The loss of industrial anchors and economic opportunity has led to major demographic decline in the Youngstown–Warren area. In Warren, the 2020 census is expected to reveal a population of around 35,000, an estimated loss of 12 percent since 2010 and 50 percent since the 1970s peak. This rapid change has left communities with hard choices about how to deal with urban infrastructures designed for larger populations. The answer is often to tear down houses and buildings that are simply too much for these communities to maintain.
Today, communities across the Mahoning Valley are searching for new uses for these sites. A frequent solution is to turn the vacant lots into new community public spaces such as gardens and urban farms. In the years leading up to 2019, the Trumbull Neighborhood Partnership (TNP), Warren’s community development corporation and land bank, demolished over 1,000 properties, renovated 350 others, and sold over 1,200 vacant lots to adjacent property owners. In Youngstown, the Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation (YNDC) created the Lots of Green program as a way to reuse vacant sites. The program organizes cleanup, volunteer, and funding efforts for small-scale community-based farming projects in previously vacant sites. These projects include pocket parks and side yard expansions, as well as larger community gardens. One such project from the Lots of Green program is the Iron Roots Urban Farm, a 1.5 acre urban farm that now serves as an agriculture training center.1Read more about Youngstown’s urban farm renaissance.
A City Built by Hand documents urban public space work that has been initiated by community residents with the support of TNP and YNDC. Helen Liggett’s photographic essay offers a comprehensive look at the transformation of vacant lots into civic spaces at the level of experience, revealing how these lots become incubators of civic life and local economic activity. —Quilian Riano, In the Mahoning Valley chief editor
Credit: Helen Liggett
All photographs and text are by Helen Liggett.
The unhappy undertone with which one says “vacant land” is comparable to the tone one uses for “used to be”: as in, used to be a house, a school, a hospital, church grounds, a parking lot. Space that has been taken out of commission and no longer functions as usable space highlights the extent to which activity is foundational to public space. For example, legacy spaces such as Mill Creek Park and Wick Park in Youngstown and the Women’s Reading Garden and Perkins Park in Warren remain part of the cultural infrastructure of their cities only insofar as they attract users.
Locations of vacant lots and parks in Warren (to the north) and Youngstown (to the south) that are discussed in this feature. Credit: In the Mahoning Valley editorial team
From this point of view, public space is an ongoing project in which enactment is as crucial as design, construction, and maintenance. The encounters and connections that define public space have been put under stress by the socioeconomic upheavals experienced in Warren and Youngstown. This has been compounded by the current pandemic. Community events such as outdoor children’s programs, community cleanup days, public performances, and sporting events have been cancelled or delayed.
The purpose of this photo essay is to show representative public spaces that persist in the context of these circumstances. Because of the perseverance of volunteer citizens, local governments and businesses, not-for-profit organizations, and church groups, “used-to-be-spaces” have new lives as green space, side lots, gardens, educational and markets places—often more than one of these at the same time. In addition to creating layered space, the activists I met continue to plan for a future of using public space to address local problems. I was struck by how plans for expansion were a common theme. In a typical conversation, a community activist would point off to a nearby lot or derelict house and explain what their group had in mind for it.
Learn more about TNP’s work in its 2019 Annual Report and read about YNDC’s strategies to reuse vacant land.
French urbanist Henri Lefebvre writes about an “architecture of enjoyment.” Community members represented here are creating cultural infrastructure that includes both joy and purpose.
The photo essay has four sections: 1) vacant land, 2) usable public space, 3) community bounty, and 4) building cultural infrastructure. Each section contains photographic sequences of land-based projects in Warren and Youngstown, as well as remarks made in conversation or overheard while on site. The hope is that viewers will be able to get a feel for what it is like being involved in these places.
Section One: Vacant Land
Trumbull Neighborhood Partnership
Boulevard Park Neighborhood Partnership
.
.
.
Section Two: Usable Public Space
Glenwood Community Park
Warren Community Amphitheater
.
.
.
.
Section Three: Community Bounty
Garfield Community Gardens
Hope for Newport Community Garden
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Section Four: Building Cultural Infrastructure
GROW Urban Farm
ACTION Pop Up Farmers Markets
Warren Farmers Market
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
◊
A project such as this has many authors. I wish to thank Terry Schwarz, director of the Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative, and Quilian Riano, associate director of the Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative, for giving me the opportunity to participate in the American Roundtable, and for their guidance and support. In Warren and Youngstown, design professionals and citizen activists generously shared their time and local knowledge, keeping me from being a stranger. They include: Matt Martin, executive director, Trumbull Neighborhood Partnership; Cassandra Clevenger, community resource coordinator, Trumbull Neighborhood Partnership; Paul Makosky, director, Engineering, Planning and Building Department, City of Warren; Danita Davis, master gardener, Garfield Community Gardens; Ian Deniston, executive director, Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation; Jack Daugherty, neighborhood stabilization director, Youngstown Neighborhood Development Corporation; John Bralich, senior manager of GIS services, Department of Geography and Urban-Regional Studies, Youngstown State University; Mary Danus, Boulevard Park Neighborhood Association; Carole Conaster, Hope for Newport Community Garden; Eric Barrett, associate professor and area leader, Ohio State University Extension, Mahoning County; Jeff Magada, executive director, Flying High, Inc.; and ACTION staff members. I especially want to thank the residents of Warren and Youngstown for their participation, conversation, and inspiration.
Biographies
Helen Liggett
is an adjunct professor and photographer teaching in the architectural studies program at Kent State University. She is the author of Urban Encounters and numerous articles and professional presentations, often incorporating urban photography. Recent projects include Design/ReBuild part of a project initiated and sponsored by the Cleveland Urban Design Collaborative and Fashioned in the Clay, shown at Heights Arts.
The views expressed here are those of the authors only and do not reflect the position of The Architectural League of New York.