Christopher Columbus Park

The North End/Waterfront Mothers Association says fight-happy homeless people in Christopher Columbus Park are becoming a menace to their children and that one answer is a six-foot-tall fence around the park's playground - locked every night from May through November.

In an e-mail to members, organizers say they reached their breaking point last month after a fatally injured man was pulled out of the harbor near the park, possibly as the result of a fight in the park.

The e-mail is a call to action to have members show up in force at a community meeting on Tuesday with city councilors. The session starts at 6:30 p.m. at the Pilot House, 2 Atlantic Ave.

We have to let the councilors know that protecting children is our first priority as a neighborhood. A packed room of concerned, involved residents will do that.

A good Samaritan jumped into Boston Harbor near Long Wharf shortly after 11 this morning and helped keep somebody foundering in the water afloat until a State Police boat arrived and troopers pulled both out. Boston EMS treated the man at the scene and then transported him to Mass. General for further care, Boston Fire spokesman Steve MacDonald says.

The Herald reports he died not long after his arrival at the hospital and that police are investigating.

NorthEndWaterfront.com quotes President of the Friends of Christopher Columbus Park that the man may have been pushed by somebody he was brawling with.

Darryl Houston captured the daylight-powerful lights on Fairmount Hill in Hyde Park - put up by a guy who rents an aerial lift to ensure no surface is unilluminated.

Uma Mirani photographed Cambridge Common:

The barrage of news about bodily fluids continues, this time via a report on NorthEndWaterfront.com about an incident this past Friday at the playground at Christopher Columbus Park, two hours after a father called 911 to report homeless men sleeping in the playground equipment and blood everywhere:

The playground area was teeming with children and mothers. I walked around the equipment and to my horror, at the back side, 2 of the tunnels were smeared with blood, there was a large puddle of urine and feces under the equipment. A little boy was just about to crawl through the tunnel. I yelled at him to stop and then told everyone they had to leave. I waited for the clean up crew, keeping everyone out of the area.

The park department's initial response: Send out a worker with some water and a pine-scented solution.

Busted!

An alert citizen uses Citizens Connect to praise an unidentified city worker:

The gentleman in blue seems to be offering tourists on Segways citations as souvenirs of their tour. Boston Gliders should be ticketed every time they use the sidewalk and this is a good spot for it. They use the sidewalk for a large part of every tour but try to hide on the harborwalk, puopolo park, behind the aquarium, fan pier, where they think there is no enforcement.

The city banned Segways from parks and sidewalks in June; the owner of Boston Gliders, of course, promptly sued.

NorthendWaterfront.com provides the video of the start of the Fisherman's Feast. Although there aren't any fishing boats there anymore, there used to be.

An annoyed citizen reports:

Segway traffic jam at Christopher Columbus Park! Large Segway tour group blacking steps & monopolizing pedestrian plaza riding practice laps. Aren't Segways illegal in pedestrian areas and parks?

The City Council adopted Segway restrictions in June, but said enforcement would have to wait until after transportation and police officials came up with specific regulations that include on-street lanes Segway tour operators can use.

Boston Fire and Boston EMS both confirm this account that a woman sustained serious enough injuries falling off a Segway Sunday evening that she needed transportation to a local hospital:

The formerly healthy rider was just taken away on a stretcher, on a backboard, in a neckbrace, bleeding.

Spokespeople for both departments, however, did not have additional information on what might have caused the fall, around 6:20 p.m. by Joe's American Bar.

Last week, the City Council voted to severely restrict Segway use by people without disabilities in Boston, citing the potential menace to senior citizens and other pedestrians. Two days later, however, a Segway tour company operating out of the North End sued over the regulations, saying in part the council could offer no proof the two-wheeled vehicles were unsafe.

Jeff Tamagini took a portfolio's worth of photos of Boston Ballet dancers yesterday at the Boston Ahts Festival at Christopher Columbus Park (still going on today).

Copyright Jeff Tamagini. Tagged as universalhub on Flickr.

Sure, you could just stage a boring rally to call for action on climate change. Or you could hold a Boston Under Water Climate Festival, featuring such fun events as

• Building a sandbag flood barrier
• A massive group photo in front of the sandbag wall with a banner calling on world leaders to get us back to 350 and to pass a fair, ambitious and binding climate treaty this yearFlooding Station: learn about what sea level rise and higher storm surges will mean for Boston
• Fred Small sings "Three Five 0"
• Canoe relay racing!!
• Participatory Climate Theater!!
• Plus blue face-painting, bike-flag making, and much, much more!

Saturday, Oct. 24, 3-5:30 p.m. at Christopher Columbus Park.

Libertarians, anti-income-taxers, Barney Frank haters, birthers, objectivists, Reagan lovers, Sarah Palin fans, Oath Keepers and gun owners descended on Christopher Columbus Park this Independence Day to vow to retake America from the the jack-booted heel of socialized medicine and pollution caps, or something, in yet another Tea Bagging.

Most of the 300 or 400 protesters were from out of state, but at-large City Council candidates Sean Ryan and Doug Bennett also attended. Bennett, in fact, was the first speaker of the day, moving further away from his Republican roots by complaining about tax-and-spend "Republicrats" who are putting us deeper into a depression. I ran into him before the speechifying; he said that while he might not agree with everything the protesters said, he did agree the income tax was unconstitutional, because the founding fathers didn't include it in the Constitution.

Girly men can't appreciate a pit bull with lipstick:

At least the city didn't flush any of its own money down the toilet.

Petercip managed to avoid getting feathers in his lens at today's waterfront pillow fight.

Steve Garfield posts photos from today's annual public pillow fight.

More photos.

Steve also posted a video, which sums it all up:

Greg MacKay spends some time under the arbor at Christopher Columbus Park.

Presumably, however, Matt eventually got tired and stopped posing behind the headless statue.