Across the country there have been an influx of community development projects in urban areas with seemingly very little engagement of the individuals directly impacted by these projects. Legion Field and McLendon Park have served as staples in the western area of Birmingham for nearly one hundred years reigning as the “Football Capital of the South". However; sacred community spaces such as these have not been reimagined, redeveloped or revitalized in years. Thus these venues have now become hollow shells for great memories and limited programming. As the dynamics of a changing Birmingham looms the lingering question is what will become of Legion Field and McLendon Park. This engagement initiative, Westside Rising, was designed to provide quantitative and qualitative data for the purpose of determining a series of concrete next steps to address future plans of Legion Field and the impact it would have on the immediate community.
