This flyby brings out some of the major design flaws of this design:
1) Olmstead walk doesn't look unbroken to me....in fact, in some places (service court entrance) it' seems to stop and you have to go laterally down stairs. Other places it appears below grade. Is that going to be great for running, walking or cycling?
2) You can just feel how oppressive the N. court pedestrian experience is going to be...how the buildings are cantilevered out over the sidewalk. I don't know why anyone would want that feeling of being a miniscule worm as the building towers above you.
3) In the N. Court you can also see an outdoor cafe in the middle of two lanes of traffic ...sure there is only two cars there now...wait till it gets filled up with traffic. Imagine the sound reflecting of all this steel and concrete. It will be a noisy canyon of sound and smog. It would not have been hard to put the two lanes of traffic on the north side of the towers (if they insist of on having cars...would have been much better as a pedestrian street). That way the other side of the towers could be outdoor cafes and the existing structures would at least partially block diners from the traffic on the other side.
3) Same thing on the South Service court. If you really want traffic on that south court ( why on earth would we?) put both lanes on one side of the towers... sticking the towers in the median not only separates them visually from the park, but it makes them look worse. Having the service court contiguous with the park side opens up the possibilty of having a farmers market space or a biergarten or something that would draw people. And you could design the towers to really be something cool (vertical gardens or something).
3) That community center....it's cool and i like the design (let's face it Renzo Piano IS talented). But there is the REALITY of it. But let's calculate the number of NEW people that are going to live on this site....to me has to be 700 or more new housing units .. add the number of people in the surrounding communities...thousands? Realize how small that pool is going to become....a 25 meter poor for how many thousands of people? Could have been much bigger if they had designed the pool to be continuous with the entrance water feature (urban beach??) ...and made the entire thing indoor/outdoor swim-able. As is, i think that pool is gonna get awful nasty awful quickly. I do appreciate that someone made them take that horrendous green mechanical shed off the top...when i saw that i immediately thought that it was the intern's first day at work. I think that it could have been MUCH more interesting had they designed the roof as a placid reflecting pool...with water cascading off the roof in tight little ribbons into the lower pools below. How cool would that have been? and what a tribute to the history of water. An instant icon.
4) The park...ok, i love the size. But unless you're playing touch football or throwing your dog a ball, how much do you actually use unprogrammed open green space? Take a photo at the mall on any given day. Notice how many people are in the grass in the middle....nearly none. People tend to congregate in the shady spots at the periphery and in the sculpture gardens. Would have been much more usable to have mixed this space up with some gardens with benches...etc. I do like this park, but i think it could have been thought thru to a greater degree. I also don't see any benches on the Olmsted walk....could be because hawthorns don't actually provide much shade. So i hope they choose a difference species of tree.
See, the sort of travesty of this is that we WERE almost there....with a few more iterations we could have taken this design from OK to really great. Now with HPRB out of the way, i don't think there will be true pressure to ramp it up any further.
Fellow community members (and those who do not live in our community) please stop using misinformation to delay or totally oppose redevelopment of McMillan. I attended last week’s HPRB hearing and have followed the HPRB’s process. They have been extremely thoughtful and diligent in their work, resulting in plans that truly do a beautiful job of respecting and embracing the historic integrity of the site. All of the silos will remain as integral pieces of the design. The Olmstead walk will be a walking history tour! Upset about the underground silos? I’m sorry. Creating underground, functional villages within these historic structures is just not feasible. To those who say that we are losing a park – please! This was NEVER a park. Ever. But it will be! We will now have acres of open space to enjoy with our families – and a community center to boot! The new building designs are significantly more appealing and cohesive than they were originally.
3 comments:
This flyby brings out some of the major design flaws of this design:
1) Olmstead walk doesn't look unbroken to me....in fact, in some places (service court entrance) it' seems to stop and you have to go laterally down stairs. Other places it appears below grade. Is that going to be great for running, walking or cycling?
2) You can just feel how oppressive the N. court pedestrian experience is going to be...how the buildings are cantilevered out over the sidewalk. I don't know why anyone would want that feeling of being a miniscule worm as the building towers above you.
3) In the N. Court you can also see an outdoor cafe in the middle of two lanes of traffic ...sure there is only two cars there now...wait till it gets filled up with traffic. Imagine the sound reflecting of all this steel and concrete. It will be a noisy canyon of sound and smog. It would not have been hard to put the two lanes of traffic on the north side of the towers (if they insist of on having cars...would have been much better as a pedestrian street). That way the other side of the towers could be outdoor cafes and the existing structures would at least partially block diners from the traffic on the other side.
3) Same thing on the South Service court. If you really want traffic on that south court ( why on earth would we?) put both lanes on one side of the towers... sticking the towers in the median not only separates them visually from the park, but it makes them look worse. Having the service court contiguous with the park side opens up the possibilty of having a farmers market space or a biergarten or something that would draw people. And you could design the towers to really be something cool (vertical gardens or something).
3) That community center....it's cool and i like the design (let's face it Renzo Piano IS talented). But there is the REALITY of it. But let's calculate the number of NEW people that are going to live on this site....to me has to be 700 or more new housing units .. add the number of people in the surrounding communities...thousands? Realize how small that pool is going to become....a 25 meter poor for how many thousands of people? Could have been much bigger if they had designed the pool to be continuous with the entrance water feature (urban beach??) ...and made the entire thing indoor/outdoor swim-able. As is, i think that pool is gonna get awful nasty awful quickly. I do appreciate that someone made them take that horrendous green mechanical shed off the top...when i saw that i immediately thought that it was the intern's first day at work. I think that it could have been MUCH more interesting had they designed the roof as a placid reflecting pool...with water cascading off the roof in tight little ribbons into the lower pools below. How cool would that have been? and what a tribute to the history of water. An instant icon.
4) The park...ok, i love the size. But unless you're playing touch football or throwing your dog a ball, how much do you actually use unprogrammed open green space? Take a photo at the mall on any given day. Notice how many people are in the grass in the middle....nearly none. People tend to congregate in the shady spots at the periphery and in the sculpture gardens. Would have been much more usable to have mixed this space up with some gardens with benches...etc. I do like this park, but i think it could have been thought thru to a greater degree.
I also don't see any benches on the Olmsted walk....could be because hawthorns don't actually provide much shade. So i hope they choose a difference species of tree.
See, the sort of travesty of this is that we WERE almost there....with a few more iterations we could have taken this design from OK to really great. Now with HPRB out of the way, i don't think there will be true pressure to ramp it up any further.
Fellow community members (and those who do not live in our community) please stop using misinformation to delay or totally oppose redevelopment of McMillan. I attended last week’s HPRB hearing and have followed the HPRB’s process. They have been extremely thoughtful and diligent in their work, resulting in plans that truly do a beautiful job of respecting and embracing the historic integrity of the site. All of the silos will remain as integral pieces of the design. The Olmstead walk will be a walking history tour! Upset about the underground silos? I’m sorry. Creating underground, functional villages within these historic structures is just not feasible. To those who say that we are losing a park – please! This was NEVER a park. Ever. But it will be! We will now have acres of open space to enjoy with our families – and a community center to boot! The new building designs are significantly more appealing and cohesive than they were originally.
Thank you PaulMinor
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