| dc.description.abstract | The object of this report is to study a neighborhood park and its impact on the neighborhood residents, park users and the City which provides the maintenance and service to the park. The hypothesis established for the report is: Dexter Park is properly designed as it presently exists.
Dexter Park has its beginnings in the 1920's as a corporately owned park. Its site characteristics relate to the fact that the park once had a lake on it and was part of a flood plain. The park today exists in a "natural" state for a variety of outdoor activities within its passive and active areas. The park has only two structures on the site--a concrete slab creek channel and a bridge to cross it. Residents, users and the City were questioned to determine the park's impact on each of them. Responses from these interviews disproved the hypothesis, and subsequent program elements were established, including physical design components and a maintenance program. A final redesign of Dexter Park was completed based on the program elements.
The method by which this study was conducted consisted mainly of interviews and questionnaires, with personal observation also an important key in collecting the data. The final design solution dealt strictly with the park site, even though the emphasis of the interviews was on the park's function as part of the neighborhood.
Conclusions derived from this park study determine that Dexter Park is indeed a part of the neighborhood, and the residents, users and City want it to continue to exist as it is. The problems and concerns pointed out, though, are personal expressions of how the park relates to each resident and improvements which need to be made. It is the responsibility of the landscape architect, or any designer, to record in his data-gathering process the ideas of the people who will live with the design once it is complete. | en |
