June 2014 - Parks & Recreation - 60

R O U N D TA B L E

them with more of the same is far costlier than to creatively look for opportunities to put green infrastructure in
its place, he says. Instead, cities need
to think in new ways. It's time to be
more innovative while designing and
building urban structures and spaces,
according to Van Valkenburgh.
As the planning directors and parks
directors from Philadelphia and Seattle demonstrated, these are two cities that are proving to be especially
forward-thinking in adopting green
infrastructure strategies, albeit in different ways.
Seattle requires all developers of
major projects to incorporate green
infrastructure into their projects as
they're designed and built through
a system called the Green Factor.
Additionally, a year and a half ago,
the city also enacted a climate action
plan to help manage runoff in major
storm events. Credits are awarded for
integrating green roofs, permeable
paving and other environmentally
advantageous features to sites, with
attention given to zones of the city
that have a need to reduce runoff and
improve infiltration.

Philadelphia
has
aggressively
embarked upon a 25-year green infrastructure plan that is the only
large-city, Environmental Protection
Agency-approved plan to address
stormwater management across an
entire city. The price tag is a hefty $1.2
billion, but it is in contrast to an esti-

Parks & Recreation

Parks and Health
When it comes to health, cities are
experiencing significant disparities
in life expectancy rates and trying
to turn around trends toward obe-

Parks and planning officials can take the lead in
treating [health] problems by executing more
thoughtful, deliberate decisionmaking about how
public space is funded and used.
mated $6 to $8 billion in gray infrastructure upgrades that it would have
taken to accomplish the same ends.
Mark Focht, Philadelphia's first
deputy commissioner for parks and
recreation, says their long-range plan
takes into account the historical development of the city and where residents live. " We have very dense rowhouses. So this is not about creating
new public green space; this is about

This one-acre stormwater wetland in the Saylor Grove parcel of Philadelphia's historic
Fairmount Park treats an estimated 70 million gallons of stormwater per year, thanks to
an innovative green infrastructure project created by Philadelphia Parks and Recreation
and the Philadelphia Water Department.

greening what we have, " he says of
their plan to create greened acres.

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sity and chronic disease, which
tend to be concentrated in lower-income and underserved neighborhoods. Parks and planning officials can take the lead in treating
these problems by executing more
thoughtful, deliberate decisionmaking about how public space is
funded and used.
Los Angeles sees an opportunity to change behaviors and lifestyle
habits of its residents by establishing new close-to-home parks, all at
the same time, through a grand vision to create 50 new parks in five
years. Michael Shull, acting general
manager of the Department of Recreation and Parks for the City of Los
Angeles, said they have set the goal
to have a park within a 10-minute
walk of all city residents.
Right now, access to parks in
some communities is " about as bad
as it gets, " he said at the roundtable event. In some parts of the
city, green space is abundant, but
in others, it's incredibly scarce
and hard to get to for a variety of
reasons. The less-served areas are
also often the ones with populations exhibiting the most severe

June 2014 - Parks & Recreation

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