Elizabeth Sanders
Crisis Landscapes: COVID-19, Public Parks, Encampments, and their Design Politics
In 2020 and 2021, public parks served as vital social infrastructure in the city of Toronto, Canada, as COVID-19 developed into a global pandemic. In Toronto, public parks provided a crucial space for the most marginalized group of people within the city: unhoused individuals (both recently displaced people and individuals who had been living on the street for a prolonged period), since the parks' status as loosely defined public spaces made them a convenient location for the semi-ephemeral encampments that have materialized throughout the pandemic. Undergoing constant destruction by the state and reconstruction by the residents, the encampments became highly politicized. The grounds of the camps themselves testify to the political support that the encampments attracted, as demonstrated by the accumulation of signs, tiny shelters, and survival objects, donated by activist groups and local allies, in this conflict over the use of public space.