I AM MIA (Miami in Action)

USGBC, AIA, and the growing “Coalition” of community organizations and businesses will host a public space festival showcasing various installations and programs to inspire the community to activate pocket parks in the downtown corridor.

We will exhibit various ideas for pocket parks in downtown to build a stronger sense of community and sparking social engagement making Miami a more open, attractive, and engaged place to live.

Programs & Installations

1. Graffiti Wall - have a wall to capture people's thoughts about "My ideal pocket park in downtown Miami would be..." and have people write out or sketch their ideas.
2. Signage - create signage to show tourists & residents where main attractions are and how close things actually are downtown to encourage them to walk and engage in downtown.
3. Dance Lessons - partner with local dance studios or schools to offer free dance lessons that could be repeated periodically. Studios could teach a different type of dance each time - Salsa, Samba, Tango, Swing, Vogue, Hip Hop, Line dancing.
4. Story Time - partner with the Miami-Dade Public Library main branch and invite students from the local elementary schools to do story time in the park. Kids will get to go out and enjoy the outdoors and sunshine, hear a story that they can act out with help from students from the New World School of the Arts, and be encouraged to read more and learn about what other great resources the library provides.
5. Games - create a life-sized version of a chess board or twister to draw people into the space. We will set up smaller tables so that people can bring board games, card games, dominoes, etc. and be able to have fun and connect with people that they would have never connected with otherwise.
6. Athletic Field - host a series of physical activity to promote sustainable physical health. We plan to do a soccer field for kids, yoga/pilates, and a mini cross-fit bootcamp.
7. Film - hosting a movie night where residents could come, lay down on a blanket, and enjoy a movie with their family.
8. Living Wall - Create a collision between environment and art by organizing plants on a wooden shipping palette in a way that would create a work of art. 

The festival will be held at the park just west of Stephen P. Clark Government Center on Friday, May 30^th, 2014 from 12:00pm-8:00pm.

Festival attendees will experience an array of programs and installations during the festival and can actively participate in the various offerings. The purpose of these programs and installations is to spark an interest and inspire attendees to want to bring these projects to their own neighborhood or create their own public space project for their community.

At each installation, there will be commitment cards where attendees can check off which projects they are interested in or write in their own. These cards will be collected and entered into a database that will then form committees.

For example, let’s say 20 people are interested in bringing yoga sessions to Bayfront Park. The 20 people would fill out commitment cards and later be introduced to each other via e-mail. The introductory e-mail will also include a how-to sheet and project timeline on how I AM MIA brought yoga to Government Center. They will now be empowered with direction and guidance from I AM MIA including how to navigate the permit process and be equipped with a team of their peers who all share the same interest and want to help improve our Miami community.

Active, successful, and iconic public spaces from around the world have many features in common – access to cultural events and galleries, breathtaking views, a variety of dining and shopping options, and access to public transportation hubs to name a few.

So why doesn’t Miami have an active and iconic downtown space like a Times Square or Millennium Park? Actually, we do! The Adrienne Arsht Center for Performing Arts, American Airlines Arena, Bayside Marketplace, Bayfront Park, and even new developments such as Museum Park and the Miami Visitors Center…they’re just not connected.

In between all these great attractions are typically vacant parking lots and unused pocket parks just waiting to be programmed and activated. Waiting for residents, businesses, organizations to take ownership and activate these pocket parks to give people a reason to walk along the downtown corridor and make it a more vibrant community.

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