A Living Library

To the Editor:

I am very impressed with the Roosevelt Island Living Library and Think Park Master Plan developed by Bonnie Ora Sherk and Life Frames, Inc., for Southpoint, which seems as timely as it is prophetic.

The idea of a “United Nations” was based on President Roosevelt’s vision of a postwar world and the need for new mechanisms for cooperation and conflict resolution if the world were to avoid another global catastrophe of the World War II variety. The United Nations Charter itself was based on his Four Freedoms. As such, the UN can be considered as an expression of a U.S. value system.

Next year will be the United Nation’s 60th anniversary, and I can’t think of a more fitting tribute to the Roosevelt legacy than the Living Library plans for Roosevelt Island – a “Living Legacy”– especially as the UN works its way through a very difficult transition, where its very future is at stake. I also envision very creative year-long opportunities and festivities for local and global communities that would include New York’s Sister Cities and other places in the world, and mark the anniversary of the UN, while simultaneously launching the long-term proposed Living Library transformations of Southpoint.

As I review the Roosevelt Island Living Library and Think Park plans, I can imagine the following:

   -A World Headquarters for Global Civil Society, which has been one of the most significant developments since the founding of the organization. It could literally become a kind of “We the Peoples Center.”
   -Opportunities to link, programmatically and electronically, this Roosevelt Island Living Library with the San Francisco Living Libraries for UN World Environment Day, also in 2005, which is being held in SF, where the UN Charter was signed.
   -A World Gathering Place
   -A World Stage
   -A world-class World Conference Center. The UN is now space-deficient. All its facilities are strained. Besides, its conference facilities are quite dated for this kind of world. We need larger conferee facilities and A Living Library provides an answer.
   -Office space for the growing number of nongovernmental organizations, many of which lack places to “hang their hats” while in New York.
   -The World Gardens
   -The World Cuisine Center with periodic World Food Festivals
   -A World Room which would be accessible to the public and where UN events could be simulcast
   -The World Health and Nutrition Agro/Ecology Gardens and Greenhouses

I can envisage also a water-taxi system which would run continuously and which would provide another link to Manhattan.

I encourage the community of Roosevelt Island, and the City and State, to move forward with this exciting and relevant plan.

Dr. Noel J. Brown
President and CEO, Friends of the United Nations
Former Regional Director, United Nations Environment Program