6/26/13 Chinatown Community Workshop Recap

Chinatown Community Workshop Recap

Boston Chinatown Neighborhood Center, 38 Ash Street

Wednesday, June 26, 2013 – 6:00 PM – 7:30 PM

 This post highlights the input and feedback that we received from attendees at our Chinatown Community Workshop on June 26, 2013.  Thanks to all those who attended and gave us their thoughts…

Download/View a copy of the presentation that we used.

The Chinatown community members present were engaged and provided thoughtful feedback on a number of issues regarding the Greenway including working with the Conservancy in partnership with the Chinatown safety committee to deal with the growing homeless population in the park. This issue has been a particular problem across the street in the grouping of trees along Surface Road. The Greenway Conservancy will continue to work with the community and Boston police on this issue.

Recycling was also addressed noting that these bins are mistakenly being used for trash on a regular basis. It was suggested that additional signage in Chinese could be very helpful in managing the problem. It was also suggested that having receptacles that have the cut outs for cans/bottles and not an open container would be helpful as well.

There was a request for additional cigarette but holders to be placed in the park, the Conservancy agreed that this would be helpful and will add an additional container as soon as possible.

The community inquired about pruning the tree along the unfinished edge of the park to allow for more light and increase safety in that area. There was request for additional lighting as well either additional fixtures or increase wattage to brighten the park at night. Conservancy staff suggested re-aiming the lights to see if that would improve the visibility at night first before looking into more costly alternatives.

A number of community members inquired about adding programming ideas like Chinese Opera, traditional music, cultural dance and martial arts demonstrations for the community to participate in. There was also discussion of a pavilion that could be used as a performance area for the public for these activities and seasonal festivals. This idea has been discussed with the community for some time and issues of design, cost, and use were again discussed at the workshop. The Greenway Conservancy is open to addressing some of these long term issues and will focus on some of the smaller more immediate issues like the lighting and safety now.

Chinatown Park much like the North End are very much neighborhood driven parks and the Greenway Conservancy looks forward to continuing to work with the Chinatown community to support the neighborhood and continue to improve the park experience.