Q&A
SBS highlights successful public space activations across NYC
1:08:48
·
126 sec
Council Member Oswald Feliz asks about successful and vibrant public spaces in NYC. Haris Khan and Calvin Brown from SBS provide examples of successful public space activations throughout the city.
- Examples include the West Side Festival, Coney Island Mermaid Festival, and Chinatown Night Market
- SBS mentions funding 88 public space activations over the past three years
- Brown emphasizes that successful projects often celebrate neighborhood identity and culture
Oswald Feliz
1:08:48
I know you wanna hear from small businesses and cultural institutions.
1:08:51
So some final questions before we Let's see what's the panel.
1:08:56
What are and, of course, this is a question that would probably be be best answered by the Department of Transportation given that they're the ones with full jurisdiction over our public plaza and similar public spaces.
1:09:08
But just curious, based on what you've seen, what are some of our most successful vibrant public spaces, and what are initiatives that we have taken on to help them get there?
1:09:19
So, actually, maybe not the most successful public spaces, but what are some examples that stand out?
Carlina Rivera
1:09:25
You don't wanna choose your favorite style.
Oswald Feliz
1:09:30
Yeah.
Haris Khan
1:09:33
So there's there's examples, you know, all over the city of public space activations.
1:09:37
I think in our testimony, we mentioned the West Side Festival.
1:09:41
As one example, we've mentioned the Kony Allen Mermaid Festival.
1:09:45
There's Chinatown.
1:09:46
In Chinatown.
1:09:47
Night market.
1:09:49
And mention in our testimony to Asian American Federation, the work they've done in Murrah Hill to activate and underutilize public space and also utilize an open street that's over there.
1:09:59
So we've gotten tremendous examples all over the city.
1:10:02
It really is 88 public space activations that our work has funded.
1:10:06
Over the past 3 years.
1:10:07
And as you can tell, it's $7,000,000 in the CTL budget that funds a lot of this work as well.
1:10:12
And so we're trying our best with what we've had.
1:10:15
We're really proud of the past 3 years of outcomes that we produce through some of this pilot work that has happened really in response to the economic recovery work and the first deputy mayor's blueprint on that topic, and we're we're excited to see all the FY 25 projects come to life by spring.
Calvin Brown
1:10:32
Yeah.
1:10:32
And and I think just to kind of punctuate what was just stated, what we've seen as successful projects are these activations that really speaks to the neighborhood identity, the culture, and things that people wanna celebrate.
1:10:46
So when think Chinatown has a night market, it brings out not only just residents of the community, but other people who wanna celebrate the Chinatown culture.
