Posts tagged Public Spaces
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Bad urbanism on the Potomac waterfront
In December, I got into an interesting debate on the Dupont Forum neighborhood list about my feelings concerning the Third Church landmarking. Lance, who considers the building a “masterpiece,” asked if my desire to get rid of most 1970s-era buildings in downtown DC extended to more widely praised structures like the Watergate and Kennedy Center. I replied:The Watergate and… Keep reading…
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DC keeps getting blank walls
Two new developments in Washington, DC continue the disappointing trend of creating buildings that present blank walls to the street. Just as New York did in the 1970s and sometimes still does, and just like much of today’s downtown DC, developers create fortress-like apartment buildings, offices, and even churches that isolate their residents from the neighborhood… Keep reading…
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What’s wrong with empowering cities?
Discussing the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact, Illinois Republican and NPV supporter Kirk Dillard said, “I’ve studied a myth among some Republicans that this empowers cities. The statistics do not bear that out.” Wait, Kirk, what’s wrong with empowering cities? Do all Republicans, or even Illinois Republicans, feel that cities should… Keep reading…
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Can NYC build me a personal garage too?
As even more lurid details emerge of New York’s $340 million giveaway for Yankees parking—that’s right, entirely for parking—we learn that 70 million will go entirely to build a free garage reserved for Yankees and their guests, with no revenue ever being collected to pay back the city; that the total amount the team is paying the city for rent will decrease;… Keep reading…
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The blank wall today
We can at least excuse the awful blank street-facing blank walls of New York buildings like Manhattan Plaza or the Atlantic Center mall because, when these buildings were built in the 1970s, nobody knew better. Keep reading…
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Local parks need local government
When you hear the words “national park” you might think of Yosemite or Ellis Island or any of the historic monuments like Concord’s Minuteman National Historical Park at the Old North Bridge where the “Shot Heard ‘Round The World” was actually heard. Keep reading…
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DC may experiment with market pricing for parking
DC Councilmember Tommy Wells apparently has been reading his Donald Shoup. New York livable-streets activists have been calling for parking pricing reform for some time, following the teachings of groundbreaking parking scholar Shoup. Slowly, NYC leaders are starting to come around to this idea. But when they arrive, they may find DC already there waiting for them. Keep reading…
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Maybe they can build ‘em like they used to
During the dark ages of urban planning (the 1960s and 70s), many old residential buildings were replaced with boxy, alienating public housing projects, until Jane Jacobs discredited the idea. Block after block of attractive row houses are gone forever, even though brownstones in places like Brooklyn, Boston, San Francisco, and DC sell for a million dollars or two, or more. Can… Keep reading…
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Landmark or mistake?
If a building is ugly, doesn’t serve its intended purpose, and the people who own it want to tear it down… but it was built by the firm of a famous architect and is a prime example of its architectural style, should it be a landmark? That’s the debate before the DC Historic Preservation Review Board about the Third Church of Christ, Scientist (aka Christian Science)… Keep reading…
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The soul-crushing emptiness of downtown DC
410,000 people enter Washington, DC each weekday (as of 2005), the second-largest increase of any American city. But if you walk around large parts of downtown in the middle of the day, you might not think so. So many buildings face inward, with their public spaces in central courtyards cut off from the fabric of the city, feeding their workers in indoor cafeterias, leaving the… Keep reading…