Dublin, TX is a rural community of about 3,400 residents with significant regional heritage. The town is the home of Dublin Bottling Works, a historic bottling plant still producing cane sugar sodas today, the Ben Hogan Museum, which honors the legacy of the golfer Ben Hogan and anchors the downtown square, and was once a historic hotbed for the dairy and railroad industries. While proud of the community’s past, the gaze of Dublin citizens today is firmly fixed on the town’s future. In order to celebrate past and present, CIRD worked with Dublin on their local design challenge to revitalize the Dublin City Park, an important local gathering place for town events and festivals, and a vital community greenspace.
In addition to its storied past, Dublin is also a vibrant and increasingly diverse town, with 40% of residents identifying as Hispanic. Dublin City Park currently hosts the Hispanic Heritage Festival each year, a popular local event that brings people together over food, drink, music, and much more to celebrate the rich culture and traditions of the community. In addition to facilitating important connections between people, this event, as well as a vibrant farmer’s market tradition, gathers Dublin residents together and contributes to the local economy. Because the city park has limited facilities in place to host these and other events, improving the existing park structures, primarily the park pavilion, and improving and enhancing the streetscape and landscape of the park all factored into the local design challenge. By better equipping the park for social gatherings and creating a multi-season pavilion, the Dublin community will be able to utilize the park more day to day, as well as for important events that can revitalize the local economy and bring people together, to the park and downtown alike.
With local efforts led by Adina Dunn, the Director of the Dublin Public Library, and support from Texas-based architecture studio Asakura Robinson, CIRD worked with key stakeholders including the park staff and the Dublin City Council, as well as the Dublin citizenry to reimagine the park as a place of celebration, connection, and economic opportunity for the community. Community members like Adina and Ben Pate, the director of the Dublin Historical Museum, exemplify the commitment local residents have to celebrating Dublin’s roots while looking to the future to reimagine the city and the park as inclusive and sustainable spaces for all community members to gather.
Site Visit: On April 10-11, 2024, CIRD staff members Stephen Sugg, of the Housing Assistance Council, and Brandon Robles, of To Be Done Studio, visited Dublin to better understand the community’s past and present, touring several local historic sites including the train depot and Ben Hogan Museum, as well as visiting Dublin City Park. During that time the CIRD team met with local leaders at the Dublin Public Library and community garden. Engaging with these representatives allowed the design team to identify initial priorities and potential challenges faced at the site.
Learn more about CIRD’s site visit and the initial ideas developed for the park.
Virtual Engagement: Beginning in July 2024, CIRD hosted virtual meetings with the Dublin team. Adina Dunn and Ben Pate, along with Stephanie Keith, of the Middle Trinity Groundwater Conservation District and other local residents played an essential role during these meetings, sharing valuable information, providing community perspectives, and identifying current challenges leading up to the workshop. During these conversations recurring themes emerged, including engaging the whole community in the workshop process, focusing the project scope to be achievable and sustainable, and creating a flexible and dynamic place for community gatherings and events.
CIRD Local Design Workshop: September 23–25, 2024 – The workshop began with a community breakfast, followed by morning and afternoon focus groups to gather input on initial design concepts developed for Dublin City Park. The CIRD team included design partners Omar Hakeem and Brandon Robles of To Be Done Studio, as well as HAC team members Sierra Mack-Erb and Hillary Presecan. Christina Moon and Hugo Colón of Asakura Robinson also joined the CIRD team to lend their expertise in landscape architecture. Collectively, the local project team and CIRD listened to the feedback shared by community members, paying close attention to how locals use the park presently and noting their desires for any future changes to the park structures and landscape. Hispanic community members who stopped by provided useful and critical insight for the CIRD team, sharing how they and other families utilize the park for gatherings and communicating the need for improved cooking facilities and more communal seating. The first day of the workshop concluded with a bustling community dinner at Dublin Intermediate School to break bread with Dublin residents and gather further input.
The next day, the CIRD design team incorporated community input into design concepts that included redesigning the existing pavilion structure in the park and developing additional shade structures for community use, as well as defining and improving the streetscape to better manage traffic for events. The team also developed plans to extend an existing walking trail and plant additional trees for much desired and needed shade. The CIRD team gathered once more with community members and city park staff over lunch at the Dublin Public Library to ensure plans developed were sustainable and maintainable for park staff. While the designers began fleshing out design concepts, the HAC team members supported the development of the design presentation and researched case studies the Dublin community could reference as they develop further plans and seek out future funding opportunities.
The workshop concluded on day 3 with a morning presentation at Dublin Station, a community gathering space down the street from the Dublin Public Library. Community members were particularly excited to see a through-road in the park reimagined with painted scenes that depict Dublin’s culture and history, as well as new sidewalks, improved lighting, outdoor furniture, and other infrastructure that make the space both celebratory and functional. All in all, the presentation was well-attended and Dublin community members gave ample and appreciated feedback for the CIRD team to consider as design concepts are further developed and the Design Book prepared.
Read more about the CIRD local design workshop and Dublin’s broader CIRD experience, according to the Dublin Citizen.
The workshop activities illuminated robust community support for plans to reimagine and enhance Dublin City Park as an inclusive and accessible place for smaller gatherings and events alike. The CIRD local design workshop has importantly brought in additional stakeholders like the City Council and Mayor, whose participation and engagement, alongside the efforts of the Dublin Public Library, will propel future work on the park plans. Additionally, community interest developed during the workshop will help maintain and increase project momentum. According to Dublin Mayor David Leatherwood, who we connected with for a brief interview during the local design workshop, CIRD has brought “new insight” and “a plan to work towards” to the community and park project.
The CIRD team will provide Dublin with a drawing package and design book that will serve as a guide for the project's next steps. The design book includes a summary of engagement activities, project and community context, relevant case studies, and final design concept drawings that incorporate feedback from the workshop presentation. CIRD's team will also provide recommendations for potential funding opportunities across multiple projects, from improving the streetscape to reimagining existing park buildings.
Adina Dunn, and the Dublin Public Library, will continue to engage with other communities in the CIRD Design Learning Cohort throughout 2024. The cohort program offers additional access to one-on-one technical assistance with the CIRD team, peer engagement, and further learning with other rural community leaders. It also enables the ongoing work in Dublin to inform national rural design conversations.
