Streetwise: Hunts Point

With support from the Rockefeller Foundation Cultural Innovation Fund, Groundswell engaged youth, artists, and other community members between 2012 and 2013 in a series of five murals that identified and prioritized transportation and environmental concerns in their South Bronx community. in the identification of transportation-related concerns in the South Bronx and recommendation of design, signage, and policy solutions with the NYC Department of Transportation.

 

This two-year campaign, entitled “StreetWise: Hunts Point,” inspired community members to envision a better community, implement short-term streetscape solutions, and secure a commitment for the realization of longer-term transportation solutions.

 

 

The artists teams used their projects to propose specific traffic interventions and street treatments to improve some of the physical attributes of the Hunts Point area. The youth asked for crosswalks and bike lanes to be refreshed, and for signage and kiosks to be installed to help people find and utilize the green spaces in their neighborhood. The murals also honor community members of the past and present who stayed in the Bronx after it was burning and helped it to rise like the legendary phoenix that holds a revitalized Bronx between its wings. Current revitalization efforts such as those by the “StreetWise: Hunts Point” artists are happening on the shoulders of the activists who came before them.