Open and green spaces are important features and conditions of many cities throughout the world. These places allow people to escape from their busy life in the city and bring a breath of nature. Nature is very important to most people and humans have always been interconnected with nature. It influences the human life and at the same time, nature is influenced by humans.
Urban parks are places where people do many activities and sports, and even walking, talking, reading and other hobbies. Parks are gathering spaces and people can meet there, celebrate with a picnic, organize festivals, listen to musical entertainment, and many other social activities that strengthen the community’s inhabitants together. A park can also be a place for crime, protests and illegal activities that can sometimes endanger the park’s reputation. But it is still obvious that a park is a place of diverse activities and has an important role to the city as an instrument to express both positive and negative acts. Parks can also serve as places of exhibition and a place that can tell some stories. There can be performing arts of people and also monumental landscapes are situated in a park. A park’s landscape has its own memory and it is hard to imagine a city without a large urban park where people can find rest and relaxation after a hard, busy day.
Washington Park is situated south of downtown Denver. This place was my favorite open space in Denver and I was able to spend some warm autumn days studying on the park’s lawns. Washington Park is very close to the University of Denver campus and this aspect made me visit the park and spend more time there. Before this visit, the only other Denver park I’d been to was Civic Center Park downtown. I found that Washington Park is probably more popular for inhabitants of different ages. I spent quite a lot of time in these parks for two reasons.
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| Washington Park is more commonly known as Wash Park. |
The proximity of Washington Park was its attraction and Civic Center Park´s monumental architecture, combined with the city’s hustle and commotion surrounding it made it into a true urban oasis. It forced me think about why Washington Park is so crowded with people when compared to Civic Center Park, which seemed to used only for protests.
Compared with Civic Center Park and other urban parks in Denver, Washington Park is the biggest. We can view this park in the spirit of New York´s Central Park, which is even bigger and also very popular within the city. Washington Park, known to locals as “Wash Park,” meets the urban resident’s recreational needs. It is surrounded by neighborhoods and residential areas, but many people come to park from more distant areas. The park is extended and contains huge green spaces, interior lakes with pedal boats available for rent, and lots of trees and flower gardens that beautify and improve the park’s landscape. There are a lot of benches where people can have a rest and there is an outer loop that stretches over two miles that is used by runners and dog walkers. Cyclists and roller skaters travel the paved inner road. The park also includes tennis, croquet, and basketball court to meet a variety of recreational needs.
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| Dog walkers are frequent at Wash Park. |
The park lacks the monuments of Civic Center Park, but has more natural features that attract people to do many activities there. Monumentality is more characteristic of Civic Center Park, but we can mention one statue in Wash Park. A statue of Wynken, Blynken and Nod is still in the park and was a fountain in the beginning of the 20th Century. The statue’s theme speaks to the children’s fantasy bedtime poem about three fishermen sailing and fishing in the stars. The lullaby was written by Eugene Field in the 19th Century. This park statue shows that the park is a great place for families and their children. The statue symbolizes children´s culture, which is missing in Civic Center Park.
The park´s popularity makes nearby housing also highly desired, so much so that old houses are sometimes torn down so that a larger and more modern house can be rebuilt in the exact same place. This makes for an interesting contrast with larger, newer houses sometimes towering over their older and smaller neighbors.
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| A new modern house dwarfs it neighbor. |
We could consider Washington Park as part of City Beautiful, which was an idea in the 19th and beginning the 20th Century. The movement was led by urbanologists and architects who saw the importance of open and green spaces in cities. City Beautiful parks had features of monumentality and were public spaces for all classes. The American landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, who was interested in conservation of wildlife, national parks and the planning of New York’s Central Park, added boathouse at the Washington Park as an elegant and beautiful feature.
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| The boathouse is an iconic feature of Wash Park. |
Why people are more likely to go during weekends or after work to Wash Park is a question. Some people that I asked said that it would be easier to spend time after work in Civic Center Park downtown, but people see Wash Park as much more relaxed and also safer for their activities. Compared with Civic Center Park, there are not as many homeless people and disorderly conduct. Wash Park is bigger and so more appropriate for sport activities and people appreciate the beauty of its lakes and gardens. Although Civic Center Park’s architecture and monuments are more elaborate, people consider this park more as a part of city’s history and not its present. For Denver resident’s hobbies and activities, Wash Park is a better environment.
