PUBLIC FRUIT PARK
A park with only fruit or nut yielding plantings, which are to be shared by everyone. It includes a demonstration area, a fruit-sharing depository (so people can trade their excess fruit for other people?s) and informative plaques with thoughts about public fruit.
This park was proposed to the City of Los Angeles in 2005. Originally proposed for Griffith Park, the largest urban park in America, its siting is adaptable. Griffith Park?s policy at this point is only to plant natives, but they have agreed to give us marginal land, probably by the LA River, which can be reclaimed. Since most fruit-producing trees are not native, we are looking for drought-tolerant varieties.
American parks are filled with non-native ornamental species that create a decorative landscape which most of us take for natural. In the case of California, these species often consume more water than the natives and are more aggressive, tending to drive them out.
The idea of the public fruit park is not a new one. Many pre-industrial societies had public spaces for grazing, communal farming, woodcutting and fishing, which are sometimes called the commons. The principle is that though common land may be owned by towns or individuals, the right to its resources or its use is shared by the community.
Fallen Fruit is a collaborative project by David Burns, Matias Viegener & Austin Young
