A Boon for Boedekker
July 31, 2012
There may be no other San Francisco neighborhood in as dire need of a well-designed park as the densely populated Tenderloin District.
Credit: Nita Winter
A majority of families here live below the poverty line in cramped apartments and single-occupancy units. Without lawns or backyards, the neighborhood suffers from a lack of places to play, gather, exercise, and enjoy nature. In fact, the only park in the neighborhood—Boedekker Park—is so poorly designed with its tall, prison-like walls and segregated activity areas that it has earned a place on the Project for Public Spaces’ “Hall of Shame.”
The Trust or Public Land aims to change all that. We’re spearheading a $6 million makeover of Boedekker Park that will remove it from the Hall of Shame permanently.
“This will be their Yosemite,” says Trudy Garber, a project manager for The Trust for Public Land’s Parks for People program. “It will be a place for neighborhood kids to run and jump and play and skip—get out and breathe fresh air.”
Watch the video below to see how we’re transforming this broken park into a new backyard for 50,000 neighborhood residents and children.
The largest park in San Francisco's gritty Tenderloin is getting a makeover by The Trust for Public Land.
