ICE-POPS

ICE-POPS

Online

2011 to present

ICE-POPS (Interested Critical Explorers of Privately-Owned Public Space) believes that spaces are not public until the public knows about them. This open collective of urban explorers, planners, writers, researchers, and artists operating from cities across the U.S. identifies and catalogues privately-owned public spaces (POPS) and other public-private developments, and conducts walking tours of these sites in hopes of making cities more open and more public. “We feel that information-sharing is itself a radical act and that research can be poetic, brash, quiet, performative,” according to the group’s website, which invites people to participate by uploading their own documentation of POPS, aggregating research on site owners, designers, amenities, and other characteristics.

Community, Information, Pleasure
200
Ongoing
15 core members, 60 additional participants
Problem - insufficient information about public open space prevents full civic use
Solution - maps, tools, and information for communities to reclaim space in their cities