I had the chance to visit Antwerp over the Easter weekend. The first thing you notice when you arrive there is the amount of infrastructural spend currently taking place. New Tram lines, Pedestrianised streets, Cycle Lanes and Parks. All of which is focused on making the City a better place to live.

While there I had a chance to visit one of the recently finished parks. Park Spoor Noord is just outside the City close to the river. It’s a very simple design with a paved path circling the park used by people walking, pushing buggies, jogging, roller skating etc. The area inside the path holds a large green space, nothing decorative, just suitable for kicking a ball or walking a dog and most importantly retaining flood water when the rain arrives. All easily achieved and easy to maintain. An old building is reused for selling food and drinks. This building also acts as a gallery space and indoor play area when it rains. There’s also an outside seating area by this building along with a water feature and a kids play area. The Park also contains a full size municipal playing pitch along with 5-a-side pitches all open for the Public to use.
You can see the scale of Park Spoor Noord in Google Maps below. The land was previously used as Train depot.

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Below is a street view from the road that goes around the park. As you can see there are no walls or gates enclosing the park. Anti social problems are kept to a minimum by it’s open layout. If you pan around in the image you’ll even see a grain silo similar to the R&H Hall Building in Cork.

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Below are the Showgrounds close to Cork City. Public land that Cork City Council want to give to a Private Organisation for their sole use.

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Guest post by Denis O’Regan a Cork City resident (a dying breed ref. Census 2011, 2006).