College of Visual and Performing Arts to make parking spots into art models

Metered parking spaces on Adams Street downtown will be creatively remodeled into temporary parks to demonstrate the need for improvement in health and space in the city Friday, between 11 a.m. and 6 p.m.

The University of Toledo's College of Visual and Performing Arts has five spaces reserved.

Each space will be transformed by the departments of theatre, film, music and two for art which Barbara Miner's installation art class is preparing.

Glacity Theatre Collective, an organization including but not limited to university faculty members, also has a space dedicated to "God's Ear," a play opening the same evening at the Valentine Theatre Studio A on Adams Street.

PARK(ing) Day is an annual event cities across the world have participated in. According to their website, the project began in 2005 in San Francisco where an art studio converted a parking space into a temporary park.

"Since 2005, PARK(ing) Day has evolved into a global movement, with organizations and individuals (operating independently of Rebar but following an established set of guidelines) creating new forms of temporary public space in urban contexts around the world," the website said. Its purpose is to "call attention to the need for more urban open space, to generate critical debate around how public space is created and allocated to improve the quality of urban human habitat."

The UpTown Association hosts the Toledo event. According to their website, there are 20 participants committed. For more information visit www.parkingday.org.