[Sdpg] Heal Your Intersection! Repair Your City! City Repair Report on Slide Show and Talk, 3 more in LA, Ojai, SLO Dec 8, 7, 9 2004

[Wesley Roe and Marjorie Lakin Erickson]

  hi everyone
         here is a great writeup by Jason Keehn(thanks) about the Slide 
Show and Talk in LA by Mark Lakeman of City Repair Portland on Friday Dec 
3, read his email below is the last three Slide shows in Dec 6 Mon  LA, Dec 
7 Tues  Ojai and Dec 9 Thurs SLO, see details of times and place below  writeup

Heal Your Intersection! Repair Your City!


 >Date: Sat, 4 Dec 2004 09:45:49 -0800
 >To: twist at thelearningparty.com
 >From: twist at thelearningparty.com (Jason Keehn)
 >
 >
 >WOW.

I just saw the single most inspiring thing I've seen since I first went to
Burning Man in 98.
 >
 >It's called City Repair.  And if you're looking for an immediate, practical
 >antidote to the pall of Bushco-911-cover-up-voter-fraud-doom&gloom, this
 >may be it.
 >
 >The gist of City Repair is about turning your local intersection into a
 >public square. Mark Lakeman, an architect from Portland Oregon, and one of
 >the instigators of City Repair, spoke last night at the LA Eco-Village.
 >Mark showed dozens of slides of giant color murals Portland residents
 >painted in the middle of their intersections. Sunflowers, crop-circle
 >mandalas, spiral labyrinths and other designs. Images of people making
 >music, kids and adults painting and dancing in intersections. Building all
 >sorts of micro-community services and structures like info-nooks, poetry
 >corners, kids' playhouses, even a 24-hour free public solar powered
 >tea-station; some people offering up parts of their front lawns for
 >sculptured benches. [That's right--this is not Black Rock City, this is in
 >Urban Portland!] Plus they had the practical benefit of slowing traffic
 >speeds [and lowering crime?].
 >
 >All of these ideas and creations arose out of a process of neighborhood
 >dialogue at potlucks--a key point. The City Repair Project acts as a
 >facilitator of this process, inspiring but allowing actual projects to
 >emerge organically from a sustained dialogue.
 >
 >Out of this process has sprung other amazing events, like the
 >"hands-across-Portland" day (up to 7000 people forming a hand-holding
 >circle across many blocks of Portland), the "T-horse", a teahouse on wheels
 >that sprouts wings for shade and creates instant public space wherever it
 >stops, and the 10-day long yearly Village Building Convergence.
 >
 >The City Repair movement started in 95, when Lakeman, housemates and
 >neighbors decided they wanted to create a tiny community park in some
 >unclaimed land. Without asking anyone's permission, they went ahead and
 >started building stuff, and came up with a funky imaginative outdoor
 >community living room modeled on the image of a baby in the womb. Next,
 >inspired by the words of travelling Cherokee elder, they rallied the
 >neighborhood behind the idea of painting circles in the intersection. The
 >whole neighborhood wound up chipping in. Initially there was resistance
 >from the local transportation department, but the mayor was into it, and
 >eventually they got the ordinance changed to allow residents to do the same
 >all over Portland. Now there are apparently many dozens of these
 >'intersection repairs' all over Portland, each different, unique to its
 >neighborhood. The intersection repair idea is contagious, and is on an
 >exponential curve all over Portland. So much so that Mark can't even stay
 >on top of all the things people are doing.
 >
 >Lakeman is an amazing speaker, and has a real historical and political
 >perspective to this work. His slide show documents the contrasting dynamics
 >of the grid versus the circle in urban design. [The grid, btw, derives from
 >the Roman Empire--used for the layout of their army camps!] City repair is
 >anti-globalization in action, in detail, because it's about reclaiming your
 >local space and turning it into a human space for dialogue, interaction,
 >and creativity, rather than simply a crossing point for cars. Saliently
 >(and this is something I've been mulling over myself), Mark pointed out
 >that democracy is not just about punching holes in a ballot to say Yes or
 >No to issues that someone else has decided for you, but a process of civic
 >engagement. That process of civic engagement originally centered around the
 >city square, or community lodge, or piazza. And guess what? The United
 >States has the fewest public squares of any country (Mark's data). Very
 >convenient to those who profit off consumer culture, driving us all into
 >malls as the only faint simulacra of a community meeting point.
 >
 >One of the things I was struck with (not surprisingly) were the curious
 >parallels with the culture of Black Rock City. The power of the circle to
 >evoke community and sacred space. The exponential curve of creativity
 >flowing out of creative engagement with neighbors and strangers.  The sense
 >of empowerment and joy that co-creating your own place can bring.
 >

Mark will also be giving a talk Monday at noon at MTA Gateway Plaza, 15th
floor conference room in downtown LA.
www.cityrepair.org

CITY REPAIR UPCOMING DATES .

Dec. 6, Slide Show & Talk, MTA, One Gateway Plaza (where Cesar Chavez and
Vignes meet in downtown LA, noon, no charge, bring a brown bag lunch. 
213/738-1254 or <crsp at igc.org>.www.ic.org/laev/.

<<<<<
Dec 7 , Tues 5pm Dinner with Mark Lakeman
Farmer and Cook Farmer and the Cook Restaurant 39 El Roblar Drive, Meiners 
Oaks, CA (near Ojai)
www.farmerandcook.com
Please RSVP 805-640-9608

Dec 7 Tues 7pm A Street Corner Revolution slide show and talk with Mark 
Lakeman, donation $5
Help of Ojai, Little House , Kent Hall 111 West Santa Anna St (next to Ojai 
City Hall )
Turn off Hwy 150 onto Blanche St Ca between Bank of America and Star Market
Contact Santa Barbara Permaculture Network, sbpcnet at silcom.com 
www.sbpermaculture.org 805-962-2571,
<<<<

Dec 9 Thursday 7pm City Repair, A Street Corner Revolution slide show and 
talk with Mark Lakeman, donation $5
SLO Public Library 995 Palm Street
Contact Elaina Geltner at QuietStar Center for Transformation, 783-2662 or 
elaina at quietstar.com. " and Tara Burke 995-2904


Cosponsors L.A. Eco-Village, Santa Barbara Permaculture Network, Hopedance 
Magazine, The Sustainability Project, The
Community Environmental Center, Los Angeles Permaculture Guild, South Coast 
Permaculture Guild,www.GreenHomesForSale.com, Ojai Permaculture Guild, 
Sustainable Building Council SLO,Central Coast Permaculture Guild 
,QuietStar Center for Transformation

CHECK Santa Barbara Permaculture Network www.sbpermaculture.org Main 
Organizer for Mark's Tour

ARTICLE IN HOPEDANCE MAGAZINE NOV/DEC 2004 www.hopedance.org




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