As AARP continues to promote the Community Challenge Grant Program with an application deadline on March 22nd, the organization is also highlighting the creative past projects that have supported older adults.

In its recent newsletter, AARP Livable Communities released a photo album called “Have a Seat” that displays all the places to sit in parks and on plazas, along hiking trails and at transit stops that have been funded by the Community Challenge Grant.

One of the featured projects is in the Ag-Friendly Community of Greenfield, which is included in the regional Age- and Dementia Friendly Franklin County-North Quabbin led by LifePath and Franklin Regional Council of Governments (FRCOG).

As described in the photo album:

• The city removed 250-square-feet of asphalt from a parking lot in its downtown and replaced it with a pocket park — called Energy Park —complete with benches, a chess table (the game store across the street is the keeper of the playing pieces), a bike repair station, a pollinator garden and a quirky bee sculpture (pictured). The small-scale success helped in securing a $200,000 grant from the state’s Department of Transportation to relocate the parking lot and expand the park. The centrally located green space has enabled Greenfield to both live up to its name and declare about itself: “There are many reasons to PARK yourself in Greenfield for the day!”