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i’m at city hall for the first meeting of the center of the city task force
introductions. jeff hayner. he likes parks in petoskey and chicago.
chip smith wants an outstanding public amenity. he likes the highline and washington sq park in cincinnati
ann dilcher likes active urban spaces like central park.
norm tyler likes rome.
miiles klapthor likes belle isle. (murmurings “good one!”)
dean yang likes public/private spaces. and public spaces in barcelona, names a couple of his favorites. (i want to know barcelona that well!)
hannah boettcher is a um student. likes a certain park in groningen.
carolyn loh likes a little square in paris.
meghan musolff is a librarian. wants a space that is full of amazing activities but also sustainable. she likes the diag. is inspired by the diag!
lorri sipes introduces herself as a neighbor of the library lot, here to represent the interests of her fellow condo owners. i mean, she said that. goes on to describe her sense of ownership of the city. 🤯 likes little parks in los angeles.
heather sipes is running the meeting (by default). she’s an urban planner.
alan haber couldn’t make it, so he is dialed in, but OMA limits his participation. he didn’t get to introduce himself, but everyone knows alan haber!
i would have liked to hear where his favorite park is. maybe in the little french village where he and odile summer.
agenda. they moved chair selection to the end. a2gov.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=A&…
OMA. ground rules. no name calling. don’t play on phones. (ulp — seen!). there will be a web site.
ms sipes speaks in favor of a program, not a design. ms dilcher chimes in: we don’t want to say where want a cafe, we just say we want a cafe. same for playground. and a fountain.
ms boetchher wants the report to be as specific as possible.
cm smith calls for a vision for the entire block and even the block across fifth, compares to the treeline process. now reversing gears, suggesting that the TF make specific recommendations to #a2council.
cm smith calls for a vision for the entire block and even the block across fifth, compares to the treeline process. now reversing gears, suggesting that the TF make specific recommendations to #a2council.
so not a design, not a program, but a vision. but also instructions to #a2council on the next steps. 🤔
ms loh wants to think of it as a land use issue, not a site issue.
cm hayner says that’s what the TF charter calls for.
cm smith wants a report that lays out a five-year process.
cm hayner says that’s what the TF charter calls for.
cm smith wants a report that lays out a five-year process.
mr yang suggest the possibility of a design competition for the site, like they did for the world trade center.
raise your hand if you participated in a design competition for the library lot in the last five years.
“… in perpetuity …” it’s too early to #drink, so 🙄
there is a draft TF charter a2gov.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=F&…
there is a long history to digest (including the report of the 1989 TF looking at the library lot 😳). ms sipes promises it will all hit the web site.
cm smith speaks to how prop a divided neighborhoods and households, says the voters have spoken, up to the TF to somehow bring everyone together. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
cliché report: cm hayner wants to leave no stone unturned.
cm smith wants to talk about public engagement and what the deliverable will look like at the next meeting
TF will meet on alternate wednesdays (kinda), sometimes from three to five, sometimes from four to six. a draft calendar is being discussed. a2gov.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=F&…
mr haber pipes in from france: “i’m feeling unheard.”
you had to be there: it was the quintessence of privilege.
you had to be there: it was the quintessence of privilege.
the TF, which has already gotten off to a late start, will meet only once in august, in part so that mr haber will miss only one august meeting.
the next task force meeting will be august 21 from 4 to 6 (presumably in #a2council chambers)
chair selection. ms loh nominates ms musolff as chair. mr Tyler nominates ms sipes as vice-chair. no other nominations. done.
public comment! i spoke!
joan lowenstein called for the TF to keep the city’s housing crisis in mind in the or vision and plans.
doug kelbaugh encourages the TF to learn a lot about public parks in europe. “to have a real park, you need big trees.”
will hathaway welcomes the members to the TF.
frank wilhelm from the library green conservancy thinks the TF has a once in a lifetime opportunity
my comments were basically: what i want from the library lot is more neighbors. as a moderate-to-heavy user of ann arbor parks — fuller pool, hunt park, the parks surrounding argo pond all pretty much weekly — what i don’t need is a little concrete park downtown.
and i know this because we have one of those, and i never use it! so good luck, friends (i continued), you have a tough task ahead of you that, at best, will end up with a plaza as nice as the one that we turned down ten million dollars for. end of comment.
@threadreaderapp please unroll
heather seyfarth, oops. city staff.
ms seyfarth, oops
and a pony
🙋🏽♂️
Because Ann Arbor’s 16,000 sq ft concrete pad (with no $$$) is just like New York’s World Trade Center
mr hathaway also trumpeted the fund-raising successes of the $55M treeline plan
