Ten Principles for Creating A Successful Hemming Plaza

8. Reaching Out Like an Octopus


Hemming Park's pedestrian scale synergy once reached out like an octopus due to specialtiy storefronts and window displays adjacent to the large department stores that surrounded the park.

Just as important as the edge of a square is the way that streets, sidewalks and ground floors of adjacent buildings lead into it. Like the tentacles of an octopus extending into the surrounding neighborhood, the influence of a good square (such as Union Square in New York) starts at least a block away. Vehicles slow down, walking becomes more enjoyable, and pedestrian traffic increases. Elements within the square are visible from a distance, and the ground floor activity of buildings entices pedestrians to move toward the square.


A Purcell's retail store window display on North Laura Street, within a block of Hemming Park in 1953.

Ask yourself: How Does Hemming Plaza reach out like an Octopus?  The answer is, outside of Subway and Cafe Nola's outdoor seating it really doesn't.  Resolving this solution can be as simple as encouraging more enties in the blocks surrounding the park to embrace the sidewalks better at the pedestrian scale.  For a restaurant, this could mean additional outdoor seating.  For a retailer, it could mean window displays.  For the City, it could mean allowing designated mobile vendors where publicly owned dead zones in the plaza's "Outer Square" exist.