I love Legacy Park, and it’s the park’s natural beauty and message that keeps me making the drive to the Sunday farmers market and to frequent our downtown shops. While I always walk through the park while there on Sundays, I’m struck on my daily commute by the landscape’s architect and city planner’s genius on creating a park that mimics the natural hills behind it, integrates the beautiful wildlife supporting native vegetation, and for the educational and water filtering elements that have been integrated to hopefully influence future generations to be better stewards of the environment than we have been.
The owners and retailers in the Malibu Country Mart can thank the city and planners for bringing “country” back into “country mart” with the park. Before the park, the name Country Mart was farcical in its previous pavement setting. The park with its native sycamore forest in front of the country mart sets off the mart beautifully.
For those folks who want green manicured lawns, more ball fields and jungle gyms, there are countless surrounding communities that offer those suburban conveniences. Malibu became a city because its residents realized that the rapid urbanization that was happening under county control would destroy our area’s quality. That is why the city’s original charter says, “the citizens of Malibu embrace their rural heritage and want to keep it that way even if it means forgoing suburban conveniences.”
Legacy park is legacy to that heritage. It honors the gem of a location we’re privileged to live in, surrounded on all sides by national, state and local parks and wilderness, as well as the wild pacific ocean. I don’t find much to commend the city council or mayor on, due to the continued urbanization of the city and resulting negative impact our quality of life. But for Legacy Park, I thank the city warmly for their thoughtfulness and foresight.
Tom Molloy