The Irvington Peace Park is a flexible-use green space at the corner of Collins Ave. and Potter Street which replaced an abandoned house and junkyard. In an area where there are few nearby parks, it provides a place for children to play, families to have outdoor celebrations, people to share resources, and community to gather. It is maintained by neighbors, and owned by St. Bartholomew’s Episcopal Church.

Creation of the Peace Park 

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For many years, the vacant lot at the top of the block, the corner of Potter St. and Collins Avenue, was a symbol of urban disinvestment. An abandoned and deteriorating house stood on a double lot piled high with garbage and junk. The previous inhabitant had long since left the neighborhood, but retained ownership and used the house as his informal junkyard, creating an environmental and visual nuisance. After years of advocacy by the Irvington Community Association (of which Michael was vice president at the time), the house was finally condemned through a public adjudicatory process. Michael and Jill facilitated transfer of ownership of the property to their nearby Episcopal church, which enabled block residents to create and collectively manage the site now known as the Irvington Peace Park. While the vacant lot’s re-purposing was the subject of community debate (some sought its transformation into a parking lot), eventually the church decided to dedicate the lot as community green space. 

The Peace Park’s initial design was developed through a year-long, youth-led charrette process facilitated by community residents with support from the Baltimore Neighborhood Design Center (www.ndc-md.org). This process surfaced a desire among the community’s children and youth for a space to experience beauty, flowers, trees, growing food, open recreational spaces, and opportunities for art, music, and play. 

Drawing from the youths’ vision and in cooperation with local residents and outside volunteers, CASC members facilitated the transformation of the vacant lot into the Peace Park. They wrote grants and received funding from the TKF Foundation, conducted cleanups, installed community created art and garden beds, and planted flowers and trees.   A shaded deck was built through a youth employment project. In sum, echoing Jane Jacobs’ (1961, 271) call to “discern, respect and build upon the forces of regeneration that exist” organically within poor and marginalized communities, youth and adults have created Peace Park, which now serves as a space for play, relaxation, fellowship, and community building. 

Activities

Most activity in the Peace Park is informal, but over the years this space has hosted a range of activities:

• Raised bed vegetables gardening: Vegetables are planted by community members and available for harvest openly to community members. Fruit trees also provide freely available apples and apricots. Young people from the neighborhood and Mt. St. Josephs College high school built a water catchment system to support gardening.

• Back to School Day, sponsored by residents of Potter Street and St. Bartholomew’s Church—over 100 book bags of school supplies were provided along with a celebratory cookout.

• Weekly food share sponsored by Baltimore Gift Economy. Organic food is gathered from local stores and made available to community residents.

• Mini-art camps whose participants created a mosaic archway emblazoned with glittering “PEACE PARK” Peace Flags that represent the future professions our children aspire to, and a Wishing Tree decorated with ribbons that hold neighbors’ hopes for the future.

• Youth worship services sponsored by St. Bartholomew’s Church.

• Community Celebration of Life: Moving from Grief to Hope, an event celebrating community members who had died in the past few years. The event included planting a community garden and a talk by licensed Black falconer Rodney Stotts, who thrilled those gathered by having his falcon fly around the Peace Park and back onto his arm.

• Live performance by hip-hop band

• Community celebration of a neighbor’s anniversary of 10 years clean of addiction

• “Sprinkler days” on hot summer afternoons, family celebrations, game days, and music and art events that take advantage of

Future plans

Future Peace Park plans include clearing and beautifying the vacant lot across the street from the Peace Park, replacing broken sidewalk, and trimming dead tree limbs in the Peace Park. If you are interested in volunteering, please click on the :Take Action tab.