I had my first opportunity to take my little kids to the newest park in RBS on Nahal Arugot. The park was designed very nicely, with landscaping around the rocks and grassy areas and a small section, perhaps too small but that is another story, of park equipment.
The park on Nahal Arugot was just opened about a month ago, and unfortunately it looks like it has not been cleaned, and that nobody has come to maintain it in any way, since day one.
The areas for flowers and bushes are quickly being overtaken by the weeds, along with the garbage strewn about.
the whole park area, where the play equipment is, the grassy areas, the areas for planting, are all strewn with garbage. I get that it is windy and garbage gets blown around, and I get that parents need to be careful about throwing things in the garbage and not just tossing things to the ground, and that kids need to be taught to throw things out, but the city has to be cleaning the park regularly as well.
The two garbage cans I saw were completely filled, and overflowing.
There was absolutely not a drop of shade in the whole park, and with a little forethought, or even afterthought, they could have put in some structures or tarps that would give some shade over the equipment and benches, and make it more pleasant for parents and kids looking to enjoy the park.
The one good thing, besides for the general potential of it being a really nice park, was that the water fountains worked nicely, which is fairly unusual.
These are a few pictures I snapped with my cellphone to show just a few of the spots. Ironically enough, shortly after I took these pictures, a friend of mine who is a city councilman came by with a nice big camera and snapped a few pictures of his own. I asked him what's happening, and he told me that they are inaugurating a new park in old Bet Shemesh this afternoon and everything is beautiful and clean. he told me that he will be handing out pictures to the journalists there to show that while the park in BS is beautiful, in RBS they put in a new park and have left it to simply deteriorate ever since.
I posted a few of these pictures to the Facebook page of iryat Bet Shemesh, and anybody using Facebook can feel free to go comment and flood them with requests to clean up the parks, along with the city in general.
Somebody put together this petition for BS/RBS people to join in requesting the city add more shading to the parks.. http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/helpusshadeourparks/
You quote two different opinions about the mess in the new park - one that residents have the habit of littering which is the cause, the other that Bet Shemesh has left this park to rot. I think both are inaccurate. The city planned an inadequate amount of garbage cans for the park - they need larger ones and a sufficiently frequent schedule to empty them.
ReplyDeleteBut it looks like they took your photos off - I couldn't find them.
re the petition for shade
ReplyDeleteI think it needs more publicity. It's sad that there are only 21 signatures on it.
i think they just put this together online haphazardly. they were going around the neighborhood with physical papers signing people up.
ReplyDeleteWell the mayor of the city should do something about it. Make something about the park and renovate it. Clean and put events, etc. to make the park lovely and lively.
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