BEIRUT: To celebrate Eid al-Fitr, which finished Thursday, many Lebanese Muslims meet with their family, cook, eat together and go for a leisurely stroll.

For those in Beirut, however, where public spaces are few and far between, there is a distinct lack of options to gather in the late summer heat, with many families venturing to Raouche to walk along the sea front.

But Beirut’s secret garden, the Horsh al-Sanawbar or Pine Forest, could soon be once again open to the public.

While an adjoining parking lot has been given over to Horsh al-Eid celebrations, and will remain open until Eid al-Adha, the rest of the spacious reserve remains closed off to the public.

Accounting for 77 percent of all open spaces in the city, the park lies at the southern edge of the Beirut municipality, next to the Hippodrome.

Closed since 1992, now only 10 percent of the park is open to the public. This small area, which includes the parking lot, is itself neglected, according to Imad, a guard who works there.

The public area, “needs a lot of attention … People don’t come, as there is nothing for the children to amuse themselves with,” he said.

To gain access to the fenced-off expansive greenery behind the fences one must be over 35 years of age and must first obtain a license from the municipality, complete with photo ID or flash a foreign passport at the gate.

Nahnoo, a youth organization, has been at the forefront of the campaign to have the entire park reopened.

“During the Civil War even the park was a free space for everyone. People used to come to celebrate Eid al-Fitr with their children, so we used to call it Horsh al-Eid,” said Mohammad Ayoub, executive director of Nahnoo.

A redesign, funded by the Conseil Regional d’Ile-de-France in the early 1990s, was set to breathe new life into the park, and it was due to be opened again in 2002, but the authorities decided to keep it closed, citing security concerns.

Now, however, there appears to be some light at the end of tunnel.

After months of negotiations with the municipality, Nahnoo, along with other civil society groups, NGOs and experts in the field, is currently forming a committee to offer advice on the next steps.

As of next week, the committee will conduct extensive research into how the park should be managed, and it will create a program of activities for the first year after reopening.

“We are going to call for the whole of the park to be open to the public. And we also want to connect the park to the Hippodrome, via a bridge,” Ayoub said.

“For us, opening the Horsh is a way of letting the children play and letting out tension and letting all sects and backgrounds, and rich and poor, meet in the park. If you go to (the southern suburbs), if you go to Furn al-Shubbak, there is nowhere for the children to play,” he added.

At the Horsh al-Eid celebrations, in the allotted parking lot, families spoke of the need for more such places.

Rana was visiting with her children. “This is such a great opportunity for the children to play: they’re so happy here,” she said.

“There’s a lack of public places in this city. We would love for the rest of the park to be open to everyone, and all year long.”

Sisters Mariam and Nour, 9 and 7-years-old, wished the small area dedicated to Eid celebrations was open all year round. “We’re so happy, we wish every day was Eid. We would come here all the time.”

In Beirut there is a 0.8 square-meter-per-capita ratio of greenery. The World Health Organization says the minimum should be 40 square meters per resident.

With its history of war, economic problems and tensions, Ayoub says residents often suffer from stress, and that the city is crying out for more public spaces.

“Where do the youth go? They want to release this tension, but how do you take it out? It is psychologically proven that games and activities ease tension. But in Beirut we have nothing, nowhere to let it out. Children can only play in the streets.”

Ayoub is confident the municipality will approve the committee’s recommendations, which they hope to submit in two months, and believes the park will again be open to all of Beirut’s citizens by next year.

But Beirut Mayor, Bilal Hamad, in a telephone interview with The Daily Star Thursday, was not willing to commit to a timetable for the park’s reopening.

Hamad said the park will not be reopened until he is satisfied it can be well protected from vandalism.

“We don’t want it turned into a narguileh area, or a barbeque area,” he added. “We need strict regulations and we have to enforce those regulations. Once I know we can enforce those regulations, we can open it.”

Hamad also voiced concern that the tense internal political situation will hinder efforts to protect the security of the park.

“First of all we need to wait until the political situation eases a little bit. I want the Internal Security Forces to be able to implement the law. If someone is caught bringing in a narguileh, and if he is released, just because he is the member of a particular party … I want enough power to enforce it.”

With this is mind, Hamad is overseeing the training of additional municipality guards, who already patrol other public spaces in the city, and he wants 40 such guards to police the park, once it is open.

But, he reiterated, the park belongs to the people.

“This park is the land of Beirutis, it is their land and we just want to protect it.” – Additional reporting by Reem Harb