban environments and the integration of past and present concerns, when planning for future development (Sawalha 2010, 1). The perception of downtown is possibly one of the most important and significant themes that we came across in our interviews and fieldwork, as it is particularly relevant for efforts to improve downtown parks. In our interviews, we tried to get a sense of what people thought of the downtown area and whether or not they chose to frequent the area’s parks. The general trend we noticed was that many people were not satisfied with downtown parks. Citing reasons ranging from road congestion to a lack of a sense of belonging, people seemed to have the impression that downtown was not an attractive place to linger. Interestingly, even those who frequented parks like Burnside in the downtown area did not entirely enjoy spending time there, and often only did so out of necessity. Another relevant theme that surfaced in our research—one that also relates to the perception of downtown—is the experience of being homeless. Because homelessness is a huge issue in Providence, we felt this issue and its impact on park life was important to our research. Overall, we observed that homeless individuals feel excluded -- that being evicted from many other spaces, they felt that lingering in the parks (especially downtown) was their only option. Our field observations also provided valuable insight into the attitudes, movements and activities of homeless individuals. We observed and documented how being homeless seemed to affect the way people used the parks, and recorded individuals’ attitudes towards the renovation of Kennedy Plaza and projected improvements in the surrounding area. The last dominant theme we identified concerns participants’ visions for the future of Providence and its parks. In our interviews, we received a wide variety of answers and opinions, however in our collective discussions we were able to discern distinct trends around key issues such as policing, affordability, and a need to preserve trees and green space. Later in this section, we will outline these suggestions by theme to form a more coherent understanding of what interviewees want, given the state of the city and visions for continued development.

13

Recreation

Providence residents enjoy public parks in a variety of ways. The most common forms of recreation observed in our research were exercise, play, and formal or spontaneous social gatherings. Some parks attracted forms of recreation that others did not, and the most common reason residents gave for choosing a particular site to engage in recreation was that the site was close to their home or that the site was aesthetically pleasing. Data from six parks reveals each space’s recreational profile. India Point Park tended to attract exercisers, fisherman, and people who were enjoying the view of the Providence River, either as a destination itself or as a stopping point on a longer trip through the city. Sometimes, exercisers like joggers, walkers (some with dogs), or cyclists passed through the park while other times they performed laps around one area. One 40-year-old Hispanic woman, who was observed exercising, said that she worked as a Certified Nursing Assistant, transferring patients between beds: “that’s why I try to stay in shape or I could end up being seriously injured.” The park’s dock attracted fishers of different ages, ethnicities, and sexes, who were often observed fishing together. One fisher, a man of approximately twenty-one and of unidentified ethnicity, said that he fishes at India Point Park most weekends and had already spent several hours there the day he was interviewed; it appeared he perceived the park as a peaceful space, less stressful than downtown. Another park dweller, a woman who said she lived in public housing, reported using India Point Park as a refuge and claimed to be “sick” of Providence: “how you can be in a nice part [of Providence] and you walk 100 yards and you’re in the ghetto...I come to India Point Park because where I live, there is ugly walking scenery.” Dexter Training Ground tended to attract families with young children, adults with dogs, adults wishing to exercise and socialize, and homeless people wishing to socialize and pass time. Several people also reported coming for the farmer’s market. Families with young children gravitated toward the playground. Adults with dogs walked through the park or used the area designated for dogs. Exercisers followed the fitness trail. A group of predominately black and Hispanic men, aged from twenty to sixty, rode bikes in one section of the park where there are benches and used that space as their regular gathering place at the end of the day. One man from that group, age 25, said that although Dexter was not his favorite park, his best friend liked it and he himself lived nearby and felt that experiencing nature was essential. The men in this group also used illegal substances in the park; one individual shared that he will “drink a beer or two” or “smoke a joint or two” when he comes to meet friends at the park. He commented, however, that most members of this group were very conscientious that there were children in the area and subsequently tried hard to conceal this activity. The park is also a place where homeless people stay. Reactions to this population were mixed. One retired woman who visits Dexter Training Ground up to five times a day with her dog said that the homeless people stay separate from other park-goers but that the alcoholics “can get pretty…scary, in a way.” She also shared that she believes the park was originally designed for homeless people and subsequently felt that “they should be here.” Burnside Park attracted people who were waiting for buses at Kennedy plaza, tourists, residents, people working downtown, and a large homeless population. Many people waiting for buses were listening to music or otherwise keeping to themselves. Some smoked cigarettes despite signs prohibiting this activity. Other groups smoked marijuana. Sometimes individuals or pairs would trade drugs for money. One group of young men (high school aged to early adults)

14 used Burnside Park as an informal gathering space, clustering around the fountain. One homeless man said he spends time in Burnside because of “the friendships that I have…or the trust that I’ve got with these people, the fun we have goofing on other people.” He says he likes to “watch the show” and that being in Burnside or Kennedy Plaza “is like TV…[but] there’s no commercials, it’s live, it’s people fighting with their issues.” Another homeless women shared that she had been sleeping in Kennedy Plaza for over a year and feels it is the only place she can spend time without being thrown out. Although many interviewees from other parks in Providence said they avoided downtown because of the drugs and the stressful environment, one man claimed he found Burnside Park peaceful. Roger Williams Park tended to attract families with children, fishers, and people taking walks. One interviewee, who lived nearby, used the park once or twice a week “generally just to get fresh air” and “exercise a little bit.” Families with children gravitated toward the carousel, playground, zoo, and other attractions, particularly when the weather was nice. As one interviewee shared, “there are so many festivals in the summer, so it's packed with people.” The same interviewee mentioned that they often encounter their neighbors in the park. Despite these reports, our research noted a bleak and empty feel to the park when the weather was poor. Some loitering and smoking in cars, parked throughout the park, was also observed. The River Walk extends from Waterplace Park to the Point Street Bridge. The researcher who visited this site did so along a stretch that was virtually uninhabited, though a few walkers were observed as well as a small group of people sitting together and smoking marijuana. Across the river, volunteers were setting up for WaterFire, an event that would later activate and repopulate the site in a much different form of recreation. A team member with the Downtown Improvement District was also working in the area and spoke of the assistance he provided to residents and tourists, providing information and promoting downtown businesses and events. Finally, Lippitt Park attracted families with children to its playground. Exercisers, dog owners, and others came to the park for its open spaces and proximity to the Blackstone Boulevard walking trail. The park was especially crowded on Saturday mornings, during the summer farmers market.

Aesthetics

According to Zhang (2010, 94), the symbolic representations captured by the aesthetics of the city influence residents’ lifestyle, social and cultural identity, and experiences with the urban environment. Our research found that many Providence residents visit parks based on how aesthetically pleasing they find the environment. In many cases, beauty seems to directly correlate with the presence of natural scenery and greenery. Residents are generally inclined to travel farther away to a more beautiful place than spend their free time in a nearby space that they consider aesthetically unappealing. In our interview findings, India Point Park was considered to be one of the more popular and beautiful parks in Providence. One 65-year-old Caucasian man was found sitting on a bench close to the bay, watching the river. In his interview, he conveyed that he visits the park almost every day, and keenly expressed his affection for India Point Park, describing it as “beautiful” and the “perfect” place to sit, walk and admire the view. He appreciated in particularly “being close to the water…and enjoying everything that the water has to offer.” In the same way that interviewees were drawn to the water of India Point Park, one interviewee who frequents Dexter’s Training Ground responded that the main attraction of the

15 park is “The trees. Lots of trees.” This woman, a grandmother of two children, was in the middle of taking her dog on a walk, and emphasized creating more green space in other parks to enhance their beauty. Similarly, at Lippitt Park, a man around 30 year old who was also walking his dog remarked a need to “spruce ‘em [the park] up a bit.” When asked about the plans for the redevelopment of the I-195 land, another interviewer from the same park expressed that she would be “really psyched” to go to a “beautiful green place,” and would even “go across town” to get to it. The beauty of the park often incentivized community members to travel beyond their neighborhood, leaving behind nearby spaces and parks—many of which were downtown—that they did not find beautiful. While many interviewees acknowledged that some parks downtown, such as the Riverwalk, also had a good view, there was a general feeling that the surrounding industrial scenery obstructed appreciation of the park’s aesthetics. One interviewer from our class observed that while the sky and river view of the Riverwalk seemed “majestic,” few people actually “stop[ped] to take in the view.” Another interviewee from Olneyville, a middle-aged Mexican woman who drives her family from downtown up to India Point Park almost every week, commented: “[The downtown parks] have a precious view, but there isn’t a space like [India Point Park] where you can appreciate it. You know? When I walk in downtown I can see the coast but I only need to slightly turn my head and see empty fields.” Only one downtown park, Waterplace Park, was commended for its beauty, seeming as a middle-aged white woman described “less rough” compared to how it was many years ago.

Place Attachment and Memory

Intersecting with park aesthetics and recreational value was an underlying sense of place attachment. Place attachment is defined as the “bonds that evolve through emotional connection, meaning, and understandings of a specific place and/or features of a place” (Wolf et al. 2014). Place attachment emerges from a variety of features, including restorative effects and escape, active use and value, similarity to the familiar, community and public significance, and emotional importance. India Point Park’s attractive waterside vistas and green spaces offer many community members mental and physical relief. Restorative effects and a sense of escape occur best in natural environments, offering relief in particular from the fatigue that can be associated with dwelling in modern urban environments (Herzog et al. 1997). One interviewee, for example, a sixty-four year old white male, frequented India Point Park for quiet reflection. As he described, “I like to come here, I like to sit here for a while, and then I can take off walking. And I walk and I walk.” He was attached in particular to the view the park afforded of the water and recreational sailing, triggering memories of a more active lifestyle and a nostalgic desire “to be out there with them.” Similarly, a recreational fisherman used India Point Park as a place of refuge and inner peace, in part to avoid the “problems” he felt he encountered downtown. This interviewee described himself as having a “short-fuse” and “too much beef downtown,” and saw India Point Park as a safe space far removed from the negative attachments he had to other places. For other interview participants, active use fostered place value and attachment, especially in parks that were identified as the best locations for recreation (Ryan 2006). One interviewee in Dexter Training Ground, a recent retiree who returned to Providence from Santa Fe to be closer to family, felt attached to that park because of its proximity to her home and because it provided accessible space to walk her dog and to take her grandchildren to play. Such attachment breeds

16 an important sense of familiarity, which furthers attachment in turn (Adevi and Grahn 2011). Yet another interviewee in India Point Park recounted family experiences that have made the park a very comfortable space for her, for almost three decades. These included entertainment and community-wide celebrations like bringing her son to see the fireworks on the 4th of July. While this interviewee now only visits the park to exercise and walk her dogs, India Point Park is the only park she comes to. Additionally, place attachment forms through memories and emotions reinforcing the relationship between individuals and space. Recent research has shown that as adults remember “childhood place”, it invokes intense memories and emotional connections that include feelings of love, grief, pleasure, security, and identity (Morgan 2009). These childhood places ultimately create place attachment for adults, adult space, because these memories encourage them to visit these spaces frequently. A pair of teenage siblings interviewed in India Point Park, for example, spoke of it fondly as their childhood place, filled with memories and milestones (learning to ride a bike, catching a fish). In Burnside Park, when a homeless middle-aged woman was asked what brought her to the space, she replied, “we don’t got no space, they’re taking it from us… this is the only one they really can’t kick us out of.” While place attachment is hard to examine for this community, due to the constant nature of such disruptions, the people we interviewed did comment on the social relations, friendships, and trust they formed and relied on in daily life. A white middle- aged homeless man, for example, described how there are many people that are “gonna rob you in any way possible,” but not his friends. He trusts certain relations, because “they got my back more than my own family does, which is sad to say.” When asked what brought him to Burnside Park, his response was “friendship.” These social relations kept him anchored to this particular space, where these connections were based. Conversely, in another interview in Burnside Park, an African American man roughly thirty-year-olds and homeless, was interviewed with his twenty-year old homeless Latina girlfriend. She claimed no attachment to the space and expressed her frustration, stating that she wants to move out of the state but cannot even get on the bus and feel safe because of family drama. Similarly, the man stated that he comes to this space to sell marijuana, but that he does not like coming to Burnside Park because “crazy shit goes down here.” However, his business anchors him to the space.

The Perception of Downtown

Downtown Providence is a dynamic, ever-changing neighborhood centrally located in a city with a rich history. With a myriad of historical buildings, the hub of Rhode Island’s transportation system (RIPTA), and many cultural resources, the downtown area inevitably occupies some space in the minds of city and state dwellers. Today, the downtown area is undergoing many changes that have resulted from conscientious planning efforts by both public and private actors. How these changes have been interpreted by residents and other onlookers is obviously variable, but important to consider. How does Providence view its own city center? How, and why, do people make the decision to visit the neighborhood? For many people, the decision to go downtown derives from the decision to spend money. Indeed, the neighborhood centers around the Providence Place Mall, a large indoor shopping center with a wide variety of both upscale and more basic stores. A few streets downtown, like Westminster Street, are also commercial districts, though more upscale. Many

17 Providence residents who were interviewed expressed the feeling that there was little for them downtown, since so much of the existing commerce caters to a wealthier demographic. Beyond the matters of commerce and dining, perceptions become much more varied. Despite the countless historical buildings that line the streets of downtown, no interview subjects addressed the historical aspects of the neighborhood. Furthermore, the residents who were interviewed did not seem particularly interested in Providence’s image as the “creative capital.” This could be indicative of a few trends. Perhaps the art-scene that Providence has long prided itself on, is still not reaching or appealing to every demographic; many of the most visible forms of public art are located downtown or along the bordering South Main Corridor near RISD, and none of our interviewees acknowledged their presence. While it is unclear what implications this has on a broader scale, it is definitely important to note that a key tenet of Providence’s renaissance and rebranding efforts remain insignificant to some of the city’s residents. One of the more significant perceptions of downtown that emerged in our interviews, however, was the sense that it is not a safe area. The interviewees who expressed this sentiment did so almost immediately upon being asked about downtown. One woman repeatedly used the word “sketchy” throughout her discussion of the area, even though she goes there almost daily to use RIPTA’s Kennedy Plaza hub. A young man interviewed in India Point Park said that downtown is “not a place to hang out,” adding that he prefers to avoid going there altogether. Another young man echoed this idea, saying that he “tries to stay away from downtown because of all the drugs and all that stuff.” Like the woman who described the neighborhood as sketchy, he said that he only goes there to catch the bus. Many of the people interviewed also cited police presence as central to their perception of the neighborhood. Yet overall, people did not seem to associate the presence of police with an increased sense of safety. The majority of interviewees who discussed public spaces downtown were vaguely aware of the city’s recent revitalization efforts. One woman said that downtown revitalization is “necessary;” another man said that he thinks the area is starting to look “more promising.” In addition, interviewees who had been unaware of the improvement efforts generally expressed enthusiasm about their potential. Overall, the small sample of residents who were interviewed for this project did not express a lot of interest in Downtown Providence. They were also not aware of the specific elements of revitalization plans, and did not seem to give much thought to the construction that has been occurring around Kennedy Plaza and Burnside Park. It seems that the most important factors preventing people from wanting to go downtown were being unable to afford the commerce options. This raises an important concern about how to make the downtown area more inclusive in its development, attractive to all residents. This is a concern the city must take steps to address, if downtown Providence is to become a true, vibrant city center.

On Being Homeless in Kennedy Plaza

Homelessness was not something we expected to encounter in depth when conducting our research. However, we soon came to understand how inescapable and important this issue is to Providence and its future. Our research began focused on public parks and how to better use and experience therein, but our focus has shifted since discovering this deeper issue. The homeless community of Providence deserves attention and acknowledgement, but most of all it needs help. Four student researchers went downtown to Burnside Park, Kennedy Plaza, and the Riverwalk to conduct interviews relating to Providence parks and public spaces. Each of us

18 returned from our work shaken from our experience—shaken in the sense that we came with questions that were completely out of place for a community who needed much more than park beautification, but services and shelter. This section aims to discuss our encounter with homelessness and its impact on our research. Kennedy Plaza and Burnside Park are in the center of Downtown Providence. The scene there is chaotic; buses come and go, as do the people. Conversations, traffic, and a general sense of transience permeate the area. Both areas are public space and have recently undergone large-scale renovation in which bus stops were relocated, the plaza was cleared and re-outfitted with glass terminals, and traffic was redirected (Reynolds 2015). The Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy (DPPC) has been part of an extensive effort to revamp the plaza and park, with the aim of turning the area into a point of pride for the state and undoing years of neglect and unsafe practices (Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy). The area has a history of being rife with criminal activity and drug trafficking, with both the City and DPPC making an effort to eliminate these activities and turn the park into a more family friendly and tourist area (Milkovits 2013). It was with this image of a rejuvenated area that four students went downtown to conduct our research. However, upon arrival into Kennedy Plaza and Burnside Park, our expectations were soon met by a much harsher reality than the one we anticipated. While we observed the area and took field notes, we witnessed many activities and things unbecoming of a newly renovated park and plaza. In Burnside Park, the benches surrounding the center fountain were stuffed with cigarettes and fast food wrappers, wedged between the wooden panels. Groups of older men and women huddled under a large tree right next to the fountain, smoking cigarettes and marijuana. Myself and two other students witnessed people selling drugs and consuming them, mostly marijuana, though I overheard a couple of adult men who discussed the price and selling of an unknown item. Many of the people we observed inside Burnside Park were homeless, carrying bags and an assortment of objects that assumedly held their possessions. There were rarely any park occupants who actually remained in the park for more than ten minutes who weren't either homeless or selling drugs, or a mix of the two. One student described feeling unsettled by the “illicit behavior and rough-looking people,” though she generally felt safe. We were there to interview someone about Providence parks, but it was difficult to gauge who was safe to approach, sober and willing, or not in a group. One of us approached a man for an interview, but he kindly declined, saying, “I’m not in the right frame of mind right now, sorry,” which made us think he was under the influence. Some of us were exposed to threats of violence between the homeless in the park. One student witnessed a couple walk past her in the center of the park, arguing. A group of men across from her came to greet the man while telling the woman, “Here we have his back. As far as we’re concerned, he didn’t do nothing to you.” One of us witnessed two men yelling at a woman who accused them of stealing her bag. These observations proved telling, as we would come to learn that park beautification was the least important issue to confront when working downtown. It was a jarring experience, as we were not expecting to see such things so readily, particularly compared to the idea of the area we had formed from our class discussion with representatives from the DPPC. The most difficult aspect of our fieldwork was actually getting through our prepared interview questions. It was not that our interview subjects did not understand the questions. The difficulty was that their answers reflected their deeper needs, which made us question our ability to analyze the data without taking the concerns and needs of the homeless into account. One student interviewed an elderly homeless man in Kennedy Plaza, who said that he sat in the plaza

19 every day. When asked if there was anything he wanted to get out of the Plaza and Park, he replied, “I want everything…because I have nothing.” When discussing the recent renovation of Kennedy Plaza, he said, “I don’t give a shit what they're trying to do.” This interview was eye opening, as the questions asked concerned things that this individual did not have the luxury to think about. He was intoxicated and unwell, and all the interviewer could think while sitting with him was that these questions about the parks did not matter, and he needed help. Other students had similar experiences when trying to ask questions of their participants. One student spoke with a man who sold blunts (marijuana wrapped in cigar paper) and his girlfriend in Burnside Park. When asked if he visited any other parks in Providence, the man did not directly answer the question, but expressed his distaste for Burnside Park. “Listen…I don’t like to come here. But I have to. I only have one bag, and when I’m here I’m scared to let it leave my back. It has a pillow and a blanket, but here people would steal it or hurt me for it. So I keep it on….” This man also did not have the luxury of discussing public parks, as he was concerned for his safety and only possessions, upset that he had to be there in the first place. Many of the homeless in Burnside Park did not want to be there, but it became clear from their testimonies that it was the only place they could go. Some of the homeless expressed their suspicions of cops in the area. One student sat next to a man who said, “[T]he cops. They're everywhere. I don't see them, but I know they're there. Looking for me.” Another student was told that the community in the park suspected her of being an undercover cop, as she had a notebook and pen in which she took notes while observing. One interviewee gave an insightful and eye-opening interview concerning her status as a homeless person in Burnside Park, in which she discussed being harassed by the police, constantly kicked out of parks until she’s forced to be in Kennedy Plaza, and her distrust of people who come in to help them. When asked if she felt policed, she responded, “I think they’re bullies. They’re assholes, cops are assholes.” She talked about cigarette smoking being policed and receiving tickets, but she said she does not care because she is homeless. This woman eventually walked away from her interview, but turned back to express her frustration with how she has been treated: “I’m really tired of all these people cause they don't help…Just like being homeless…they say they have a voucher for you…and where is it? Why am I still out here?.” She ended by stating that she needs to have a major surgery that will “cripple me,” but she can’t have it because she has no home to go to afterwards. Testimonies like hers made it impossible for us to ignore the issues that put people in these positions. Our greatest takeaway from working in Burnside Park and Kennedy Plaza, therefore, was the need to address the deeper issue of homelessness in Downtown Providence. Homelessness is not something that will go away with new bus terminals and park programming. The homeless in Providence are people in need of services, jobs, health care, and of course, a home. While the aim of downtown development is to make the area a thriving tourist and commercial center where people will want to be, the fact is that despite the new renovation no one wants to be there, including the homeless. If we want beautiful parks and residents who take pride in them, we need to address homelessness in a positive manner. Rather than ticketing people who have no means to pay a fine, our focus should be on rehabilitation and providing health services. Opening day and overnight shelters in downtown to take people off the streets will not only alleviate the issue in Burnside Park, it will provide a bed to someone who desperately needs it. Providence needs to work on providing these people the necessary services before it can work on turning Greater Kennedy Plaza into a destination for tourists and commerce. After seeing first hand how these

20 people live their lives, many students in our class came to the conclusion that work cannot continue on the parks until we can address homelessness and provide the necessary services and treatment to their community.

Participants’ Visions for the Future

The ethnographic fieldwork involving interviews with participants at public parks throughout Providence helped us outline a vision for the future of Providence parks and the city itself including the I-195 land. The people want the City of Providence to pay additional attention to the overall cleanliness and presentation of the parks on a more frequent basis. Subjects also recommended that there be more planned space in the parks for specific usage. Lastly, participants suggested holding more events in the parks to get the local community better involved. As for the development of the I-195 land, participants felt as if the land should go towards green, open space, education (local universities), and affordable housing. With the city in mind, some participants additionally made it clear that Providence is divided by class and is in need of affordable housing to improve the city and allow for a diverse mix of people. The one theme that came up over and over again in the interviews is that the parks are in significant need of maintenance. Interviewees, especially at Dexter Training Ground Park, made it quite clear that there is a need for more trashcans placed strategically where people tend to walk or converge. One subject, a woman in her late 30s who frequents Dexter Training Ground with her dogs, specified the need for more trashcans in the right spots rather than just in the middle of the park. As the woman watched her dogs in the dog-park area of Dexter, she commented on how “[T]here used to be trash cans at all of the corners and then they took them away and I noticed so much trash because people don’t want to walk all the way to the middle, you know, so they just toss it.” Another participant, a 25 year old Cape Verdean man, reflecting on the trash in Dexter while sitting on a bench alongside the field explained how “[T]here’s more trash coming in than them [the City of Providence] taking out, so it’s kind of hard to keep up with.” Trash may be the biggest issue concerning the parks but it is not the only one. Another item that the parks of Providence are missing is more pathway lighting. The woman in her late 30s who visits Dexter Training Ground commented on how “[T]he periphery is very dimly lit.” The lack of lighting in some areas could be a factor as to why people might not visit the parks when the sun has gone down in fear of safety. Another missing element to several of the parks in Providence is trees. An older woman who participated in an interview and frequents Dexter “five times a day” observed on how “[T]his park [Dexter Training Ground] has the right amount, but other parks could use more.” The people who come to the parks want the City of Providence to take better care of their parks and make them more people friendly. Along with more maintenance and development, the subjects of the interviews also called for more space in the parks set out for certain activities. The subjects from our interviews envisioned parks in the future of Providence having more space that is designed for specific uses to go with the open, green space. One specific idea for “designed space” that a participant suggested was a set space for recreational sports. She claimed how “a lot of kids want to play volleyball; they just have to bring a net every time. I don’t know if it would make sense to leave up. But even if there was a square kind of mapped out with boundaries of even soccer.” She explains how setting aside space for sports will make it so people do not have to compete to use the space. Another idea for planned space could be more playground equipment. A woman interviewed at Roger Williams Park reasoned that adding

21 playground equipment to more parks would attract more families with kids to use the space. Another specific way to attract people to the parks would be by adding simple exercise equipment blended along the park pathways. A male participant in his twenties explained how he has “been looking for a park with like pull up bars and stuff like that…if they had all that stuff set up, [he] would definitely come here all the time.” Another theme that emerged was the idea of holding more planned events and activities to get the local community involved in park life. People will become more attached to the parks and care for them more if they are brought together to enjoy them. While in Roger Williams Park on an overcast November afternoon, for example, a woman stated, “sometimes I walk through the park and it's the Dominican Festival [...] There’s so many festivals in the summer, so it's packed with people. The community garden right over here usually has people in the summer, so it depends on what’s going on in the park.” An older man at India Point Park recalled how, “they have concerts here [at India Point Park] during the summer. It’s wonderful!” This same man, however, also suggested that parks such as India Point Park could be “more complete, with places to eat, and things like that.” Such improvements were considered as positive, with the capacity to bring about more community engagement. Lastly, participants were also asked what they wanted for the future of the city and also the I-195 land. Some participants expressed the need for some of the I-195 land to become a green, open space. Many participants at various parks when giving recommendations for the I- 195 land stated how they felt some of the space should to go to the universities nearby such as Brown University, Johnson & Wales University, and RISD. Another participant, who happens to be a female urban anthropology professor, believed that the land should be primarily for affordable housing but it could be “mixed use…retail on the bottom […] and affordable housing on the top […] that would be inclusive of different backgrounds and ethnicities and races” so that it could provide housing and jobs. For the future of the city, participants envision the city of Providence to be unified with no barriers. One participant, a Puerto Rican-American man who works for the Downtown Improvement District on the Safety Team, wants the city to improve by getting rid of the “disparities […along with] the different labels as far as the different areas of the city.” The man, while walking along the River Walk on a windy Saturday at noontime, also called for the “stigmas of social class” to be erased because they divide the city into a South side, an East side, and they create an “invisible wall” that separates the lesser part of the city with the “more upscale.” Another interviewee remarking on the future of the city saw how affordable housing and improvement on accessibility could be necessary because of her “concerns about rent levels sort of being exclusionary” and how Providence has become “more gentrified in a way.” The city of Providence that people hope for in the future is a city that is more accessible to people of all classes and one that has no divides within.

SECTION THREE - PROPOSALS

Student Ideas for Development of the I-195 Land: Summary of Overarching Themes

After collecting data, our class was challenged with our final field assignment: to propose a plan for the development of the land made available by the I-195 relocation. As emphasized throughout this process, the data we collected from archival research and interviews became the

22 basis for our suggestions and plans. However, we found the process to be more complicated than we had anticipated, as we had to consider the needs and desires of the Providence public and what implications our proposals might have for people’s day-to-day lives. While our ideas were diverse, some general themes did emerge regarding methodology, goals, and specific plans. Overall our plans considered the development of the Knowledge District, parcels that have already been purchased, recent city plans for Downtown Providence, and current stakeholders invested/interested in the space. As far as methodology, most students began by addressing the human needs that emerged from the data, considering issues of safety, homelessness, cleanliness, and exclusion in the downtown area. One student expressed that, “we cannot allow these concerns to be missing from the conversation.” With these objectives in mind, two primary goals that emerged were 1) the fostering of place attachment, and 2) the development of a public space. Based on our interview data we noted that memory breeds place attachment. When interviewees had little experience or connection to a particular place, their attachment and therefore their investment in that place was also very limited. Conversely, when interviewees had memories (especially positive memories) of a given place, they seemed to care more about the maintenance and development of that location. Though our plans focused on how to foster the creation of memories, we acknowledge that forcing this process in newly created places might be difficult. In addition, as a class we felt that the opportunity to create memories in any new place should be available to all individuals and communities. Through inclusive and participatory plans for development, the land could become a space that truly reflects Providence’s diversity. As one student noted, “Public spaces are for the public, so why shouldn’t they be made by the public?” Noting the most prevalent divides in Providence, income segregation was a large issue, as noted by the data we collected in our first two field assignments. Our goal, then, was to create places that, as one participant described, “could potentially create [a] sense of balance, a place where all the neighboring communities, regardless of their individual socioeconomic differences, could find a purpose to come to the space.” Each resident of the city has something important to contribute, and too often in our data we noticed a trend of valuing primarily the goals and ideas of the elite – a trend that was especially evident in plans for the development of the Knowledge District. As a class, therefore, we see potential in expanding the concept of knowledge to include local, cultural, and creative forms. Doing so will create more collaborative and non-hierarchical communities of knowledge. Our specific proposals explain further how to achieve these ideals.

Student Ideas: Rethinking the Knowledge District and Subsidized Housing

Many students incorporated the Knowledge District into their plans for the development of the newly exposed I-195 land. Students saw an unfulfilled need for learning programs and social services in downtown Providence, and they overwhelmingly agreed that this space could be used to provide such services to a diverse group of residents. For example, one student proposed a science museum that would contain exhibits, classrooms, lab spaces, and a botanical garden. The proposed science museum would attract families, youth, and schools, offering after school programming and curriculum-enhancing programs for public school teachers. This proposal aligns with community efforts in Providence to encourage STEM education, knowledge, and learning opportunities to a diverse community in Providence.

23 Similarly, another student felt this new space should be used as “a hub that promotes educational and cultural learning” instead of focusing on knowledge in the form of labs and university spaces, which can be seen as exclusive. This student recognized that universities are integral to the shaping of the Knowledge District and felt their buildings should be present in the development of the I-195 recovered land. However, at the same time, the space should provide independent and non-university affiliated services to the community. Suggestions included an amphitheater and various centers to promote cultural and educational learning, located on and around Parcel 4 (P4). These sites would offer “accessible and subsidized adult education, job training, financial/legal counseling, and cultural and arts training.” Some of these offerings might be environmentally grounded and developed, due to the proximity of this space to the river. Again, this would allow for the Knowledge District to be an inclusive space that offers learning opportunities for a wide range of individuals in the community. Other students saw public art as a way to make the Knowledge District more inclusive. One student proposed interactive public art demonstrations in the form of graffiti murals in order to diversity the forms of artistic knowledge that get showcased. This student’s downtown plan proposed working with famous Rhode Island School of Design alums, such as artists Shepard Fairey and Kara Walker, to create public murals that depict educational messages about public health and current events. Linking art to knowledge was seen as a way to make the space accessible to a broader variety of people in the community. Since education is a privilege, students recognized that the concept of “the Knowledge District” may make the space seem exclusive. In order to alleviate this issue, students suggested an active engagement with the community when developing the I-195 land parcels. Students saw the land’s location within the Knowledge District as integral to the space’s developing character and felt it necessary to create an inclusive space for people of varying socioeconomic and educational backgrounds. Other students believed that the issue of exclusivity in downtown could be solved through the creation of affordable housing. One student highlighted Parcel 4 as the suggested location for public housing, because it is centrally located and in close proximity to healthcare resources, such as Rhode Island Hospital and Women & Infants Hospital, as well as public transport (RIPTA stops). This student also pointed to Mayor Jorge Elorza’s 2014 campaign promise to create more subsidized housing on the East Side and in downtown Providence; the creation of subsidized housing in this area would allow the mayor to make good on this pledge. Another student was struck by the high rate of homelessness in Rhode Island, and found public housing to be the proper way to serve the downtown community, especially since there is a large homeless population in downtown Kennedy Plaza that is continuously being displaced in redevelopment plans. Even further, students pointed to the high prices of downtown real estate as rationale for building more affordable housing in order to attempt to alleviate gentrification and to allow for individuals of all socioeconomic backgrounds to be welcome downtown. It is important to note that many students recognized these social issues as being prevalent in Providence, however they did not include them in their proposals for the I-195 land. Students reasoned against subsidized housing in the area for varying reasons; while there is an obvious need for more affordable housing in downtown, it doesn’t fit the theme of the burgeoning Knowledge District. Some students proposed other forms of service, solving the problem in various ways and not necessarily through subsidized housing. For instance, one student proposed a day center for the homeless in order to create a place for people to congregate where they feel more welcomed. Hence, students made sure to account for the needs of the

24 current population when developing plans for the area, factoring in feasibility for this particular location. Though our class discussions were quite productive, the students never came to one concrete solution about the best way to utilize the land, since there were so many complex issues at hand.

Student Ideas: Multi-Purpose Use and Increased Connectivity

There was a general consensus of approval, among students in the class, for the construction of a pedestrian bridge over the existing pilings where I-195 previously crossed over the Providence River. The City of Providence Department of Planning and Development has proposed this bridge in order to unite the East and West sides of Downtown Providence in a pedestrian-friendly manner. One student, who felt that this will be a great way of increasing the utilization of these spaces, suggested placing a sculpture or physical piece of art on the land on the East side, in order to spark people’s curiosity and attract them to cross the bridge. Students realized the importance of adding connectivity and access throughout Providence, based on our interview findings that describe how Providence citizens dislike the lack of fluidity throughout the city. Remedying this sense of separation is critical, as it is found in many of our city neighborhoods. Students suggested the creation of a walking or biking path that connects the multiple parks in Providence, specifically the soon to be redeveloped land from the old I-195 corridor to India Point Park. This path would “allow for better mobility, exposure, and access to the city” and would improve the sense of neighborhood separation. Several students also proposed the construction of a multi-purpose space that would be designated for community use. Acknowledging the fact that Providence is a diverse city, student plans made sure that all citizens would feel welcome and some suggested ways for the space to be used throughout the entire year. For example, one student suggested a glass pavilion with garage-like doors that would open in the summer in order to create an indoor/outdoor space. Other suggestions centered on the introduction and consolidation of local farmers markets to increase food accessibility for the surrounding neighborhoods and also engage community members. For example, Farm Fresh Rhode Island’s program, Fresh Bucks, encourages low- income residents to participate in these markets by subsidizing the cost of fresh produce, which would encourage diverse use of this parcel of land. Students recognized the power of the arts and its successful deployment in Providence to date. To continue this, several students proposed the creation of murals to portray the complex history and current diversity of Providence. Public art would draw residents to the space, in a method of creative placemaking, fostering place attachment and meaning through a creative engagement with the urban landscape. Related suggestions included a gallery fostering local artists and showcasing their art on a rotating basis in order to reflect the diversity of Providence’s creative placemakers.

CONCLUSIONS AND NEXT STEPS

As extensive as it is, our research is still very limited in scope, and we thus recommend at least three more kinds of research: comparative work, statistical work, and community involvement. Conducting only 18 short interviews, for example, is not nearly enough to gauge the interests and needs of a city of nearly 200,000 people. Furthermore, our perspectives as

25 Brown University affiliates inextricably color our perceptions and alter our means of access to the Providence community. Further research should thus aim to involve as broad of a segment of the Providence community as possible. The great importance of the downtown space for the city’s identity – and that of the whole area as well – necessitates intensive research from all possible angles at all levels of sociopolitical power. While we did not focus on cultural history, primarily looking at present conditions of the city instead, such a focus would not be unwelcome in examining how to best use downtown spaces. In addition, implementing the plans we have suggested (or some version thereof) requires much more analysis and input. First, since none of us are professional urban planners, architects, or engineers, we would need considerable technical feedback in order to make some of our ideas a reality. As that is the case, our plans should be viewed more as ways of rethinking downtown space. Second, since we are students at Brown, we lack on-the-ground perspective of many of these issues. Any implementation should incorporate community feedback as well as original community suggestions. Essentially, moving forward with any revitalization efforts ought to involve bringing in planners as well as participants in order to create space that is truly responsive to community needs. If these steps are followed, perhaps some of our aforementioned proposals can be taken into account when planning the use of parkland downtown. One of the primary forms of further research that should be pursued going forward is comparative work, as numerous cities have found effective means of addressing issues that face Providence. Perhaps most obviously, future park planning endeavors should study examples of park revitalization provided by other cities. Such study should examine both positive and negative examples – e.g., New York’s Bryant Park should be studied alongside Los Angeles’ Pershing Square. The chosen examples should have some critical aspect similar to Providence but need not be identical in terms of city or park characteristics. Beyond park use, work should be done to identify methods to address urban social issues like homelessness, and these methods could then be implemented in conjunction with park redevelopment. It also bears consideration that park redevelopment may in fact exacerbate issues like homelessness, so steps should be undertaken to mitigate, or ideally solve, such issues. Most importantly, examples should be sought that respond to community needs and not the oftentimes mysterious workings of a public- private partnership. Further research efforts should also encompass statistical work, particularly as our research did not make much in-depth use of this method. Even though we did not emphasize this analysis, instead taking a primarily anthropological perspective on urban issues, it is absolutely crucial for a more scientific understanding of park usage. One example of statistical information that would be useful would be attendance data for various parks both downtown and across Providence. It would also be useful to have data regarding park usage at different times of the day across the city in order to track usage patterns. Another area of statistical analysis that deserves more focus lies in demography. In addition to researching the demographics of park users, the spatial demography of Providence, particularly of the areas surrounding downtown, should be taken into account when planning downtown parks: they are currently accessible to residents of other neighborhoods but not in a meaningfully diverse way. The use of statistical analysis could thus be used to remedy this inequity of access. In order to increase the usage of downtown parks, adequate community involvement in the planning process is required. Urban planning and redevelopment frequently takes a top-down approach that works to the detriment of the local community’s needs, particularly when that community, like many surrounding downtown, is not white or affluent. Kelly Anderson’s 2012

26 documentary My Brooklyn provides a relevant example of how to involve the community in the planning process: in the film, a community organization spearheads a participatory plan as an alternative to a Downtown Brooklyn redevelopment plan created by a public-private partnership. Community members are given the opportunity to caucus and determine how redevelopment could serve their needs as well as the goals of developers. Of course, in the film, the plan is ignored, but it can still serve as a model that other public-private partnerships should follow. Essentially, when planning, diverse community suggestions – in terms of race, class, citizenship, housing status, and neighborhood – must be taken to account to develop park planning, policy, and programming. Expanding on the ideal of diverse community engagement, the Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy should broaden its perspective to include neighborhoods throughout Providence. Despite its name, the Conservancy really serves the entire city, as its parks must draw in visitors from across the city. In looking more closely at other Providence neighborhoods – their demography, their parks, etc. – the Conservancy can more effectively determine what to implement to attract people downtown. If this is not examined, downtown parks cannot continue to rely on the caprices of tourism and consumerism. Downtown park redevelopment therefore must examine issues that affect the city of Providence as a whole, particularly those that would affect the widespread accessibility of the area. RIPTA routes and pedestrian connections to other neighborhoods throughout the city, for example, deserve an additional focus so that more people use public parks. If the Conservancy can expand its focus, it can better promote diverse park use. In aiming to reshape the parks of Downtown Providence, the Conservancy should leverage its formidable connections throughout the city, particularly with regard to legal and commercial authorities in addition to community organizations. Connections with city officials should be used to find the legislative means to revitalize public spaces and to strengthen commitments to serve the public interest. As mentioned, the role of community organizations will also be a deciding factor in serving the public interest, and the Conservancy should work to expand these connections. Where leveraging connections may be most crucial is making community needs attractive to developers and other private business interests. The Conservancy can serve as the conduit to ensure that park redevelopment will both respond to community needs and incentivize developers to do so as well. With these connections at its disposal, the Conservancy is uniquely positioned to secure a downtown that is both vibrant and equitable. Keeping these considerations in mind, we believe that further research will enhance the goals we have outlined for redevelopment. First, efforts at downtown revitalization should consider affordable housing and homelessness as relevant concerns. Second, the conception of the Knowledge District should be reexamined and expanded. Third, broadening cultural access – by means such as public art or community centers – requires attention in order to draw in visitors of all backgrounds. Fourth, physical access must be evaluated to attract users from across the city. Fifth, park redevelopment projects should entail multiple uses during multiple seasons. The Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy has an incredible opportunity to revitalize the city of Providence, but, to invoke cliché, with great power comes great responsibility. With continued research, we hope to be successful in creating an inclusive space that not only makes downtown appealing but also addresses urban social issues and community needs.

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