Gated for Community's Sake

摘要

Baltimore's landscape may be best known as the menacing context for David Simon's TV series The Wire: miles of rowhouses with small, plain stoops in front and dark alleys in back, where all manner of dangers may lurk. Lately, though, some of Baltimore's alleys have begun transforming from dirty back lots to verdant city oases through a project called Alley Gating and Greening, spearheaded by the Ashoka Foundation's Community Greens Program. The program, part of Ashoka's social entrepreneur-ship efforts, aims to redevelop alleys as commons with the combined help of state and city officials, who have given the new designs regulatory sanction, and neighbors, who organize and manage the alley spaces.