Adding screening for privacy, porch on an apartment building on 1700 South, Salt Lake City

20+ years ago beginning work on revitalization of the H Street NE corridor in Washington DC, I saw a great photo of a new apartment building with people on balconies in the Los Angeles Times (this was before I used Flickr to store photos so I no longer have a clue on how to find it).

I thought "what a great activation device for the street."

Since then lots of big apartment buildings have opened on H Street NE but none have balconies.

Across the country, at least in commercial districts, most of the new big buildings are constructed without balconies, although Park Place in Petworth ("Chris Donatelli, a DC real estate developer, dead at 58") does.  

I have a photo of people on a balcony there, but flaws in Flickr's current search function means I can't find it.

And I have photos of balconies with bikes, as the only secure place to park a bike in a building without dedicated, secure bicycle parking like this one in Boise.

This photo shows what can be done with bigger balconies.

Although with smaller buildings in Salt Lake, yes, people climb up somehow and steal the bikes.

The photo at the top of the entry, of a building balcony just a few feet from a busy roadway and likely what is a very noisy place demonstrates that "my activation" is "someone else's space they have to live in and with" and they modify it accordingly.

Up high, like the photo in the LA Times or even Park Place which is on busy Georgia Avenue, the sound gets dissipated and the space is more usable.

But not when it's only one floor above the street and sidewalk.  Balcony screens are then a good device.

Similarly, this porch screen, with a garden motif is placed on a house on 2100 South, which at the location is six lanes, one for parking.