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Direct Design Assistance: Dickerman Park
Existing Conditions 2003: |
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In 2003, Friends of the Parks and Trails of St. Paul and Ramsey County spearheaded an effort to create a vision for Dickerman Park in St. Paul. Dickerman Park is a city park located at the intersection of University Avenue and Fairview Avenue. The park was dedicated to the city in 1909 by the Griggs, Cooper & Company and Dickerman Investment for “park and parkway purposes”. However, since that time the property has been little used in the traditional sense of a park. Currently, the land is maintained by adjacent property owners and parking lots have been built on a portion of the park. To most, the land appears to be private property.
Working with Friends of the Parks and Trails, a technical advisory group that included the Design Center for American Urban Landscape, University UNITED, Public Art St. Paul, St. Paul on the Mississippi River Design Center, and others helped Friends of the Parks develop a consensus-building process for creating a vision for Dickerman Park. The process culminated in a charrette hosted by the Dickerman Park Task Force and facilitated by Tim Griffin, St. Paul on the Mississippi River Design Center. The task force included community residents, area business and property owners, representatives of elected officials and government agencies, and advocates from Friends of the Parks. From the four scenarios developed during the charrette, a technical advisory group crafted a resolution as well as two diagrammatic drawings, a near-term plan and a long-term conceptual illustration.
The assistance provided by the technical advisory group helped Friends of the Parks develop capacity for working in difficult situations where competing visions for green space present difficult challenges.
Outcome: In February 2004, the St. Paul Parks and Recreation Commission approved a resolution to accept the park report from the Dickerman Park Committee and agreed to include the park proposal in their 2004 Commission Action Plan. Dickerman family members from across the country have contributed over $45,000 for the upgrade of the park and the city of St. Paul has recommended $30,000 in Neighborhood STAR grant funds for the project. In 2005, the landscape architecture firm of Coen and Partners and artist Wing Yung Huie were hired to prepare a design for the park.
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