Grew up in the area, lived off of College Ave for many years, and I spent a lot of time around the park since the late 90’s. Since that time it’s never really felt like a safe place for the people.
It’s always just struck me as dumping ground for people who need help and an unsafe place for consumption. I get the intentions, but the park is hub for some pretty violent crimes. People are calling in incidents to the cops all the time, and it’s been sketchy for decades.
I haven;t been there for too many years, sadly, but I think the park has always been sketchy. It sure was when I was there. It wasn’t a hub for violent crime, at least not in my era. Sketchy, though, has always been my home turf and always has my sympathies. Hell, I’m sketchy now.
Whoa, a stat sheet compiled to make People’s Park look as scary as possible!
I’ve lived in scarier places than that and been fine, and if “lots of crimes happen there” is justification for tearing a place down, send the wrecking crew to Washington DC.
There are definitely sketchier parts of the Bay Area. The TL for example. That said, those numbers for a 1 block park aren’t exactly fantastic.
But safety aside, my main point is that locals don’t universally want to keep the park as is. Far from it. A lot of locals believe the park has changed significantly since the 70’s, and not for the better. Many have been pushing hard to redesign that space for like 30 years.
I would argue that only thing more Berkeley than people’s park is the push to completely redevelop people’s park. Every couple years there is another big push to redevelop, and then counterwave of protests to halt redevelopment. There are two sides that are both quite loud and passionate.
Grew up in the area, lived off of College Ave for many years, and I spent a lot of time around the park since the late 90’s. Since that time it’s never really felt like a safe place for the people.
It’s always just struck me as dumping ground for people who need help and an unsafe place for consumption. I get the intentions, but the park is hub for some pretty violent crimes. People are calling in incidents to the cops all the time, and it’s been sketchy for decades.
I haven;t been there for too many years, sadly, but I think the park has always been sketchy. It sure was when I was there. It wasn’t a hub for violent crime, at least not in my era. Sketchy, though, has always been my home turf and always has my sympathies. Hell, I’m sketchy now.
It’s been quite bad for decades. These are the stats from city and campus police:
Whoa, a stat sheet compiled to make People’s Park look as scary as possible!
I’ve lived in scarier places than that and been fine, and if “lots of crimes happen there” is justification for tearing a place down, send the wrecking crew to Washington DC.
There are definitely sketchier parts of the Bay Area. The TL for example. That said, those numbers for a 1 block park aren’t exactly fantastic.
But safety aside, my main point is that locals don’t universally want to keep the park as is. Far from it. A lot of locals believe the park has changed significantly since the 70’s, and not for the better. Many have been pushing hard to redesign that space for like 30 years.
I would argue that only thing more Berkeley than people’s park is the push to completely redevelop people’s park. Every couple years there is another big push to redevelop, and then counterwave of protests to halt redevelopment. There are two sides that are both quite loud and passionate.
I love that line, and it feels exactly right. That’s my Berkeley.
My mind was made up on People’s Park thirty years ago, when I lived there. Beautiful place. :)