Executive Director of City Parks Alliance, Catherine Nagel, was asked recently why building and maintaining parks was so important, given all of our other obvious public and urban needs, and considering how costly it can be to fund such projects. Her response: “With the urbanization of our planet, people living in these dense environments — this is kind of obvious — need clean air to breathe, clean water to drink. Their children need places to play. We have the researchnow. All the new health studies about open space have been significantly helpful. There is growing recognition that proximity to parks has a direct impact on how healthy a community and its residents are.”
