Brickell Is Finally Getting A Park For Children
Photo courtesy of Paola Andrea
Anyone who lives in Brickell and has a family will tell you that one of the things the neighborhood lacks is a proper park for little kids. Sure, Mary Brickell Park has a playscape and also the park across from Santa Maria in South Brickell, but both of those are designed for kids that are older. There are no swings, no slide and no fun for the little ones…until now.
Three years ago, Southside Park was one of many in Miami that were closed for remediation due to contaminated soil. It was a huge controversy at the time, but today things are looking up for the green spaces. Most have already reopened, and Southside Park officially reopened in June of 2016, only to close again this year for the addition of a much-needed playscape.
At long last moms, dads and nannies will be able to take the kids out to play without taking the MetroMover to Bayfront Park, schlepping across the Brickell Key Bridge in the blistering summer heat, or getting our cars out to go to Key Biscayne or Alice Wainwright park! Thank you, City of Miami!!
For those who are unfamiliar, Southside Park is located just west of the Metrorail tracks at 140 SW 11th Street, just west of Axis at Brickell. As you can see from the photos, it is still very much under construction but looks really fun for the little ones already!!
Photo courtesy of Paola Andrea
Blighted Lots West Of Adrienne Arscht Center To Become Park Space
Image from The New Tropic
The vacant lots around North Miami Avenue and 13th Street in Downtown Miami have been a blighted eyesore for years now, but that is changing as we speak. Brad Knoefler, the owner of Bar 1306 nearby, has made it his business to redevelop these lots into something more usable and enjoyable. With help of the Omni CRA, the area will become a 4 block park space until construction of the 395 flyover bridge begins.
Knoefler isn’t a stranger to redevelopment of park space, he is the man behind the Grand Central temporary park that was located on the site that was once the Miami Arena and near his previous bar/nightclub, Grand Central. For Grand Central Park, he invested $80,000 of his own money and used $200,000 of CRA funds to transform the lot into a skate park, according to The New Tropic. For Omni Park, he vows to up the ante by investing differently. Rather than purchasing landscaping and permanent structures that will ultimately be removed when the park closes, he is investing in structures that can be relocated at the end of the park’s term.
For shelter, they are designing cafes and restaurant spaces from shipping containers and portable chikee huts for shade outside of the trees that already exist in the space. He is working with a $300,000 budget from the Omni CRA that was earmarked for redeveloping blighted spaces.
The project was approved in mid-December and broke ground on January 16. It should open by the end of the month with an opening celebration set for early March. The park will eventually move to another space when it comes time to begin the construction of the new I395 flyover that has been in the works.
Omni Park Rendering via The New Tropic
Omni Park Rendering via The New Tropic
Omni Park February 2017
The proposed I395 flyover bridge, rendering from FDOT
The Underline Public Meeting: Preview & Give Feedback Of The Brickell Backyard Plans
If you have been curious about the plans of The Underline, Miami’s upcoming 10 mile linear park, now is your opportunity. The Miami-Dade Transportation & Public Works Departments, and Parks, Recreation and Open Spaces Departments will be holding a public meeting this Thursday, Janaury 19 with the Friends of The Underline initiative.
During the meeting, the preliminary design proposals for Phase 1: Brickell Backyard will be discussed by the James Corner Field Operations design team. The Brickell Backyard is the name for the span of The Underline that runs under the Metrorail tracks from the Miami River to SW 13th Street (Coral Way). The site is currently grossly underused, with only a collection of bus stops and a temporary outdoor gym. Along the Brickell Station, there is a beautiful natural coral rock ledge that will be incorporated into the park.
The Underline is a proposed 10-mile greenway with urban biking and pedestrian trails and park amenities beneath the county’s Metrorail, in Miami-Dade County’s Rapid Transit Right of Way, between the Miami River north of Brickell and Dadeland South stations. The project’s vision is to enhance connectivity, mobility, sustainability and biking safety for hundreds of thousands of Miami-Dade residents and visitors.
To see the plans in detail, visit Southside Elementary on Thursday night from 5:30pm-8pm. The meeting will be held in the cafeteria. Southside Elementary is on the corner of SW 1st Avenue & 13th Street, just across the street from Infinity at Brickell. There is street parking around Infinity & SLS Brickell, along with a surface lot across the street. If you are a transit rider, the Brickell Station Metromover & Metrorail stops are just across the street to the west of the school. We’ll see you there!
If you’d like to RSVP, you can do so here.
Biscayne Boulevard’s Parking Lots Are Transforming Into A Popup Park For January
Image Courtesy of Prism Creative Group
In order to demonstrate what can be achieved if people abandon their cars for transit options, a pop-up park is coming to the parking lots along Biscayne Boulevard in Downtown Miami this month. The event launches on Friday, January 6 with a free concert and runs through January 26 with events for all ages each day.
Some of the pedestrian-friendly options we will see are:
Puppy Brunch
Sweat Circuit by Lululemon
Local Vendors
Food Trucks From Local Eateries
Free films on the “Biscayne Screen”
If you’re interested to check it out, everything is taking place near the Bayfront Park MetroMover stop. You can register for the grand opening on Friday here and check out the calendar of events here. We’ll see you there!
At Last! Renovations Are Coming To 1814 Brickell Park
Photo courtesy of Rebecca Carter Facebook
After months of requesting and circulating a petition, the City of Miami Parks Department has agreed to the proposed changes to the park located at 1814 Brickell. We chimed in as well, as the current design was excellent in theory, but fell flat with the originally intended use.
Originally, the park was intended for “businesswomen in high heels” and “workers relaxing from the business district,” except those people never showed up. You can find them after work at happy hour, not strolling 5 blocks to sit in a park. Meanwhile, young children with their mothers and nannies are left with nowhere to play. As a member of the stroller brigade, this redesign makes me very, very happy!
In an onsite meeting this week, the Director of Parks met with a handful of interested Brickellians to go over the approved changes. They will be replacing the current playscape with a setup for 2-5 year old children and a swing set. To add more shade, they discussed adding a mature shade tree in the back corner of the play area and extending the foam flooring further out to add more play space. The project is set to take 6 months to complete, but will likely take a bit more time because we all know how construction timelines are fluid. There will only be about a month of the park being fully closed.
Photo courtesy of Rebecca Carter Facebook
Photo courtesy of Rebecca Carter Facebook
Brickell Homeowners Association Proposes Upgrades To 1814 Brickell Park
Five years ago, residents of Brickell were overjoyed at the addition of a new park designed by Enea Garden Design at 1814 Brickell Avenue. At the time, it was envisioned that the park would be frequented by “businesswomen in high heels” and “workers relaxing from the business district”. Now that the park has been open for awhile, it is evident that they missed the demographic big time. The businesswomen and businessmen that were envisioned are instead young children with their mothers or nannies an nowhere to play.
Currently, the park has some picnic tables outside of the gated area and beautiful yet non-functional landscaping. The playscape is great for big kids and there is a dog park area. The dog park is really just a fenced in area with a bench, and I rarely see anyone there. Tibor Hollo donated a sculpture that was formed from beams from the 9/11 terrorist attacks and there is a CitiBike station.
As of now, the only parks for little kids nearby are Brickell Key Park and Alice Wainwright Park. Both are very nice, but not necessarily walking-distance for those living in the Brickell condos. Considering that we’re one of the densest neighborhoods in America and Brickell residents make up 2/3 of Miami’s tax base, there really aren’t enough play areas for our little ones. In order to accommodate the 0-7 year old crowd, a few changes will need to be made such as:
– Remove the large landscaping and add better lighting for security purposes.
– Add a playscape suitable for smaller children. Ideally a slide and swings at the very least.
– Move the picnic tables into the gated playscape area so that the moms and nannies can watch over their children as they play.
– Install sunshades over the playground to protect the equipment and children from the sun.
A petition has been started on Change.org and needs just 135 more signature. I signed it here, will you?
1814 Brickell Park – Proposed Changes on Scribd
‘Cocaine Cowboy’ Mickey Munday is Building Parks on Neglected Land in Miami
Screenshot from local 10 News, with LOVE sculpture and artist Maurizio Raponi.he
Mickey Munday, one of the biggest drug traffickers of Miami’s legendary ‘Cocaine Cowboy’ era has set out to change Miami again, but this time in a completely different way, by building neighborhood parks on neglected or underutilized pieces of public property. His first park was formerly a vacant lot in North Miami that the South Florida Water Management District uses to access the C-8 canal, which Mickey and artist Maurizio Raponi have transformed into the Lock-In-Love Park.
Munday gave Channel 10 News a tour recently, showing off a large heart formed in the turf, and a ‘LOVE’ sculpture by Raponi. The idea, Mickey says is to bring a lock symbolizing your love of someone or something, lock it to a chain in the park, and toss the key in the canal ( perhaps inspired by that bridge in Paris that broke under the weight of thousands of love locks) symbolizing the permanence of your love. More parks will follow says Munday and Raponi, who plan this to just be the first of many. “We want to get a lot of parks done like this, beautified and just promote positivity and love,” said Raponi.
Is There a Way to Save Midtown’s Central Green Space?
Photo by Sean McCaughan.
The great big empty lawn in the center of Midtown Miami has sat there for years as Midtown gradually gets built up around it. Originally meant to be the location of an entertainment center and mall when Midtown was first developed from the old Buena Vista Rail Yards, the huge lawn has for years been literally nothing but a luscious green carpet of grass, with the potential to make a fantastic public space, parkland, gardens, Central Park, etc. for the entire neighborhood. Back in 2012, I wondered what was up, and the answer was nothing. The assumption today in 2016 is that it still will be developed, by its owners or whoever they sell it to, someday. But is there an alternative? I posed the question to some friends on Facebook and one, urban planner Donald Shockey, offered an intriguing potential solution:
The City could aggressively offer the owners expanded transferable development rights to make this a permanent park and still profit from their investment. This is very feasible and would provide a desperately needed central park to serve Midtown, Wynwood, and Edgewater. This would be an enormously transformative project for Miami.
