All Ideas

Nintendo Nights

Idea:

Put together a weekly or monthly series of events where people can bring picnic food (or we invite food trucks and get an alcohol permit for a beer garden if we’re ambitious) and there are one or two projectors set up in a locked case hooked up to old video games. They can eat and [Read more…]

Benefit:

Would help revitalize a park and bring people together. If it was advertised, maybe people would come from out of town to experience this unique Lowell idea.

Location:

Downtown / JAM.

Flags of the Acre

Idea:

Add flags and art banners to the lampposts along Upper Merrimack Street between City Hall and University Crossing. The art would be inspired by the folks of many backgrounds, races, and ethnicities of the Acre. If there’s enough interest, we could also add history/fact signs similar to the Visualize Lowell’s Black History tour.

Benefit:

It would encourage people of different types to come together around the art and flags. It would add color and vibrancy to the walking route between downtown and the university and also show off the unique character of the Acre.

Location:

Acre.

Merrimack Street Rotating Cultural Exhibit!

Idea:

Work with the Adult Ed center across from the Library to install an outdoor “rotating cultural exhibit.” This would include a couple of structures that could be chained to the fence that would hold items behind plexiglass, frames to be attached to the fence that could hold informational panels, and perhaps some planters for small [Read more…]

Benefit:

This would be a low-cost way to celebrate Lowell’s diversity and create some visual interest and excitement connecting downtown with “Upper Merrimack Street” walking toward UMass Lowell. If the materials are high enough quality and draw a lot of attention, perhaps it would also contribute to interest in redeveloping abandoned [Read more…]

Location:

Acre.

Sidewalk Poetry (With stamps or stencils)

Idea:

The Public Works departments of Cambridge, MA and St. Paul, MN have a Sidewalk Poetry Program that annually requests residents to submit original pieces of poetry to be stamped into fresh cement. A group of individuals then reviews the poems and select a few to be used. The cost of this program is minimal: the [Read more…]

Benefit:

This would serve a dual purpose: engaging pedestrians —including visitors– with art and inspiring Lowellians to submit their original work. Furthermore, the poetry/ public art will have a lasting impression since the sidewalks could exist for decades.

Location:

Downtown / JAM.

Wall of Peace

Idea:

This idea is based on the Shinto Ema shrine in Japan. It place where people leave their wishes. My idea is to build a simple wooden structure and have people come and write their hopes and dreams for peace in their homes, lives and in the world and tie them on to the structure. To [Read more…]

Benefit:

This is a place where many generations can come together to share their hopes and dreams. I would love to have youth involved in building the structure. The space can become a meditative place. I think there is great benefit in having people share their hopes and dreams. even silently. [Read more…]

Location:

Downtown / JAM.