Tu Salud: Now is the Moment!

I recently read a report by The Trust for Public Land () about how cities, parks departments, schools, non-profits, businesses and urban planners are making a positive impact on health and saving tax payers money across the country.
The report outlines six specific ways communities can maximize resources to create higher quality of living, and more importantly, reduce the costs of chronic diseases like obesity, diabetes and cardiovascular disease.
The idea is to create inspiring spaces and programs that can help families be more active and make healthier food choices. The report offers great examples from Cincinnati, Little Rock, Los Angeles, Milwaukee, Portland and Atlanta, where local leaders have planned and implemented spaces, places and programs to transform communities in positive ways.

But those are all big cities you say, with lots of resources we don’t have in Cameron County. Still, we’re not so different. Like it or not, Harlingen, Brownsville and the Rio Grande Valley in general are growing rapidly, and our population soon will surpass many well-known smaller and medium-size urban areas.
With a young median-age, our growth will not slow anytime soon. So, this is the moment to start weaving health, recreation and wellness into our community design. We’re off to a good start. With some beautiful parks, farmers markets, bike paths and health initiatives, Cameron County cities are transforming to healthier and more livable communities that will, in turn, help attract more visitors and industry.
Area leaders and residents need to continue to look to models from other places and adapt them to our unique culture, climate and citizenry. We have a great opportunity to build our community parks, trails, programs, gardens, markets, etc., by learning from the mistakes and successes of other cities that were once our size..
The Trust for Public Land study makes six recommendations in all, two of which I will cover in this first of a two-part series. With each recommendation come some great examples from around the country.
Mix Up Land Use,
Maximize Programming
In other words, don’t just build a pretty park and expect people to use it. Bring in programs, staff and activities in partnership with community groups to offer activities that will draw folks to the park and get them active.
Also, use parks for multiple activities. Baseball and soccer practice is great, but parks also can be used as space for all ages and abilities through community gardens, educational nature programs and adaptation for special needs, as well as providing space and programming for fitness, walking and even Tai Chi for the elderly.
In Cincinnati, the Recreation Commission has gone all out to get people using their parks. The Trust for Public Land reports that Cincinnati, a city of only 330,000 people (surprisingly not that much bigger than Brownsville), has the highest per capita recreation participation rate of all cities reporting.
Programming at parks attracted more than 3.2 million participant visits in 2009 — about 690,000 were visits by youths.
In Milwaukee, an interactive Urban Ecology Center is attracting inner-city kids to explore the local wildlife of area parks through a school partnership.
The Land Trust report describes the initiative: “Each year, 15,000 students and teachers from 45 schools are exposed to the excitement and wonders of nature. They explore river corridors, hike trails, identify birds, and investigate wildlife habitat. Participants, about 85 percent are low income, stretch muscles as well as minds. A significant number of them learn to feel comfortable in the outdoors — a place that many city kids fear.”

Focus on Stress Reduction: Calming Traffic, Emotions
The numbers are clear: converting park and city roadways to car-free, multi-use space attracts more users of all ages and has the added benefit of reducing stress by allowing for varied use of roadways for cycling, walking, running, scooting, skating and pushing strollers.
It gives neighborhoods and local businesses the opportunity for exposure as people get out from behind the windshield of their cars and get to know the community.
There are hundreds of cities around the world that close streets and roads temporarily on weekends to allow for a car-free outdoor experience.
The well-known street closures include the loop drives in New York’s Central Park and Prospect Park, Memorial Drive along the Charles River every Sunday in Boston (for the last 20 years by the way), Piedmont Park in Atlanta and Portland, Oregon’s “Sunday Parkways” which rotates the street closures to different neighborhoods around the city.
In Bogota and now spreading throughout Latin American cities is the popular Ciclovía, where every Sunday more than one million people cycle, walk, run, skate and scoot along 81 miles of car-free roadways linking all the city parks. San Antonio, Chicago, Baltimore and San Francisco all have started similar Sunday road closings.
Next week, I will focus on design, co-location, interconnected park webs and community gardens—additional ideas and criteria that are mentioned in the Trust for Public Land Recommendations.
There are so many great examples of how to improve quality of life through parks, programming and pedestrian initiatives.
We know what works – but it takes the whole community getting behind our city leaders and investing in our future to make it happen, because Tu Salud ¡Si Cuenta! (Your Health Matters!).