It’s a sign!

While the city’s edge is already fairly well marked with stickers placed by the several hundred folk Walk Around Philadelphia participants who’ve already set out on the perimeter walk, I’m particularly psyched about this new signpost that we just installed by Independence Seaport Museum on Penn’s Landing.

The sign came about as part of my project as one of the 2022 Ecotopian Toolmakers (part of a collaboration by the Independence Seaport Museum and the Penn Program in Environmental Humanities.)

Huge thanks to them and to the Delaware River Waterfront Corporation for this opportunity, as well as to everyone who’s participated in and/or supported the walk.

The sign points to parks and green spaces that one might encounter if one explored the city’s edge a little bit further upstream (counter-clockwise) or downstream (clockwise)…

For this particular sign, I chose to highlight Penn Treaty Park, Graffiti Pier, Glen Foerd, Lardner’s Point Park, Pier 68, Windy Point, Washington Ave Green, FDR Park & the Navy Yard.

Also highlighted are environmental educational centers on or near the city’s edge:

Cobbs Creek Community Education Center, The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education, Wissahickon & Pennypack Environmental Centers and the John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge

The sign goes on to point out water-related sites including the Schuylkill River, and tributaries in the Delaware River watershed such as Poquessing, Pennypack, Tacony-Frankford, Darby & Cobbs creeks.

It also includes some of the Philadelphia Water Department treatment plants that prepare our drinking water and process our wastewater.

Setting out to explore the perimeter of the city, one also encounters industrial sites that support our modern lifestyles.

These are often set on the margins of the city, and might impact our water (such as the recent spill of thousands of gallons of phenol in Bridesburg or the 2019 explosion at the Schuylkill refinery site)

Of course, this sign is far from exhaustive… there are *so many* other things that one encounters while participating in Walk Around Philadelphia (farms, prisons, scrapyards, graveyards, factories & so much more…)

Also, as soon as we’d installed it, I realized that I wished that I’d included the label Lenapehoking under the Delaware River label to acknowledge the indigenous land that Philadelphia sits in.

There are already many other little tweaks that I’d make to the sign – as a first time CNC milling / carpentry project, I learned a lot.

I’m delighted about this sign’s potential to invite new participants into exploring the city’s edge via Walk Around Philadelphia. Hopefully this will be the first of many signs pointing the way…

Want to help make that happen? Please consider making a contribution / becoming a backer to support my work.

Come hand-print your own map of the Delaware Watershed & Philadelphia’s perimeter as part of my Ecotopian Toolkit workshop at Independence Seaport Museum!

Drop in to ISM anytime 2:30 – 5pm on Wednesday June 15th to participate.

If you’d like to host a perimeter printmaking workshop at your organization, get in touch.

REGISTRATION:

Aug 1 – Registration opens for walk dates
via WalkAroundPhiladelphia.com

Aug 8 – Registration opens for kickoff event & closing party – via FringeArts.com

Sept 8 – Virtual info session / kickoff celebration

WALK DAYS:

Sept 10 / 11 / 12  
Sept 17 /18 /19
Sept 23 / 24 / 25 / 26 

CLOSING PARTY:

October 1 – in-person celebration of 10th walk (1,000+ miles!)

Don’t forget to mark your calendars & get on the list for invites!