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Historic St. Luke’s Church gets new executive director

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ISLE OF WIGHT — Rachael Buchanan is brimming with excitement and ideas. She talks like she and the staff of the small brick church outside of Smithfield are going to revolutionize the historic tourism industry – and they just might, if Buchanan has her way.

Buchanan became the executive director at Historic St. Luke’s Church in Isle of Wight on Nov. 25, after a long career as a development director with other nonprofits, including the Red Cross and Planned Parenthood. When she first saw the opening listed this summer, Buchanan thought it was a joke. It was just too perfect of an opportunity, she said at the time. Now, she’s at the helm of one of the oldest churches in America, and she has big ideas about bringing St. Luke’s into the future.

The church has been through three major restoration efforts over the past 120 years and predates many of the area’s major historic landmarks, including Williamsburg and Jamestown. It was used as a stable for soldiers’ horses during the Civil War and has stood since the middle of the 17th century. Despite its history, St. Luke’s is still relatively little-known in the wider world.

“I’m looking forward to getting it well-known outside of Isle of Wight,” Buchanan said. “It’s Isle of Wight’s jewel, but it’s a national historic site.”

Buchanan talks a mile a minute, reeling off ideas that she hopes will get people as excited about St. Luke’s as she is — and increase donations in the process, because many of her ideas won’t come cheap.

For starters, Buchanan wants to give the site a facelift, updating signage, fences and landscaping to give the church more physical visibility, which Buchanan believes will help in her quest to raise the church’s national profile. As she puts it, “Before I go out and sell it, I want to polish it up.”

Before Buchanan can fire the starting gun on many of her big ideas, she must weather the church’s busiest time of the year – the stretch between Thanksgiving and New Year’s.

Many events are on the schedule, including three Christmas Eve services, and there’s an uptick in donations as people start to get into the giving spirit — not a bad problem for a non-profit to have, but one that will leave Buchanan spending a lot of her holiday writing thank-you notes.

“I don’t envy her honeymoon period,” said Charlotte Klamer, the outgoing executive director.

Buchanan received just four days of on-site training last week before Klamer handed over the keys. “It’s trial by fire. Oh, fun,” Buchanan laughed. “I like a challenge.”

The church will host its annual Christmas Open House on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1, which will double as an unofficial welcome for Buchanan – by then, she will have about a week as executive director under her belt.

Klamer said the church shifted from “a sleepy little historic church” in the direction of a functional business during her more than nine years as director.

“What everybody wanted was to make it more competitive in the tourism industry,” Klamer said, noting that Buchanan was chosen to take charge of St. Luke’s in part because of her background in fundraising.

Buchanan plans to seek out corporate partnerships and government grants, which have been a major contributor to the church’s rehabilitation efforts. The church just completed a $500,000 preservation project, financed by a federal grant and a matching contribution from the Smithfield-Luter Foundation.

Buchanan said she also has plenty of grant-writing experience – she wrote her first proposal when she was 11, as a Girl Scout seeking funding for large-print Bibles for her grandfather’s church. She said fundraising is in her blood and her greatest challenge will be learning the ins and outs of preservation.

“It’s a huge responsibility to maintain the integrity of the site,” Buchanan said. “I’m intimidated by what Charlotte’s leaving me, but excitedly so.”

Buchanan’s excitement for the position was also a major reason she was chosen to fill the spot, according to Klamer.

“You could not do this job with all the time and effort it takes if you don’t have the passion,” Klamer said. “You don’t want to turn over your efforts to someone who’s not going to take it and run with it. Rachel’s going to run with it.”

Some of Buchanan’s big ideas include building a separate museum to house the church’s artifacts (an idea previously floated by board members), bettering their digital outreach, marketing the church a “historic wedding destination” for couples who want to step backward in time, and even hosting classic car shows.

“The church was here in the 1960s too. Why not? There’s a lot of places to grow,” she said. “I don’t ever want to leave the history behind, but I want to bring St. Luke’s into the future.”

Murphy can be reached by phone at 757-247-4760.

Making a life in the world of gardening

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Every year, more people find a life for themselves in the world of gardening, some as landscapers, others as arborists and many working in nurseries, helping to grow plants for market.

Here’s a look at some of the success stories; young people who have forged a career for themselves as horticultural professionals.

Matt Vandenberg with his gardening crew.
Matt Vandenberg with his gardening crew.

Matt Vandenberg, a graduate of the two-year horticultural diploma course in 2001 at Kwantlen School of Horticulture in Langley, is now the owner of his own landscape installation company, Vandenberg’s Landscape Design in Aldergrove.
It was natural for Matt Vandenberg to follow the footsteps of his dad and go into landscaping.
His father, Henry, had run a successful landscaping business for more than 34 years when he retired in 1998.

Matt Vandenberg

Matt Vandenberg

Matt worked for various landscapers, including Bruce Hunter, one of B.C.’s most well-known landscape professionals. “Bruce had a big influence on me and put me on the career path I needed to pursue.”
After graduating with his horticultural diploma from Kwantlen, Matt worked for another year for Hunter before launching his own company in 2002.
Over the past 10 years, he has established himself as a top-notch landscape installer, concentrating on residential projects and garden renovation work all over the Lower Mainland, “Our specialty is hard-landscaping — paving, walls, stonework — but we also know our plants and know where to find perfect specimens for the job.”
Matt has been a regular participant at the B.C. Home and Garden Show, producing award-winning show gardens that have helped elevate the garden content of the show.
Now a father with four children, he loves his life as a landscaper.
“I say I haven’t worked a day in my life — it is like a hobby for me. It is great when you have a job that makes you feel that way, that it is pure fun and not work at all”

Marina McEwan

Marina McEwan

Marina McEwan is a 2005 graduate of the nursery production program at Kwantlen Polytechnic’s School of Horticulture.
Since graduating, 28-year-old McEwan has been responsible for growing most of the key flower crops for Amsterdam Greenhouses in Pitt Meadows, including all the tens of thousands of summer bedding plants — marigolds, petunias, impatiens, begonias, many of which get distributed to other garden centres.
“I have always liked plants,” says McEwan, who is originally from Prince George.
“It was a natural thing for me to go into horticulture.”
“One of the reasons I prefer greenhouse work over landscaping is because you are inside in the shade most of the time, out of the summer heat,” she adds.
She is also responsible for growing 30,000 cyclamen, as well as 11,000 pansies for the late-summer/early-fall market, as well as growing fuchsia patio-trees (called. fuchsia standards) for the nursery.
I like doing this work a lot. I can see myself staying and doing this for many years to come,” she says.
“It is fun to see the plants develop from seed and become beautiful specimens people want to buy.”

Jeff Case pruning a tree.

Jeff Case pruning a tree.

Jeff Case, graduate of the arborists technician level 1 program at Kwantlen School of Horticulture, is now working full time with the tree crew for North Vancouver’s parks department.
Originally from Ottawa, Case, 37, came to Vancouver four years ago after working with the Canadian Forest Service in Ontario on reforestation projects, as well as working with a research scientist on various tree studies.
He already had a forest technician diploma and a degree in forestry before enrolling at Kwantlen to get some technical skills suitable for a career in urban arboriculture.
While he is still working with trees, the switch to working arborist has been a career change for Case, and one that has given him much more individual responsibility, as well as a far more active working day.
“There is a difference in terms of practical application in dealing with trees in an urban environment compared to traditional forestry.
“The Kwantlen courses focused a lot more on practical techniques of arboriculture and taught me basic skills, such as how to use rigging, proper cutting techniques, operate chippers and stump grinders properly, and so on.”
For two years, he was one of the key arborists with Davey Tree in Burnaby, where he was classified as a “ground arborist,” primarily responsible for site cleanup, operating the chipper and working with a certified arborist, whether felling a tree or pruning or hedging.
He is an expert at deep root fertilization, a technique that pumps organic nutrients into the ground around a tree that is failing to thrive or declining because of being planted in impoverished soil.
Case has quickly progressed into the role of a climbing arborist.
“I have a real passion for trees, particularly trees in the urban environment,” Case says.
“And I particularly enjoy educating people about the benefits of trees and the right way to look after them.”
He says even during his years working in forestry, he always had an interest in the “dynamics and synergies” of tress in an urban environment and he also found he was happiest working with his hands doing practical arboriculture work.
“It is important to do cuts properly in order to maximize the benefit to the tree. Any time you do cut a tree, it negatively impacts it, but there is a way of making cuts to minimize that.
“It is exciting, as well as challenging work with a variety of challenges that you need to overcome each day.”
Case plans to continue his education at Kwantlen and will take the next two levels in the arborist program, which will focus on consultation and assessment work as well as advance skills as a climbing arborist.
“I know that in discussions with a client it is often necessary to say what would work best for the tree because we are always looking to satisfy the client while at the same time protect the esthetic integrity of the tree.”

swhysall@vancouversun.com

Bravo Brazil: Your gardens are beautiful

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My mind is still a jumble of thrilling scenes and unforgettable images after spending two weeks visiting some of the most spectacular gardens and places in Brazil.

The tour I was leading started out at Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, jumped over to the bustling city of Belo Horizonte in Minas Gerais and ended up at Iguazu Falls, one of the world’s seven natural wonders, on the Argentina/Paraguay border.

On the way, we visited amazing gardens, most of them designed or inspired by, but always imprinted with, the bold, unmistakable signature of Brazil’s most famous and celebrated landscape architect, Roberto Burle Marx.

Burle Marx was a genius of style. He was not only a superb garden designer and knowledgeable plantsman, but also an artist who produced strikingly original images that have deeply penetrated the collective consciousness of Brazil.

You can see his iconic black and white art squiggles embedded in the pavements and sidewalks all over Rio de Janeiro.

But it was his unwavering enthusiasm for using indigenous South American plants, especially palms, agaves, yuccas, bromeliads, maranta, sansevieria, aloes and unusual tropical trees and shrubs that gave his landscapes their distinctive personality and lush, exotic ambience. We started out by visiting the place where Burle Marx lived and worked until the end of his life: the 3.6-hectare Burle Marx estate, a magnificent garden property in Barra de Guaratiba, on the outskirts of Rio. Burle Marx bought the estate in 1949 with the help of his brother. At the time, the property was mostly undeveloped, but did have a lovely 17th-century chapel, once used by Carmelite nuns.

Burle Marx moved to live permanently on the estate in 1973 until his death at 84 in 1994.

Rather than see the property disappear after his death, Burle Marx bought out his brother and made sure the wonderful garden and art collections were preserved for the future.

Today, the garden, which contains an estimated 3,500 species of plants, is owned and operated by the government.

Stepping through the front gates, we were immediately aware of Burle Marx’s love for native plants.

Huge, lush palms were everywhere and Adam’s rib philodendrons (Monstera deliciosa) scrambled as high as 18 metres up the trunks of trees.

Most trees were also home to various epiphytic plants – orchids, bromeliads, staghorn ferns and air plants – and as we slowly ascended the hillside along an avenue of Brazilian ironwood trees (Caesalpinia ferrea), we passed grove after grove of sculptural agaves, aloes, aechmea, yuccas, cycads and tropical euphorbias.

At the top of the hill, we reached the house, with its elegant interior of hand-painted blue ceilings and tastefully decorated walls, where Burle Marx lived until his death.

The veranda overlooked a charming water garden where borders were crammed with sansevieria and bright yellow grasses while ornate granite columns rising out of the pond were topped with elegant bromeliads.

There were large plumeria trees, also known as frangipani, and great clouds of pink blooming woolly congea (Congea tomentosa).

Holiday plants for gifts or decorating

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By Carol Stocker, who will be on line live to answer your holiday decorating questions Thursday, Dec. 5 from 1-2 p.m….Many houseplants that bloom in December have become staples of holiday decorating, including azaleas, Christmas cactus, cyclamen, kalanchoe, paper whites, phalaenopsis orchids, amaryllis, and, of course, poinsettias.

Hot, dry, modern houses, however, are a trial for most houseplants, including Christmas plants, which are happier in drafty old homes with uninsulated windows. If you are going to discard the plants after blooming, don’t worry about providing ideal conditions. However, if you want to keep them long term, consider setting them up in a cool, sunny area, such as a porch or sunroom, to be brought out for display when company arrives. Don’t put plants near a radiator or on a TV set or they won’t even last through Christmas. Most have received enough feeding from the professional growers to glide through the holidays without more fertilizing. Careful watering, though, will prolong flowering.

Azaleas: Many of the Indian azaleas (Rhododendron simsii) purchased as classy decorations each holiday season will wilt and drop their leaves in a week. The usual culprit is hot, dry air. The secret of enjoying many weeks of bloom is to make sure the soil is always wet. Not just moist. Wet. Don’t despair if they wilt. Many are grown in peat that can become impermeable after it dries out. Just soak the entire pot in a sink. These plants also need a cool but bright location that is not in direct sunlight. The ideal temperature is 50 to 60 degrees. Obviously, this is cooler than most houses, but you can compensate by misting the foliage daily, removing at the same time any spent flowers.

Indian azaleas will bloom again next winter if you move them to a cool room after flowering, continue watering, and start fertilizing. Let them spend the summer outdoors in their pots and wait until October to bring them indoors to help set new buds. Then put them in a bright but cool room. When the flowers open, move them to their temporary display area. If you want holiday azaleas to enjoy now but plant outdoors later, look for the less common Japanese azaleas (Rhododendron obstusum), which look similar but are winter hardy.

Christmas cactus: Both the winter-blooming Christmas cactus and its popular cousin, the spring-blooming Easter cactus, have willing dispositions and flat arching stems that terminate in colorful flowers. They don’t need as much water as azaleas. They make the best long-term houseplants on this list, so don’t throw them out. Instead, to get them to rebloom next year, decrease moisture to almost nothing after they finish flowering so they can have a rest period. Then trim the ends of the stems to increase branching (and flowering), and move them outdoors in a shady spot from June until frost is predicted. They form buds in response to shortening daylight, so keeping them outdoors as long as possible helps set their flowering clock. Back indoors, keep them dryish and cool until they bloom again, then increase watering. If your plants have scalloped stems instead of stem margins with pointed projections, don’t expect them to rebloom for Christmas. They are Easter cactus.

Cyclamens: Most homes are too warm to keep these as long-term houseplants. With care, though, you can keep the little flowers with their elegant swept-back petals in bloom for several months. They like to be in a cool, bright, north window where they won’t get direct sunlight, and should be moist at all times. Like African violets and gloxinias, cyclamens will rot if their leaves and crowns become wet, so immersing the pots just up to the soil line in a sink or bowl of tepid water for 10 minutes is the best way to water.

Most people discard cyclamens after they bloom. To try to keep them, reduce watering and stop feeding them to induce dormancy until midsummer. Then repot them with fresh soil mixture, making sure the bulb-like corms are one-third above the soil line, and resume watering and fertilizing. Put these in a north window where temperatures remain between 50 and 60 degrees after their summer outdoors.

Kalanchoes: These long-flowering plants have large flower heads in red, white, orange, lilac, pink, or yellow that make me think of a Mexican fiesta. The palette is just too sunny for Christmas, but they tolerate warm temperatures better than most plants. After they bloom, discard them, or prune the tops and place the pots on a shady windowsill. Keep the compost nearly dry for a month and then put them in a sunny window and water normally. Growers are able to make them flower at any season, but you can’t, so if they do rebloom, it will be in spring 16 months later.

Norfolk Island pine: Often sold as miniature potted Christmas trees, slow-growing araucarias will eventually reach 5 feet and are easy to keep. They need repotting only every three years as they like to be root-bound. Water sparingly in winter, but mist them occasionally.

Paperwhites: These fragrant narcissus bulbs are usually grown on top of a bowl of pebbles covered with water that just touches their basal plates on the bottoms. This is where the roots will sprout, winding quickly through the pebbles to anchor themselves. Some people find the smell of traditional white paperwhites too strong and prefer the more softly scented yellow varieties. Give them the sunniest spot you can so they don’t grow too tall reaching for the light. They will probably flop anyway, unless you tie them up. Discard them after blooming.

Phalaenopsis orchids: These flat-faced moth orchids are the easiest orchids to grow and make tasteful gifts. All orchids need high humidity, which can be achieved by misting the leaves and placing the pots on top of large saucers filled with pebbles in water that evaporates and creates a moist, mini-climate without actually touching the roots. An east- or west-facing window is best if you have some lightweight curtains to shield them from direct sun, which will cause brown spots on leaves. They will greatly benefit from some supplemental grow lights in the winter, as they need at least 10 hours of light a day to rebloom. Fertilize them during the summer months. Well-grown phalaenopsis will bloom year-round. They have no resting period, so keep them moist at all times.

Poinsettias: These euphorbias aren’t exactly made of plastic, but they are treated with chemicals to keep them compact, and engineered to bloom for up to six months, longer than most of us would like. What we think of as flowers are really colored leaves. When buying plants, look for the true flowers, which are tiny yellow buds in the center of the flower-head. They should not be showing pollen. Let poinsettias dry out between waterings but water them immediately if the leaves begin to wilt. Misting is also beneficial.

Poinsettias should be discarded after flowering, but if you like a challenge cut the stems back to 4-inch stumps after the leaves have fallen and water them very little. In May, move them to larger pots with some new compost and increase watering and start fertilizing. Thin the new growth to five stems. They can spend the summer outdoors until the end of September. Then comes the hard part. You must cover them each evening with black polythene bags so they get exactly 14 hours of complete darkness until their unveiling the next morning. This will add a glum note to your decor, and if you forget to cover them for even one evening, your plants won’t color up. After eight weeks of this, treat them normally and they will bloom for Christmas. Without the greenhouse-applied growth retardants, they will be taller.

Fisher Tomlin & Bowyer reveal Blind Veterans UK new woodland garden design

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Woodland garden for Blind Veterans UK

UK garden designers Fisher Tomlin Bowyer have released details of the new woodland garden that will be built at Blind Veterans UK new Llandudno Centre. And work is already underway to transform 4 acres of woodland into a useful resource for those using the centre and local residents.

Founding Director Andrew Fisher Tomlin said “It was a great honor to be asked to provide master planning and creative designs to transform what was an unused but very valuable resource. The new woodland will include a series of experiences linked by a matrix of paths where vision impaired ex-servicemen and women can enjoy the woodland in groups as well as on their own. ” Amongst other features the new woodland includes a meeting space formed from a glade with a central outdoor fireplace to make it an all year round destination. Other features include a special wildlife and bird watching walk as well as shelters, hides and a raised walkway through a densely planted tree planting.

Fisher Tomlin added “ This isn’t just for members of Blind Veterans UK who are visiting the centre but also a great resource for the whole community for example local school children will be able to experience the woodland wildlife. We’re especially keen to get nurseries involved in the supply of new plant material and attract companies such as tree surgeons to provide long term support to the new woodland garden’s maintenance.”

In addition to the woodland Fisher Tomlin Bowyer are designing a separate kitchen garden that will include some more unusual edible plants inspired by the work of James Wong and Mark Diacono and chosen for their ability to provide year round interest.

Paul Wynne-Williams who is leading the project said “Blind Veterans UK has been providing services to veterans since 1915 and as we approach our 100th year this is a great way to celebrate the work that we do by providing a resource that not just our visitors but the whole community can use.”

Further Information

Fisher Tomlin Bowyer create gardens and parks from their offices in Wimbledon, London and Chobham in Surrey. The company provides design and horticulture services worldwide for which they have received a number of international awards.

Blind Veterans UK (formerly St Dunstan’s) is a national charity that believes that no-one who has served our country should have to battle blindness alone. It provides blind and vision impaired ex-Service men and women with lifelong support including welfare support, rehabilitation, training, residential and respite care.

The charity needs £100 million over 5 years to provide lifelong support to blind ex-Service men and women. Find out more at: www.blindveterans.org.uk, and follow us on Facebook at: www.facebook.com/blindveteransuk and on Twitter at: twitter.com/blindveterans.

For further information please contact Andrew Fisher Tomlin on
Email – andrew@fishertomlin.com
Telephone – +44(0) 1276 855900 or +44 (0) 7957 855457
Website address – www.andrewfishertomlin.com

This press release was distributed by SourceWire News Distribution on behalf of e-Zone UK in the following categories:
Education Human Resources, Men’s Interest, Entertainment Arts, Leisure Hobbies, Home Garden, Women’s Interest.
For more information visit http://www.sourcewire.com/about

Dubai’s Miracle Garden opens today with 45 million flowers

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With over 45 million flowers this season, Miracle Garden in Dubailand is all set to open its door to the public today.

Click to see gallery of Dubai’s Miracle Garden in full flower

In the second season, Miracle Garden will have a UAE floral flag, a floral clock, a butterfly park, an aromatic garden and an edible garden, Akar Landscaping Services Agriculture, the developer’s of the garden, said in a statement emailed to Emirates 24l7.

“Nearly 700,000 people visited our garden during the first season (February 14 to May 18, 2013). In this new season, we are expecting the numbers to cross a million,” the company said.

A floral UAE flag

Miracle Garden will open in two phases. The first phase, opening today, will have huge structures of sunflowers, seven flower hearts, seven stars and huge stunning flowers made with 3D art design.

The garden will have seven pyramids, including a huge one with the UAE flag designed by flowers. There will be two flower arch pathways shaded by hanging flower baskets, adding a romantic vibe to the garden. Besides, there will be also an umbrella pathway, a flower tunnel, Lilium flower lamps and a birthday corner made with 3D design.

A Ferrari car with driver decorated by flowers, a vertical buried cars zone, flower apple structures, artificial animals, flower boats and an  Islamic Arch Design will also be part of phase one.

Floral clock

For the first time in Dubai, there will a floral clock, around 13 meters in diameter, made out of real plants and flowers with changeable design for every season (twice a year). The clock will have a small bird house with the bird tweeting every 15 minutes.

Colorful peacocks

There will be three colorful peacocks with two of them with a large fanlike opened tails, 12 meters in diameter, and one with closed tail, around 13 meters in length, designed with colored flowers posed on the Green floor.

Butterfly Park

Phase 2, which will open in January, will have the Butterfly Garden, which will be a round shape garden designed in 3D and decorated with flowers.

There garden will be nine domes, spread across 1,800 square meters, with each dome filled with different color, sizes and species of butterflies.

“Between these domes, we will have an alluring butterfly museum and butterfly flower park. All the designs will be built consistently on the butterfly garden theme,” the company added.

Aromatic Garden

Visitors will be able to see and smell natures most powerful aromatic and medicinal plants from over 200 countries. One can touch, smell and even make his own cup of tea, fresh from the garden.

“We will have seating areas and service counters to provide cups and seats for the visitors comfort,” according to the company.

There will be an Edible Plants Garden where visitor will be allowed to pluck vegetable or fruits. A Strawberry Garden will also be part of phase 2.

Located in Dubailand, Miracle Garden’s entrance fee is Dh20 per adult while disabled and kids three years and below will allowed free of charge.

Dubai Miracle Garden will be open all through the week – 9am to 9 pm on weekdays and 9 am to 11 pm/12 am during weekends.

Can Mayor Garcetti Make LA’s Streets Great?

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STREET TALK-In 2009, then New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg made one of the biggest changes Manhattan had ever seen. It had nothing to do with Big Gulps. Bloomberg and his transportation czar Janette Sadik-Khan took a congested section of Times Square and closed it to traffic. They erected barriers, painted the asphalt, added beach chairs and — presto! — the street became a park. 

These and other instant plazas reduced injuries to pedestrians and motorists while they boosted retail receipts. Most importantly, they returned the public realm to the people.

Can the same magic happen in LA? For his first act as new mayor, Eric Garcetti unveiled the “Great Streets Initiative.”  

Of course, LA already has great streets. A few, anyway: Ventura Boulevard is teeming with energy. First Street in Boyle Heights is a real community gathering spot. Abbot Kinney Boulevard — anti-gentrification protests — has become a hipster haven. But greatness doesn’t happen by accident: These places are like stages set with wide sidewalks, tamed traffic and authentic retail so that daily social dramas can happen. 

Then there are the duds. Lincoln Boulevard from Marina del Rey to Santa Monica should be great. Instead it’s a headache of auto-domination, cluttered signage and crummy landscaping. (My mother called it “Stinkin’ Lincoln.”) 

As LA Times reporter Michael Finnegan noted, Garcetti has created a Great Streets Working Group, in which eight city agencies will collaborate (imagine that!) to create new medians, sidewalk repairs, bus stops, police patrols, bike corrals, business improvement districts and, yes, pocket parks.

“And while we’re at it, let’s add some sculptures and murals,” Garcetti announced at an October transportation conference by the Urban Land Institute, Los Angeles. 

“Their first priority will be to make sure street projects are coordinated. No more Bureau of Street Services paving a street on Monday, DWP digging it up on Tuesday,” said Garcetti. “Let’s also combine a DWP pipe project with some street furniture funds and with a sidewalk repair project all at the same time.” Here’s the video of his speech.  

But this “first priority” is a no-brainer. It doesn’t take an urban visionary to see that departments should work together. 

What would really transform the landscape is a Times Square-like project. Something big and bold. The ideas are already floating out there… some of which Garcetti endorsed as a City Councilman from Hollywood. He could cover L.A.’s sub-surface freeways, such as the 101, and turn them into parks. He could join forces with L.A.’s uber-popular Cyclavia events and revive the dormant bike-share program, such as those successful in Chicago in New York. 

And he could identify the streets at present designed only to flush traffic through town and instead give them a human dimension. These places constitute our meager public spaces. Let’s cede more of them to walkers, to runners, to bikers, to skaters, to moms with strollers. To us. 

When Bloomberg’s transportation chief Janette Sadik-Khan did this, there was opposition, naturally. But, according to Esquire magazine’s profile of “16 Geniuses Who Give Us Hope,” she created plazas in at Madison, Herald and Union Square. “A whole long stretch of Broadway — two hundred thousand square feet, the size of three and a half football fields — is a pedestrian parkland, tables and flowers and sweating tourists resting their eighty-pound Toys ‘R’ Us bags while billboards glint commercially above them.” In her inspiring TED talk, Sadik-Khan sums up these changes.  

Her changes were a huge success. Maybe the best move Garcetti could make is to hire her.

 

(Jack Skelley is an urbanologist and marketing expert … and owner of JSPR. He blogs at HuffingtonPost.com [[hotlink]]] where this column was first posted. More on Skelley here.)  

-cw

 

 

 

 

 

CityWatch

Vol 11 Issue 96

Pub: Nov 29, 2013

 

 

 

CORRECTION: Santa Clarita Roundabout To Get Landscape, More Input

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CORRECTS THE FIGURES ATTRIBUTED TO CITY COUNCILWOMAN MARSHA MCLEAN 
Santa Clarita residents will have the center of their roundabout landscaped, with a minimalist approach, after two go-rounds of public input, including online surveys, and much discussion of the controversial traffic circle.

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The move sets aside the most recent results of a public outreach effort that called on City Council members to “Do nothing” with the space, which Santa Clarita Mayor Bob Kellar attributed to prior grievances residents had with the roundabout itself.These two ideas were the results of the Santa Clarita Arts Commission input

“I think a lot of those people who chose the ‘do nothing’ option didn’t want a roundabout there,” Kellar said, questioning whether those same residents would still choose that if they knew it meant barren concrete would be the centerpiece.

The sentiment seemed to be echoed by three of his fellow councilmembers, who were unhappy with the survey results for the Newhall roundabout at the intersection Newhall Avenue, Fifth Street and Main Street in Old Town Newhall.

City Councilwoman Marsha McLean had a different takeaway, as well.

“I look at the figures just a little bit differently,” McLean said.

“Almost 200 people said, ‘Do nothing,’ but 303 people said, ‘do something,’” she said. “I think (the 303) far outweighs the ‘do nothing.’”

City Councilman Frank Ferry said he wasn’t going to be around when future decisions on the topic are made, however, he didn’t think Santa Clarita became one of the greatest cities in the state by making “doing nothing” an option.

City Councilwoman Laurene Weste reconsidered her earlier stance, in light of the results, after initially feeling that the second-most popular option — a statue of Bill Hart and his horse Fritz — would be the best choice.

In September, she said, “We need to nail it down and get it started.”

On Tuesday, she suggested that the council wait until community input was solicited on a master plan for the arts community, which might bring more input and a more deliberate choice for art in the city.

“I just don’t think there’s a rush,” Weste said. “We have time to spend with the very talented arts commissioners we have,” adding that public input is always part of the process in any city of Santa Clarita decision.

City Councilman TimBen Boydston said while he wasn’t necessarily in favor of doing nothing, if that was what the people wanted, it was important to follow through on public outreach.

“I believe strongly that if you ask the people, you should listen to them,” Boydston said.

Santa Clarita results from the Newhall roundabout survey Kellar followed up on Weste’s comment, adding that the city should do an appropriate level of landscaping, since that was the second most popular option of the people who wanted to do something. (Initial cost estimates for a bronze Hart statue were placed at roughly $100,000, roughly double the centerpiece’s budget.)

“We should  do some level of appropriate landscaping,” Kellar said, “and at some time in the near future when we get our master plan in place, we can take a further review.”

City Manager Ken Striplin said a motion wasn’t necessary, merely direction for staff, which was the goal of the discussion.

“We’ll proceed with doing minimal landscaping,” Striplin said, adding that that would leave the city open for input later in the process.

Do you have a news tip? Call us at (661) 298-1220, or drop us a line at community@hometownstation.com.

Article: CORRECTION: Santa Clarita Roundabout To Get Landscape, Input
Source: Santa Clarita News
Author: Perry Smith

CORRECTION: Santa Clarita Roundabout To Get Landscape, Input

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CORRECTS THE FIGURES ATTRIBUTED TO CITY COUNCILWOMAN MARSHA MCLEAN 
Santa Clarita residents will have the center of their roundabout landscaped, with a minimalist approach, after two go-rounds of public input, including online surveys, and much discussion of the controversial traffic circle.

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The move sets aside the most recent results of a public outreach effort that called on City Council members to “Do nothing” with the space, which Santa Clarita Mayor Bob Kellar attributed to prior grievances residents had with the roundabout itself.These two ideas were the results of the Santa Clarita Arts Commission input

“I think a lot of those people who chose the ‘do nothing’ option didn’t want a roundabout there,” Kellar said, questioning whether those same residents would still choose that if they knew it meant barren concrete would be the centerpiece.

The sentiment seemed to be echoed by three of his fellow councilmembers, who were unhappy with the survey results for the Newhall roundabout at the intersection Newhall Avenue, Fifth Street and Main Street in Old Town Newhall.

City Councilwoman Marsha McLean had a different takeaway, as well.

“I look at the figures just a little bit differently,” McLean said.

“Almost 200 people said, ‘Do nothing,’ but 303 people said, ‘do something,’” she said. “I think (the 303) far outweighs the ‘do nothing.’”

City Councilman Frank Ferry said he wasn’t going to be around when future decisions on the topic are made, however, he didn’t think Santa Clarita became one of the greatest cities in the state by making “doing nothing” an option.

City Councilwoman Laurene Weste reconsidered her earlier stance, in light of the results, after initially feeling that the second-most popular option — a statue of Bill Hart and his horse Fritz — would be the best choice.

In September, she said, “We need to nail it down and get it started.”

On Tuesday, she suggested that the council wait until community input was solicited on a master plan for the arts community, which might bring more input and a more deliberate choice for art in the city.

“I just don’t think there’s a rush,” Weste said. “We have time to spend with the very talented arts commissioners we have,” adding that public input is always part of the process in any city of Santa Clarita decision.

City Councilman TimBen Boydston said while he wasn’t necessarily in favor of doing nothing, if that was what the people wanted, it was important to follow through on public outreach.

“I believe strongly that if you ask the people, you should listen to them,” Boydston said.

Santa Clarita results from the Newhall roundabout survey Kellar followed up on Weste’s comment, adding that the city should do an appropriate level of landscaping, since that was the second most popular option of the people who wanted to do something. (Initial cost estimates for a bronze Hart statue were placed at roughly $100,000, roughly double the centerpiece’s budget.)

“We should  do some level of appropriate landscaping,” Kellar said, “and at some time in the near future when we get our master plan in place, we can take a further review.”

City Manager Ken Striplin said a motion wasn’t necessary, merely direction for staff, which was the goal of the discussion.

“We’ll proceed with doing minimal landscaping,” Striplin said, adding that that would leave the city open for input later in the process.

Do you have a news tip? Call us at (661) 298-1220, or drop us a line at community@hometownstation.com.

Article: CORRECTION: Santa Clarita Roundabout To Get Landscape, Input
Source: Santa Clarita News
Author: Perry Smith