Sleeping in Public
. . . this pattern helps to make places like the Interchange, Small Public Squares, Public Outdoor Room, Street Cafe, Pedestrian Street, Building Thoroughfare, A Place to Wait completely public.
Problem:
It is a mark of success in a park, public lobby or a porch, when people can come there and fall asleep.
Background & Research: Not Included on the site—Go read the book!
Solution:
Keep the environment filled with ample benches, comfortable places, comers to sit on the ground, or lie in comfort in the sand. Make these places relatively sheltered, protected from circulation, perhaps up a step, with seats and grass to slump down upon, read the paper and doze off.
Usage:
Above all, put the places for sleeping along Building Edge; make seats there, and perhaps even a bed alcove or two in public might be a nice touch—Bed Alcove, Seat Spots; but above all, it will hinge on the attitudes which people have—do anything you can to create trust, so that people feel no fear in going to sleep in public and so that other people feel no fear of people sleeping in the street.
pg. 457