The Last Public Space - People's Park in Berkeley

public spaces is declining, People’s Park still symbolizes the values of liberty of the 1960’s, because any person is allowed in the park at any time and those users govern the activities that take place within it. The park also fosters social gatherings and public community events, and maintains a spirit of activism. Thus the park also fully enforces the idea of open access and equality of users in public spaces. This is important because there is a strong correlation between the amount of “real” public spaces and the degree of the sociality of our urban society.

Berkeley is considered to be one of the most liberal, progressive and tolerant city cities in the country. Here we can see extreme cases of intolerant and reserved public spaces among real public spaces. People’s Park is a real public place proven in its history and in its current importance as a center point regarding political activism.

“We have a serious situation out there. People think it is about volleyball at the park but it is not. It’s about a group of people who think they can use violence and we won’t accept that.” iii

Michael Brown 1991 (Berkeley City Manager)

People’s Park still represents a real public place because its recent history has shown how it fosters activism and protests. The fact that persistent activism has been allowed to occur shows how the government and public interact. The biggest, most recent protest situated in People’s Park was - as the sociologist Don Mitchell calls it - an exercise of “public rights in a public space” ^iv . Expanding corporate capitalism, and consequently the disappearance of public spaces frightened people who thought they would lose social rights and control over the park. This fear was specifically expressed in the 1991 riots surrounding the issue of the sand volleyball courts being built in the park by the university. Before that, the university had intended to re-establish their ownership of the piece of land that it practically lost in 1969, which it had planned to build new dormitories for students. This agenda mobilized the people because they wanted to maintain the park as it was. Activists and residents of the park (homeless

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people) realized that “Only by taking and maintaining control over People’s Park could oppositional political activity be represented and advanced.” v

This attitude led to the protests themselves which started the 1 ^st of August in 1991, when more than a dozen activists were captured by the police. The protesters tried to stop the bulldozers which started to remove soil and grass from People’s Park in order to make room for the volleyball courts. That same day activists and police battled violently. For the next weeks the riots continued with the police shooting wooden bullets into the crowds and protesters throwing rocks and bottles of urine at the police. ^vi These conflicts show how powerfully the values of the 1960’s have been sustained and how the park is the unique as one of the last existing “real” public places.

Eventually the people - activists and homeless people together - won in 1999 when the University uninstalled the volleyball courts because of constant sabotage and infrequent usage. vii

As an example of many other riots and protests, the 1991 riots and its consequences allowed the park to exist until the present day. Back then, the activism could achieve its goals because the existing site embodied the power gained through its history. The simple fact of People’s Park being a real public space, supporting unlimited socializing, communication and community, promoted a successful protest.

People’s Park Symbiosis with the Community

Other than being a breeding ground for activism, People’s Park also enhances the Berkeley community’s ability to socialize and to organize public events. The fostering of communication is an important characteristic of a real public space because it is a necessity of a functioning democracy. The park’s fostering of community is also a symbiosis, because - as the Berkeley Daily Planet says - many people believe that “it is the community that keeps the park running” ^viii .

The first aspects of a community enhancing feature of the public space People’s Park are the community gardens on the west end of the park. Anyone in the Berkeley

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community could claim a piece of earth here and grow anything. As a planned feature of the park during its construction phase, the community gardens were very successful thereafter because they allowed people to interact with nature, which was hard to do in a dense urban environment. Even today environmental and communal organizations make frequent usage of the park’s community gardens possible. ^ix This public sharing and ownership of responsibility of the park reinforce it as the central public park in Berkeley.

Secondly, People’s Park has a long tradition of public events, which are usually organized by the existing “People’s Park Community”. Hereby, the physical settings of the park, such as the public stage, also facilitate the events. An assessment of People’s Park in 1995 by the City and the University resulted in the findings of at least eight current park activities, which took place at least once a year or even monthly. The report states that activities such as concerts, carnivals and camps “have been generally supported by the community” ^x . Moreover basketball on the existing court and other sports still take place in the park.

Additionally, the park facilitates social gatherings just by being a piece of green land in the urban desert, surrounded by a plethora of trees. The large lawn area is inviting to sit down, relax and chat with members of the community.

People’s Park lives up to its name because it provides a large amount of services for the people of Berkeley. The recreational advantages of the physical space itself in combination with the effort of the community undoubtedly form a real public space because of their impact on the community’s coherence. People’s Park fostering effect on communication within the community had positive consequences on the realization of a national democracy.

Open Access

People’s Park is one of the few places left where any person has open access to park land. The openness of the park contributes to its symbolic representation of the public right values. Mostly homeless people utilize the open access and consequently

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