Tag Archives: parks
High Line Opens New Stretch of Spiky Flowers, Amblers, Voyeurs: Interview
The High Line, a hairline of greenery running 22 blocks atop a nearly forgotten railroad viaduct, has improbably become a global phenomenon.
Threading its way between factories tangled with water tanks and fire escapes, the dilapidated viaduct was turned into a park in 2009 and now attracts human traffic jams.
A neighbor has put on coy fire-escape performances. I hear that guests in a hotel that looms above the park sometimes undress for the pleasure of the strolling throngs.
Tomorrow, the second stage of the $153-million park opens, stretching 10 blocks from 20th Street in Manhattan’s West Chelsea, to 30th Street — more than doubling the length of the first phase.
Last week, I walked the new stretch with two of the park’s designers, Ricardo Scofidio, a principal at the architecture firm of Diller Scofidio and Renfro, and James Corner, the landscape architect, who is principal of James Corner Field Operations.
Curious folks pressed noses against the dividing chain link fence that is about to come down.
Corner smiled, remembering when his client — the nonprofit Friends of the High Line — worried no one would come.
Read more at Bloomberg.
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James S. Russell is the architecture columnist for Bloomberg News. He has written about cities, architecture, and environmental design for more than 20 years. His new book is The Agile City: Building Well-Being and Wealth in an Era of Climate Change.
About James S. Russell
James S. Russell is the architecture columnist for Bloomberg News. He has written about cities, architecture, and environmental design for more than 20 years. As a long-time editor, he helped Architectural Record magazine win a National Magazine Award for General Excellence. He has written for numerous newspapers, magazines and books and consulted to environmental organizations, cities, and architects. He teaches at the City College of New York and is a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects.
Innovations in Urban Green, Questions for Peter Harnik
Peter Harnik discusses ideas from his new book Urban Green: Innovate Parks for Resurgent Cities on the Trust for Public Land’s City Parks blog:
We asked Peter Harnik to answer some questions about his new book, Urban Green: Innovative Parks for Resurgent Cities, that covers how cities can plan for parks as well as how to create them in “all built-out” settings.
Your book addresses many age-old questions about parks and cities. Let’s start with the big one — how much parkland should a city have?
“Should” is the wrong verb. “Should” implies that the outcome is decided by planners. The right verb is “want”: “How much parkland do we as residents and taxpayers want?” It’s a political issue, and it’s got to be approached politically by building a base of active park supporters. Every city has a different geography, a different history and a different culture — it’s not one size fits all. I think people sometimes use the word “should” in the hopes that someone else will do the work for them. No great park system was created solely by planners using official standards.
But still — don’t even advocates need to know how their city compares to others?
Oh, definitely! That’s why I give some comparative numbers in the book and many more on our web page (at www.tpl.org/cityparkfacts). If you take a trip to Boston or Minneapolis and like what you see, you can compare what your city has with them — everything from acreage to playgrounds to recreation centers to swimming pools. Which is why I always say it’s not just about gross acreage. One place may have lots of young people primarily interested in sports fields, another may be tilted toward older folks who want walking trails through bird-filled marshes. The environment also matters: some cities easily support lush forested parks, others are built on arid deserts where trees are essentially alien species. But the most important factor is population density. Crowded New York and San Francisco have so much concrete everywhere that every added pocket park is magical. Roomy Jacksonville and Oklahoma City, with thousands of large suburban-style yards are already halfway natural even not counting their parks. Density has a major impact on how people think about parks and how they use them.
Read more at the City Parks blog or learn more about Urban Green
