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>> City officials were aghast at large numbers of individuals playing Pokemon Go who visited parks, littered, trampled grass and flowers, and stayed past park h
by wfunction 9y ago
>> City officials were aghast at large numbers of individuals playing Pokemon Go who visited parks, littered, trampled grass and flowers, and stayed past park hours.
This seems like a legitimate issue though. How do you propose it be solved?
- jmcdiesel 9y agoStaying past park hours for the most part is dumb... as far as being a big deal, its not. People walking around trying to play a game after hours is no something that needs policing in the first place... Is the game responsible for people littering? Or tramping grass (seriously, its grass... lets get over ourselves) or flowers... Is the game responsible for that, or are the people who do the wrong thing responsible? This points at the overall shifting of blame for everything that is becoming so common in our culture... put the blame on the person who does the wrong thing.
- wfunction 9y ago>> This seems like a legitimate issue though. How do you propose it be solved? > Is the game responsible for people littering? I feel like you didn't answer my question? Edit, to clarify: I'm asking what the actual solution is: expecting the city to pay for skyrocketing enforcement? Or letting the park get trashed and then blaming the citizens? Or just closing the park and blaming people for it happening? etc.
- nemo44x 9y agoI think they did: > put the blame on the person who does the wrong thing.
- LoonyBalloony 9y agoWhile I agree, I think the problem is affording blaming the person who does the wrong thing. Perhaps more permanent solution to the problem is in order such as fencing around the flowers getting trampled. End the drug war if you want to save money elsewhere for this.
- wfunction 9y agoHow does that answer the question? I'm asking how to solve problem, the response is who needs to receive the blame? Edit: See edit above. The question isn't whom to blame, the question is how to resolve the issue. Blaming people doesn't generally resolve an issue, but enforcing it or putting in place mechanisms for preventing it or some other tangible action might.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- function_seven 9y agoEnforce existing laws on the people who are to blame. Fine them for littering. As far as flower-trampling, just shrug and wait for the fad to pass. It's not a big deal.
- freebirdtoss 9y agoIf parks did not have hours enforced, they would become permanent homeless tent encampments.
- jmcdiesel 9y agoThats a bad argument... There are plenty of places that rules in place to prevent "homeless tent encampments" from being a thing. The same laws that prevent you from camping in city parks. Thats a bad example...
- brewdad 9y agoObviously you haven't been to Portland lately. Any plot of land that doesn't have an overnight closure turns into a homeless camp.
- learc83 9y agoLets look at an open park that can't be easily locked up. How much easier is it to enforce no one in the park past $10 than no camping in the park.
- Sharlin 9y agoThe idea of parks having opening hours is so completely alien to me that I don't even know where to begin...
- gozur88 9y agoIf you leave parks open at night you have to provide quite a bit extra policing. Otherwise they get taken over by hookers and junkies, and normal people won't go there. That kind of policing is the first thing that gets cut when cities run out of money, at least in my area, so they close the parks at night.
- koenigdavidmj 9y agoAnd if you close it, then you either need a big impenetrable fence around the whole thing, or you still need to police it.
- gozur88 9y agoYou do, but not as many.
- dmurray 9y agoIn my city they close the small parks (1-10 blocks, surrounded by cast iron railings) but can't do anything about the huge park that covers several square kilometres and has important roads running through it. There are some hookers and junkies and doggers there at night, but they have to go somewhere and they don't bother the "normal people" who are, after all, tucked up in bed at that time. All this suggests that locking parks overnight is more about every government's burning desire to "think of the children" and control everything possible than any legitimate concern for public safety.
- dragonwriter 9y agoBy enforcing rules against littering, using parks after hours, etc.
- Sleeep 9y agoThey were complaining the enforcement was what was expensive... "It cost the city tens of thousands of dollars in additional law enforcement."
- dragonwriter 9y agoGovernment doesn't have a right to cheap enforcement that trumps rights held by the people, like those protected by the First Amendment.
- Sleeep 9y agoYeah, I totally agree with you. I was just pointing out that "enforcing rules against littering, using parks after hours, etc." isn't the solution to them, they see it as the problem.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- barsonme 9y agoI don't quite understand the issue. It's the government's job to keep up public infrastructure regardless of how heavily it's used—that's something the left _and_ right can agree on.
- PeterisP 9y agoLarge numbers of people visiting part sounds like a success - the only purpose why the park exists in the first place is so that the residents can go there and visit, so if they're doing it more than before then the park is achieving it's goal and it's great! It would be reasonable to expect that the job of these city officials should be to (a) encourage the people to visit parks even more; and (b) maintain the parks adequately to their usage - if people use the parks more then it obviously costs more to maintain, but it also obviously means that people are getting more benefit from the parks and they want them to be maintained more. Enforcing the rules about littering and trampling flowers is part of maintaining the park; but if people are routinely staying past park hours (the whole concept of park hours is a bit strange to me, I'd expect parks to simply be unserviced but otherwise available 24/7), then likely that's a sign that these hours should be extended - the purpose of littering restrictions is obvious but the only legitimate purpose of restricted hours is that the population wants the hours to be restricted for safety reasons or whatever; if now it turns out that the population doesn't want that restriction anymore, then it shouldn't exist.
- wfunction 9y agoI agree with you entirely about the success but I don't think that implies a lack of a failure. Yes, the entire point of a park is for people to visit, and I love that people are doing that, but "visiting" a public place is not the same as trashing it. Especially given that there are rare flora there -- the point is for people to be able to enjoy them, not destroy them. How do you respond to that? Do you just think "who cares about rare plants, just plant grass or everyday flowers or something", or do you think there's value to having something less commonplace? Obviously these all need care, and fining people doesn't really fix the problem of letting the plants grow, since when the crowd is large there's always going to be someone messing something up, even if it's a small percentage of the people.
- ajmurmann 9y agoThey weren't there though to enjoy there park they were there because of the game. Not even because the park is a great environment to play there have but because the game encouraged to be in that place. If the game had put all the rare Pokemon in a parking lot that's probably were people would have gone. Were people there to enjoy nature? I doubt it.