Homeless in Vancouver: More cheap thrills from Jonathan Rogers Park

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      Jonathan Rogers Park is less than two block away from the Go Green bottle depot, so I ride by it a lot. I also stop and enjoy it from time to time.

      The park boasts a washroom, soccer goal posts, a small children’s play area, a concrete wading pool which has not deliberately been filled in living memory, and a small community garden. Mostly it is a one block rectangle of grass fringed on two sides by trees—and residents seem to like it that way.

      Looking at it, big picture-wise

      Jonathan Rogers Park is a good illustration of why I think fields of green are irresistible to cash-strapped cities.

      I think parks may be to cities what reality shows are to television networks—lots of bang for the buck and cheap at twice the price.

      Putting a community centre and/or a public swimming pool on the land would be a fine thing and popular even, but it would be—I think—much more expensive to operate. Also it would make the land useful to fewer people in fewer ways.

      Jonathan Rogers Park is really just a blank sheet of grass for the neighbourhood to find uses for.

      • It is a soccer pitch
      • And a children’s playground
      • As well as a place to set up a water slide in the summer
      • And come autumn, it’s a place to blow off fireworks at Halloween
      • It is a year-round lunch room for employees from neighbouring businesses
      • Not to mention a place to let dogs run off-leash
      • And it’s such a popular place for street people to camp that area residents nickname it “Homeless Guy Park”
      • It’s where I watched the Vancouver Police test a camera drone several years ago
      • And where I once watched a woman practice a dance routine on stilts
      • Lastly, it gives some of the best sky in Vancouver

      Is there a cheaper way to provide a popular neighbourhood amenity (that doesn’t involve opening a fire hydrant on a very hot summer’s day)? 

      Stanley Q. Woodvine is a homeless resident of Vancouver who has worked in the past as an illustrator, graphic designer, and writer. Follow Stanley on Twitter at @sqwabb.

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