June 2011 - Parks & Recreation - 71

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people have very different views about how existing open
space and parkland should be used. In Australia, Peter Ker,
environmental reporter for The Age, one of the country's national newspapers, describes how, in Melbourne, " meddling
with parks has always been easier said than done. " Plans to
establish a community garden within one park sparked local
anger. " One group of locals wanted the space to grow plants,
while others saw the move as a reduction of existing park
space for the benefit of few. " With that controversy in mind,
Deakin University associate professor Mardie Townsend suggested to Ker the " scouring (of) the urban environment for
places to establish new parks and community gardens, " including " taking advantage of laneways, disused blocks of land
and river frontages that are unsuitable for housing developments. " In the long term, she added, private companies could
turn some of their land into public recreation spaces.
We can also reframe the way existing open space is perceived and used. In San Diego, a citizen's group is attempting
to weave the city's natural canyons, which aren't physically
linked together, into a new urban canyonlands park; the idea
being that if you give the canyons a single name, you can better protect them - hurt one, and you've hurt them all. You can
also increase their use as parkland.
You emphasize inter-connectedness in The Nature
Principle, using the Thread Trail as an example. How far
along are communities across the country in realizing this
connectedness?
In Charlotte, North Carolina, the Catawba Lands Conservancy, a regional land trust, is the lead agency for the Carolina Thread Trail, a trail network that will eventually weave
through a huge area of North Carolina and South Carolina,
reach into 15 counties and serve over two million people. Similar park networks and wildlife corridors, usually on a smaller
scale, are being created throughout the United States, including my hometown of San Diego.
These networks are one way to increase what I call human/
nature social capital. Why, when we talk about social capital, do we only include humans? Scientists at the University of
Sheffield in the United Kingdom have found that the more species that live in a park, the greater the apparent psychological benefits to human beings. In related work, researchers at
the University of Rochester, in New York, report that exposure
to the natural environment appears to lead people to nurture
close relationships with fellow human beings, to value community, and to be more generous with money. Kinship with the
larger community of species can build our social capital and
help us feel more alive.

What ideas do you have for new parks, and what are the
chances for realizing them? Button parks, for example.
What if neighborhoods were to use the legal techniques of
land trusts to protect the pieces of nearby nature that are too
small for cities or even the major land trust organizations to
consider? " Pocket park " is the term for small parks created by
governments or developers; but button parks - well, people
can sew those on themselves. Park and trail networks such as
the Carolina Thread Trail could be strengthened over time,
politically and socially, if the people who live adjacent to the
trail were to become more directly involved not only in the
use of the trail but also in the creation of button parks. These
spaces wouldn't need to be physically connected to the trails
and parks, but would serve as small extensions throughout a
region. By going through the process of creating button parks,
people would learn about the growing importance land trusts
and public parks.
What else can parks and recreation professionals and
advocates do to act on the Nature Principle?
They can expand their already important role as advocates
for reconnecting children and adults to nature. New ways to
use nature as a family/friendship bonding agent are emerging, such as family nature clubs, through which multiple families hike or do another nature activities together. There are
now at least 100 of these family nature clubs around the country, some of them boasting several hundred families as members. Parks could distribute free family nature club toolkits,
like the one offered by the Children & Nature Network (www.-
childrenandnature.org).
They could also help educate people about the restorative
powers of nature, and how to apply what they learn in a wilderness or urban park to their own homes: creating healing gardens and wildlife sanctuaries, planting native species to bring
back bird and butterfly migrations. Parks and recreation professionals can literally seed that needed change (they could
distribute seeds for native plants).
Parks can also do even more to reflect the cultural and
racial diversity of America. And parks and recreation professionals and advocates can help organize a larger movement, one that many of us believe is coming, that could touch
every part of society. Some are already leaders in this great
change: the evolution of environmentalism and sustainability, merging with urban agriculture, the food movement, ecotherapy, biophilic design, citizen naturalists, the children
and nature movement, and others, to create a New Nature
Movement-one focused on human restoration through the
natural world.
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Parks & Recreation 69

June 2011 - Parks & Recreation

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