Flowers, Bushes and Trees: Greening San Diego

Partners for Livable Places/San Diego presents a symposium on Strategies for "Greening" our Urban Environment. Click here for more information.

Gardens, parks, greenways, pocket parks and canyons. What do they all have in common? The obvious answer is they make our city look nice and enhance our cities beauty, but is that all they do?

We have groups in San Diego who can tell you they do much more. The San Diego River Foundation can describe the many benefits we would receive from creating a long linear park in the San Diego river valley. Another group can talk about how just planting trees helps or we can talk with more then one group who believe we can benefit from developing our canyons into people friendly parks. Information appears monthly in articles across the country which tell of using a green strategy to reduce health cost, lower crime, reduce pollutants from rain runoff, improve property values and revitalize abandon properties.

There are scattered plans all over San Diego to put in more greening. University Heights is trying to develop a point over looking Mission Valley and preserve Buchanan Canyon. The CCDC is planning five new pocket parks. The East Village Association is trying to put in parks to alleviate some side affects of higher density. The Port Authority has projects along the bay and residents near Chollas Creek are trying to clean up that resource and create a park. City Heights, Logan Heights, Talmadge and nearly all communities are thinking about parks, greenways, and gardens to enhance their communities.

Unfortunately for most neighborhoods it is a struggle. The lack understanding by city officials or even by the people who promote the projects causes these projects to receive low priority. The city has never done a broad study to assess our cities needs or assess the value greening may produce. We have master plans for Balboa Park but not for the city parks, gardens, and greenways as a whole.

Partners for Livable Communities San Diego believes it is time to look at the overall picture. We believe it is time to raise the issues of greening to a higher level. We realize this issue is easily dismissed and we need to educate the public, city officials and city planners to the many benefits we could expect from these greening projects. We know we also need to reach out to developers and community planning groups to not only educate but to also inspire greater inclusion of the greening strategies.

We need to bring together these groups to share information not only from our local experience but what has happened in other cites. We need to share information and make the efforts of all these different organizations stronger. We need to bring in the voices of success from other cities and have them share with us their knowledge and experience. We need to share our local stories of success with each other so community groups will know how to effect change in their neighborhoods

Partners for Livable Communities San Diego is planning a one-day seminar.
The purpose of the seminar is "to explore the concepts of greening San Diego, identify its value; create awareness, stimulate thought and action; and influence design and planning decisions." We have been compiling a list of individuals from across the country that can add valuable information and share their experiences for this program. We are trying to have them specifically address these areas; a) Mental and Physical impact, b) Property values, c) neighborhood revitalization, d) Pollution control, and e) Crime reduction. We will put them together with some of our local success to provide an eye-opening look at what can happen, what has happened and the value those projects brought. We plan to finish the day with a panel discussion featuring local groups so they can be put in the spotlight. They can share how they succeeded and answer questions from others who are trying to do greening in their neighborhoods. We hope the panel discussion will also strength their efforts.

Executive Summary

Strategic Greening of San Diego Seminar

The purpose of the seminar is to explore the concept of greening as a strategy for growth, sustainability and livability, identify its value, create awareness, and stimulate thought, actions, influence design and planning decisions.

We define the concept of greening as those plans relative to large parks, pocket parks, canyons, greenways, parkways, community gardens, rooftop gardens, private gardens and building enhancements.

The program will focus on three arenas. A vision of what greening looks like, the value it has to a city and how greening can be accomplished.

Vision will demonstrate what has been done in San Diego and other cities. Open the audience to concepts of what can be done and how extensive it can be.

Value will focus on the impact to property values, impact on crime reduction, impact on mental health, physical health, impact on livability, and impact on sustainability.

How greening can be accomplished will explore the elements organizations need to organize, raise funds, plan projects, develop support and maintain a project. In addition some focus will be on how to develop a dynamic community master plan, get the plan accepted and executed.

The three focuses of vision, value and action will be presented by the use of speakers, panel discussion and displays.

Two types of speakers will be used: Some speakers will be brought in from other states. These individuals will be selected for their expertise and recognized accomplishments. Their participation is meant to add a high level of credibility, attract media attention and bring experience not available in San Diego.

Local speakers will also be brought in. These individuals will be selected for their work locally and their expertise. They will focus on local issues, participate in the panel discussions and bring focus to local projects and issues.

Panel Discussions will primarily be local. Individuals will be chosen for their experience in developing local projects and organization. The panel discussion will focus on how local organizations and projects get started, develop support, raise funding and handle local issues.

In order to demonstrate a vision of a green San Diego, displays of proposed green projects, old, new, proposed and abandoned, will be set up in the entry ways and lobby areas. These will be projects exclusive to the San Diego area. The purpose of all the displays is to visualize what can be done here.

The day’s activities are designed to begin early with numerous intense presentations followed by a working lunch. The day will end with a panel discussion in mid-afternoon. The following is an outline of the days proposed time lines.

Organization and management: Partners for Livable Communities San Diego, A 501C corporation is acting as producers of the program. Other organizations will act as co-sponsors of the program providing volunteers, materials, information, and resources and funding.