On Wednesday, May 28th, the second meeting of citizens concerned about the future of the Dorothea Dix property met, once again at Cup-A-Joes in Mission Valley. There were only five people in attendance this time: Joseph Huberman, Tracey Oliveto, Jamie Ramsey, Sam Olin, and myself, Will Hooker.
Joseph had taken on the task of organizing/ running the meetings, and he had an agenda that we basically followed, wherein we dealt with brainstorming about a name for this group, talked about long range goals, discussed goals for this Summer and Fall, and talked a bit about plans for involving the State, the City, and NCSU.
Relative to the name for this group, we wanted a name that acknowledged as many parts of the Raleigh community as possible, given that everyone involved in both meetings feels that the Dix property has the potential to have
as powerful a community, social, and environmental impact as does Central Park in New York City. Joseph came with ideas such as Dix Conservation Trust, Dix Community Project, Dorothea Dix Parkland, and Dix Skyline Park. The
brainstorming led to Dix Community Conservation Coalition, which we shortened to Dix C-cubed (I don't know how to do post script numbers to give the true name.) After discussing other portions of the agenda, we came back to a simpler name: Dix Community Partnership, or DCP (this is not the powerful anacronym that Jessica Bellas hoped for - FIST or POWER, but it does have a rhyming ring.) Any thoughts?
We talked briefly about the long range goals, discussing those aspects of the property that had a powerful personal impact on each of the people present.
Things like, The Field (there's only one "The Field" on the property, even though there are a number of wonderful fields - this is the one towards the Farmers' Market, just off of Barbour Drive), the view of the Raleigh skyline (the view from Barbour Drive, just above the two terraced parking lots, with
the soccer fields in the background - this is the BEST view of the skyline in the entire city!), the oak trees in the loop next to Bilyeu Street (where all the houses were recently removed), the allees of trees along many of the streets, the gazebo and field (across Western Blvd. from Boylan Heights), and just all the trees in general. Relative to the long range goals, one person was passionate about creating an environmental education center, where ways to
live more "green" could be demonstrated and taught. We all felt strongly about retaining the existing hospital, feeling that this is a valuable and necessary function and the main part of Dorothea Dix's history. (We did discuss that this land is where Sherman's Union troops camped at the end of the Civil War, and debated whether or not we could incorporate some aspect of the
stand-off at the bridge entrance to the hospital, when Raleigh finally surrendered, in our name.) We talked about not being opposed to having more housing on
the fringes of the property (and therefore more voices), as long as this was done well (not
disrupting the exisiting neighborhoods, and perhaps with all "green" building techniques utilized, etc.).
We realized that we needed a mission statement for this group (the Dix Community
Partnership) so we brainstormed about what was important overall relative to the property. The following were posed:
| A Sense of Place |
| Open Space |
| The History (this was originally a place that cared for the less able of our community, and it was done in a self-sustaining manner - growing most of the food, etc. - in an agrarian, pastoral setting) |
| The Environment (with all its habitats and vegetation) |
| The 'Greeness' (as opposed to dense, impervious surfaces everywhere) |
For the mission statement, we stated that we needed a simple, easily understood statement that was inclusive enough to allow all of Raleigh and the constituents to participate. In this vein, we came up with three main attributes for this statement. The mission statement will include:
For 1) We want this to be about 'preserving' and not about preservation. The latter has a somewhat negative connotation in that it typically means choosing a time period and keeping everything static thereafter in order to honor that past period. This land, if done right, will be the center and one of the main urban open spaces in the entire area. As such, it needs to have the
ability to adapt to the new realities (having an amphitheater, for instance) as
opposed to being locked into only one vision. Several people thought that the word,
'pastoral,' is a good choice for guiding all future articulations of this open space, coining the phrase, "to preserve and create a pastoral setting within the context of responsible urban growth."
For 2) We believe that the location of the Dix campus lends itself
beautifully to serving as a 'connector' or 'center' for a wide variety of
functions: We feel strongly about retaining the extant hospital function, if
possible; there are a great number of adjoining neighbors that will benefit from
having a 'center,' including NC State Centennial Campus, the Farmer's Market,
Downtown Raleigh, WRAL, Pullen Park, South Saunders Street, etc.; and all the
various adjacent neighborhoods - Pullen Park Terrace (formerly known as Kirby-Bilyeu
Street Neighborhood), Boylan Heights, the Pullen Neighborhood (between
Hillsborough St. and Pullen Park),the Caroleigh (sp?) Neighborhood, the Nazereth
Neighborhood, etc. In a sense, this could be the 'heart of Raleigh' fifty years
down the line. One of the goals that we mentioned briefly would be to generate
an aerial computer image of what Raleigh would look like 50 years from now, with
Dorothea Dix retained as a open space park (very powerful stuff!).
For 3) We do want to try to envision the impact of this space on all that
Raleigh could and will be, 50 years, 100 years, or more in the future. And we do
not want to be limited, as the discussions seem to have been up to now, by just
trying to determine how much money we can get if we sell this land to
developers. (Imagine how much money Central Park in NYC could fetch if it were
offered for sale - !!!!! Would that ever happen now? No way! The citizens
wouldn't allow it; and they're more strapped for $$$ than we ever will be.)
Thinking in terms of the 'quality of life' for Raleigh and how this property
could improve upon that is what this visioning process needs to be about. (And
even in these hard economic times, it would be penny wise and pound foolish to
simply agree out of hand to sell it off to the highest bidders.) Our feeling was
that this is a discussion that should best involve as many of the interested
neighbors and constituents as possible.
So, the draft mission statement for the Dix Community Partnership, which does need to be worked on, is the following:
To promote community involvement in the preservation and planning of
Dorothea Dix's past and future heritage.
(This statement addresses our most pressing concern; i.e., that of involving citizen input in the decision making process. It does not address in enough detail, however, preserving the open space and serving as a connector or 'heart' of Raleigh. So, please have a 'go' at writing this, and copy it to everyone on the above main list.) We ended the meeting by trying to determine the next step. Certainly, we need to finally decide on a name, and then we need to finish the mission statement. We did say that it would be good if we could contact Mark DeBree and Bill Flournoy about having this site considered in the Million Acre Initiative. (We did not discuss this at the meeting, but from reading both Eric Reeves email message regarding having the City appoint a study commission, and in reading Janet Cowell's suggestion of having the Planning Department gather information and perhaps begin, if it's not already in place, a Small Area Planning Process for this area, these seem like immediate goals as well.)
When the meeting was breaking up, several members remained and did some 'what if' visioning. We 'walked' through the park in the future, imagining, for instance, a good sized amphitheater in the spot where the two terraced parking lots are off of Barbour Drive, thus giving us a major space for city gatherings where the audience would have the best view of the Raleigh skyline in the background of the staged activities - imagine the fireworks display at First Nigt as seen from here. We imagined giant events, like harvest celebrations that would 'bring the local communities together for and in the Heart of Raleigh.' With the population and density greatly increased, this park would be a respite, a breath of clean air, a break from the rigors of urban living. (This visioning is remarkably similar to the dreaming and writing that Andrew Jackson Downing, the Father of Landscape Architecture, did in the 1850s concerning an area in Manhattan then used as a pig farm - an area now known the world over as Central Park.)
Respectfully submitted,
Will Hooker