Strangers, Sidewalks and Folding Chairs Are One Solution for the Loneliness Epidemic

Psychotherapist Traci Ruble believes that everybody — even folks with close-knit friends and family — gets lonely. It can happen anytime, and it doesn’t only happen when you’re alone. You might have felt it at a party with friends; or on a crowded subway watching strangers on their phones; or while you’re spending time with your partner.   
But Ruble thinks she’s found a simple way to make us feel less isolated and more connected.
It starts by doing the exact opposite of what your parents likely told you never to do: talking to a stranger.
In 50 cities around the world, volunteers unfold chairs, sprawl out blankets and create a welcoming space in public spaces. Their goal isn’t to give advice and therapize the strangers who sit down. They’re there to simply listen. 
Ruble calls her movement Sidewalk Talk — and there’s a reason to believe it’s working.
Loneliness is a societal problem that doesn’t get as much mainstream attention as, say, health care reform. But multiple studies show that feeling lonely on a regular basis may be more harmful to the human body than obesity or smoking cigarettes
“Belonging is as important to our survival and well-being as breathing. It’s a connection you can’t always get from a text message,” Ruble told City Lab. “As humans, we need eye contact, touch and personal interaction. It’s important not to forget how vital this is.” 
Experts have concluded that it’s a pervasive feeling: In a study published in 2018, nearly half of the 20,000 surveyed individuals reported sometimes or always feeling lonely. 
Barbara Meyers is one of the many volunteers working with Ruble to help. Every Thursday, she goes to Tenderloin, California, to make human connections with the people who show up. Two years and a myriad of conversations later, Meyers is the nonprofit’s longest volunteer. She’s passionate about supporting folks with mental health issues and saw Sidewalk Talk as an opportunity to spring into action.
“I like it because I think it’s a gift to offer yourself as a listener and to be, I guess, authentically connecting with another human being,” she told the Alternative UK.
She goes to Tenderloin to meet people from marginalized communities — communities where stigmas against mental health are sometimes stronger and communities are often underserved
“I know that … they don’t have the access to a lot of the mental health system, and if there’s somebody that actually listens to them, that’s a little piece of something that can be helpful to them,” she said. “I know they aren’t getting what they need elsewhere.”
After the Sandy Hook shooting, Ruble searched for ways to connect strangers and bring awareness about mental health. She and her colleague Lily Sloane decided to bring conversations to community centers.
“I wanted to create an empathy movement that extended beyond the walls of my office,” Ruble told City Lab.
In 2015, they gathered volunteers and launched the first day of talks in 12 locations throughout San Francisco, California. 
The idea quickly spread, and four years later, the nonprofit has hosted over 12,000 talks in 12 countries. 
Each city is structured with a city leader and volunteers. While the volunteers don’t need experience in therapy or trained listening, they all go through a training course. The city leaders are trained mental health professionals who can connect individuals to low or no-cost mental health support.
“I have a fundamental belief that we are all responsible for each other’s mental health,” Ruble told Washington Post. “But this is not therapy on the streets; this is taking one of its biggest tools and bringing it out to the masses. I’m trying to keep the message simple: It’s about listening and belonging. I’m talking about what makes us healthy, and relationships make us healthy.”
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Can You Green a Community Without Stealing Its Identity?

Large, elegant projects that showcase the best of the best when it comes to environmental design have made their way into cities across the country. Politicians have praised these efforts endlessly, and the press, including NationSwell, have lauded their benefits. But what if the neighborhoods that house projects such as New York City’s High Line or Chicago’s green roofs (and benefit from them) end up being hurt in the long run?
Unfortunately, that’s what seems to be happening with certain projects of this nature — an overgentrification, of sorts, that ends up driving out existing residents.
How does that happen? Well, as it turns out, by making neighborhoods nicer, they can often become too nice — driving up the cost of living and bringing in wealthier residents, according to Next City.
So, how do we make neighborhoods greener without changing the makeup of the area altogether?
One successful example is Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Home to significant heavy industry and a large Polish population, Greenpoint is a working-class neighborhood, just like it was before becoming “just green enough.”
In 2010, the polluted estuary there, known as Newtown Creek, was declared a superfund site. Instead of cleaning it up through a large gentrification project, newcomers and longtime residents alike joined forces through the Newtown Creek Alliance, winning a settlement from Exxon-Mobil (the company that leaked the oil and contaminated the creek). With that money and their elbow grease, a nature trail was created, benefitting the community.
Greenpoint resident and Alliance member Bill Schuck, explained to Next City that his fellow activists thought, “hey, wait a second.  Are we doing this to make this attractive to real estate developers? And it was, no, we’re looking to benefit people like us.” Because of those efforts, Greenpoint received some much-needed cleanup and improvements without sacrificing its cultural and economic backbone.
Though there is no one secret for success in this arena, neighborhoods in other cities can learn from places like Greenpoint.
The key is to tailor any solution to the specific neighborhood — to listen to and to learn from the community members about their lifestyle and what kind of greening could benefit them. Another step is to make sure rents are stabilized and there’s enough affordable housing. Beyond that, though, is a general focus on practicality over publicity. The large, glamorous parks that are often widely loved can often be far less useful to a community, for example, than many smaller parks.
By focusing on the needs of the people when greening, a whole lot of good can be done.
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With Parking Spaces Sitting Vacant, Atlanta Has a Bold Plan to Merge Communities With Transit

Everyone who lives near a city knows all too well how much location – specifically, proximity to the commuter rail — matters. The shorter the drive is to the station, the better. And the ability to walk there trumps just about everything.
Such convenience is about to come to thousands in Atlanta. That city’s metro system MARTA has started making real estate deals to build housing to unused transit parking lots. MARTA plans to turn the space at the King Memorial, Edgewood, and Edgewood/Chandler Park stations into combination residential and retail developments.
“People have been looking at these parking lots for decades wondering why they were just sitting there,” Amanda Rhein, senior director of transit-oriented development at MARTA, told City Lab.
Now, that is finally changing — and it’s not only helping commuters, but also the railroad itself. Without state funding, MARTA’s bottom line is very easily impacted by the ups and downs of the economy. So, when Keith Parker took over the agency in 2012, he decided that a bold project like this is what was required to keep it competitive. The development will not only produce revenue from all the train riders, but also with each unit sold, will raise money for the transit system that it can use for improvements.
And so far, Parker’s decision is looking like a good one. MARTA has successfully leased land to developers for mixed-use buildings that are focused on the adjacent transit opportunities, including a project on a four-acre unused parking lot that features 13,000 square feet of retails space and 386 housing units.
The boon does not only belong to the railroads, though; it is the entire community’s as these projects could decrease traffic on the roads. And on top of that, there is more to the new spaces then one might think. Beyond all the great new housing and shops, each development will also feature a public park as well as have at least 20 percent of the units dedicated to affordable housing.
While construction has yet to start, there’s already hope for more in the future since this model is good for both the city of Atlanta, its citizens and the transit system itself.
“We’re going to make the stations themselves and the surrounding areas more pleasant and more easily accessible, and we’ll be providing amenities to our riders and to the surrounding community. So I think people will realize that and give MARTA a chance,” says Rhein.
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Why Fake Brick Makes for a Better Sidewalk

Bricks: A classic material used across the country to construct everything from buildings and walls to sidewalks.
Americans love the familiar look, but increasingly, towns and cities are having a hard time justifying the clay-based material — especially as it ages.
But now, innovations in asphalt treatment and decoration are allowing surfaces to offer the same great look but without the bricks, according to the Washington Post.
So, how do these new crosswalks and sidewalks go from looking just like the surface of a road to resembling authentic brickwork?
First, the asphalt is heated, then a metal grid with the desired brick pattern is laid on top (think of it as a giant cookie cutter). This creates a pretty convincing brick-like indentation, which then comes to life through a paint or plastic coloring to complete the look.
Primarily offered by Quest Construction Products and Ennis-Flint, these ingenious surfaces offer countless advantages over traditional brick. Changes in the underlying soil often causes bricks to dislodge, but that won’t happen with these new paths since they are made of contiguous material. Not only does this make surfaces safer for pedestrians, but also easier to maintain – especially considering the toll a tough winter takes on our sidewalks and crosswalks.
Additionally, since the cracks in between traditional bricks are no longer a factor, unsightly weeds will not take over sidewalks. People also won’t be tempted to steal bricks – yes, that actually happens – as there won’t be any to remove.
A civil engineer for Boston’s public works department, Bob Astrella knows a thing or two about this subject. He boasted to the Washington Post, “this is a hell of a lot easier to repair than brick crosswalks,” adding that brick “looks nice, but there’s a maintenance issue.”
Thanks to this new advancement, public surfaces in cities and towns across the country are going to get a whole lot safer, and much easier to maintain, too.
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