Tuesday In The Park With… Solitude

On a normal Tuesday afternoon in June, there might be something other than browning grass, two lonely baseball diamonds, a hoop-less basketball court, and an empty bleacher on Pine Rock Field in Hamden.

But this Tuesday, aside from that solitary assemblage of sporting infrastructure, there was just a stiff wind kicking up the dust from the baseball diamonds and rustling the leaves of the large maples on the northern end of the field.

If Tuesday afternoon in Hamden’s parks is any indication, town officials don’t have to worry about people following the rules and staying away from each other at playgrounds and playscapes.

On Friday, Mayor Curt Leng announced that ​“playgrounds, playscapes, and splash pads” would remain closed until the end of the public health emergency caused by Covid-19 (which, of course, has no set end date). Parks, trails, fields, and courts remain open, though there cannot be gatherings of more than 10 people, and users must socially distance.

He also announced that the town’s dog park would reopen, which it did on Saturday, and that only 25 people are allowed at a time, and they must stay six feet apart. Leng also extended his order requiring face coverings in public places like stores until the end of the public health emergency, whenever that long-anticipated day may come.

On Tuesday, no one was breaking any of the rules. There was practically no one around to break them. Either the heat, the rules, the fear of contracting the virus, or most likely a combination of all of the above had kept residents out of Hamden’s parks in droves.

The Helen Street School playground was closed off. As it should be, it was empty.

Pine Rock Field was empty. The grass was turning brown and crunched underfoot because of the hot sun and weeks without rain. A banner hung on the fence of the baseball diamond explaining that the park can only be used as long as people socially distance.

Nearby, at Hamden Plains Park, the playground was closed off, and no one was nearby. The field was empty, until a family of five entered at one end and then walked along the perimeter to the other.

Serena Johnson said she and her family walk there every day. Sometimes they just walk through it or around it, like on Tuesday, she said. Sometimes they kick around a soccer ball.

It’s always like this, she said of the dearth of other park-goers. Usually there are just one or two other people there.

“If more people started to show up, we wouldn’t come,” she said.

John P. DeNicola Park on Treadwell Street was completely empty, despite the shade parts of it afford. The basketball hoops had been taken off the backboards, as they had been at every other park in town.

Someone had drawn an obstacle course in chalk on the basketball court. The chalk line jumped over the cracks in the pavement through which grass and weeds had begun to sprout.

On the other side of Whitney Avenue, Morretti Field was empty. The only objects in the field were two net-less soccer goals, and three traffic cones, one of them on its side at one end. Through the line of shrubs and trees along the southern edge, you could see a line of golf carts pass by on the New Haven Country Club’s golf course.

A landscaping truck was parked in the shaded gravel parking lot, its driver’s side door open. A young man was sitting in the cab, his head resting on his arm, asleep.

At the nearby dog park, a few people were taking advantage of the now reopened play space. As the Independent arrived, two cars pulled out of the parking lot. A man was sitting on a bench, asleep, his dog sitting at his feet.

Sandy Collins (pictured above) was standing among the trees with her sister Penny Draker and her dog Coco. She said she moved to Hamden from California in April, and that this was her first time in the park.

Before the park opened back up, she drove to the dog park in either Wallingford or Naugatuck. Now, she has a park much closer to her new home where she can take Coco. She said she would be coming back.

“This is where I’ll be making friends. I hope,” she said, adding that dog parks are often the place neighbors get to know each other.

Bassett Field across the street was empty too, save for three adolescent boys hanging out, masked, on bikes.

Further south, at Villano Park, there were just two girls sitting on a bench. Otherwise, the playground, playing field, and courts were deserted.

The tennis court, though, was not completely empty. Unlike the soccer goals and basketball courts of the town, it did have a net. But no one was keeping it company.