Rochester has a bragging right that can be claimed by only four U.S. cities: An entire park system designed by the famed landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted.
To show off this rare asset, the Rochester Olmsted Parks Alliance and Rochester Ecology Partners are offering a bus and walking tour of Highland, Genesee Valley, Seneca, and Maplewood Parks from 5:30 to 8 p.m. Sept. 17.
The theme of the tour is “Material Expressions of Democracy.”
According to architectural historian and Parks Alliance board member Katie Eggers Comeau, Olmsted was part of a new generation of landscape architects and thinkers in the late 19th century who believed parks should be spaces enjoyed by the public, not reserved for the aristocracy, as they had traditionally been in Europe…