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Parks & Public Spaces
Application to Hold the Western Digital Freedom Quest on the South Plaza of Union Square Park on Friday, October 7th, 2011
WHEREAS, Weber Shandwick has submitted an application to hold a portion of the Western Digital Freedom Quest on the South Plaza of Union Square Park; and
WHEREAS, The event would take place on Friday, October 7th, 2011, from 11:00 am to 3:00 pm, with set-up beginning at 7:30 am and clean-up concluding by 5:00 pm; and
WHEREAS, The event would be a product launch for Western Digital's "My Book Live" program, a shared storage system for computers, tablets, and smartphones; and
WHEREAS, The event would feature freerunning performances, prize giveaways, product demonstrations, DJ-ed music and check-in for a 200-person scavenger hunt to occur later in the day in the area surrounding the park; and
WHEREAS, The footprint of the event fills a large portion of the South Plaza with structures including two 10 ft by 10 ft tents (each including a television and generator for product demonstrations), a DJ sound system with generator, props for the freerunnung performances, a fence around the performance area and freestanding signage; and
WHEREAS, Signage would include 8 ft by 8 ft banners in each of the product demonstration tents, two 10 ft by 20 ft banners, four 9 ft signs, four 3 ft by 7 ft banners and four 6 ft by 3 ft banners, all with the Western Digital logo; and
WHEREAS, Although the technology and the freerunning performances may be of interest to the community, this is essentially a commercial product launch that takes up a large amount of space throughout the South Plaza for most of the day and features excessive commercial signage; and
WHEREAS, Community Board Five discourages such highly commercial use of New York City parks; therefore, be it
RESOLVED, That Community Board Five recommends denial of the application from Weber Shandwick for the Western Digital Freedom Quest on the South Plaza of Union Square Park on Friday, October 7th, 2011.
The above resolution passed by a vote of 36 in favor; 0 opposed; 1 abstaining.