Tori Kjer and Ronald “Kartoon” Antwine, Project Manager/ Community Organize for The Trust for Public Land
The Monitor Avenue Park project was spearheaded by Kartoon and other dedicated community members from Watts who simply demanded a fresh, simple, beautiful, and open green space for their community.
Originally owned by Union Pacific Railroad, and subsequently a private developer, the site was considered a “blighted” area by the community. But one acre of vacant blight, combined with the desperate need for new parks in Watts became the catalyst for a community-wide movement to reclaim the space.
The Trust for Public Land has been working in partnership with the City of Los Angeles Department of Recreation and Parks and the local community since summer 2009. Tori Kjer, an LA-based program manager with The Trust for Public Land describes the future Monitor Avenue Park as “a lot, vacant for many decades, that was hand-picked by the community as the site of their new park.” The Trust for Public Land has worked closely with the community to develop a design for their park, and completed the purchase of the land in August 2011.
Gracias al apoyo de la comunidad de Watts, el parque de Monitor Avenue es un ejemplo de cómo convertir un espacio agotado a un espacio inspirador. Este terreno era un lote vacío que fue seleccionado por la comunidad como el sitio de su parque nuevo.
