Alberta Street Neighbor Fence
An affordable, cheerful design solution for housing on a busy street, developed while working for Sabin CDC, 2014
What if we turned a maintenance project into an engaging community activity?
On a prominent and busy block of Alberta Street lies one of the few affordable housing complexes in the Alberta neighborhood. When it was built in the 1970s, the fact that it turned its back on Alberta Street was considered a good thing. With ongoing revitalization, the façade of the Alberta Street Apartments—with its small windows, chain link fence, and lackluster landscaping—created a gap in the street life, and singled out the complex as a “project” in an otherwise thriving and vital streetscape.
BEFORE - site with a bare chain link fence and window-sparse façade
AFTER - a cheerful pattern of multicolor fence pieces woven through chain link
Most importantly, tenants were suffering from lack of privacy and noise issues from nightlife at bars across the street.
People are highly attuned to noise distractions. For anyone whose living spaces butt up against busy streets, having a visual and acoustic separation from the street is critical for allowing the nervous system to relax. The fence may also marginally improve air quality for those tenants whose windows face the street and would otherwise be more receptive to the exhaust of passing vehicles.
Low-tech and low-budget, but high-impact!
I needed to develop a screening system that would both provide privacy for residents and brighten up the block for passers-by.
We had a very small budget—around $1,200 for fence materials and a few new plants. Using only standard off-the-shelf chain-link fence slats in a few fun colors, I developed a simple design and installation process.
Happy Earth Day!
Alberta Main Street, the neighborhood’s business association, hosts a big neighborhood clean-up day on Earth Day each year. We wanted our fence project to be a fun activity for clean-up volunteers who passed by, so we made sure we had coffee and donuts on hand. We were happy to have engaged friends and miscellaneous friendly neighbors in our very simple installation process.
The Alberta Neighbor Fence was a fixture on Alberta Street until about 2020. Not bad for a temporary solution!