Something I see in my neighborhood everyday is the open street. The place where people walk and take in the weather. The place where kids play with their toys and draw on the cemented streets. The place where gardeners plant mini gardens to make our community better. The street where people ride their mopeds up and down blasting music at odd times of the day.
When I am riding my bike I see all of these things all at the same time. I can also smell the air, nice and refreshing, with the smoky bbq smell of neighbors bbq’ing in their backyards. Or you can smell the smell of gas from cars, which isn’t so nice but hey, you can’t win them all. I see birds flying around, dogs barking at random things or peeing on a car or something stupid like that. Children in my neighborhood enjoy the nature and draw all over the street as I stated earlier. They don’t bat an eye towards any real world issues going on, oblivious to it all, they are in their own world it seems like. It all leads to an enjoyable NYC neighborhood experience, and I see it everyday.
I added the lenses of children in my neighborhood to my blog post. I added this because I notice them all the time just walking around with their parents and/or having fun with their friends or siblings. This makes me think about when that was me, all those years ago.
This was a great addition, Ariel. One question this takes me to– a direction to explore more in a future analysis— is, what affect does the physical design of your neighborhood have on the experience of those who live there? (You could contrast it with another neighborhood: one where homes are less or more expensive; one with more or fewer or different businesses; one with wider streets; etc.)