Making Our Own Space (MOOS) the CUDC’s design/build program for middle and high school students is back in full force this summer, with new MOOS programs in Cleveland’s Old Brooklyn and Slavic Village neighborhoods and returning programs in Glenville and Shaker Heights.
Making Our Own Space Coordinator Ben Herring and the MOOS Rapid Response Team in Old Brooklyn
The logistics of MOOS workshops were complicated during the pandemic, but MOOS students persevered, creating seating and structures to help their neighbors interact safely outdoors during the challenging months of lock-down and remote school. Now, as things are returning to something like normal, the MOOS program is moving in exciting new directions.
The new MOOS Rapid Response Team (MOOS-RRT) is a smaller group of students working intensively on planning and design issues in Cleveland’s Old Brooklyn neighborhood. The MOOS team is designing and building outdoor structures, but also conducting urban research and experimenting with new technologies. The goal is to keep a core team of students working together for 18 months to enhance the Old Brooklyn neighborhood and Brighton Park, while exploring future careers in the design fields.
Brighton Park, a new community park on Pearl Road, across from the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo, was built on a former landfill site. MOOS students are envisioning ways to help their neighbors discover the park’s natural beauty and connect to a larger regional green space network.
Another MOOS team is operating out of the Stella Walsh Recreation Center on Cleveland’s east side. This team spent three weeks developing design ideas for Mural Park, 5742 Broadway Avenue in Cleveland. This project was featured in Rooms To Let, a two-day temporary art exhibit and community celebration in Cleveland’s Slavic Village neighborhood held in July, 2002.
MOOS Team building seating structures for Mural Park in Slavic Village. (photo: Helen Liggett)
MOOS Glenville, our largest ever MOOS team with over 20 participants, has big dreams of creating a temporary pavilion that can be used for fundraising events and as a shelter.
The Glenville team with MOOS Coordinator Ben Herring (at left) and MOOS Intern Luke Manning (supervising the chop saw). (photo: Helen Liggett)
In Shaker Heights, MOOS team members are contributing their ideas to a commercial corridor plan for the Lee Road.
Shaker MOOS team touring and mapping the Lee Road corridor.
MOOS team meeting with Kara Hamley O’Donnell, Principal Planner for the City of Shaker Heights.
For more information about MOOS, visit www.wearemoos.org or contact us at cudc@kent.edu