Shit runs down hill, and pay day is on Friday. That’s a joke I learned in an evironmental systems class. In New York, plumbers also know Copper is King. But not for long, perhaps. New York City is in the process of revising its building codes, top to bottom. The overall goal is to be consistent with the national Uniform Building Codes, which in principal should streamline design and construction. The only two items that are up for revision that are mentioned in detail are the requirement to use copper plumbing in buildings over three stories and that New York has stricter standards for fireproofing (the length of time before a structural member fails, and the amount of resistance materials have seperating dwellings in multi-unit buildings in New York is twice the national code). The only thing revisions to this code would produce is a reduction in construction cost, but no improvement to the quality of construction (the second sheet of fire-rated drywall also adds much needed sound attentuation) nor any increase in safety. The Real Estate Board mouthpiece implies that these changes will lead to a windfall of affordable housing. Let’s all take a deep breath and wait for that to happen (via Anil).
No one can get it right.
That isn’t intended to be a specific criticism; I am of the belief there is an inherent futility in trying to create a memorial for the WTC site. The Times, which has played a complicated role in trying to set an agenda about the discussion and process that stands awkwardly among providing a populist voice(something they are never good at) for the families, maintaining their preeminence as cultural arbiters by championing various ‘high design’ concepts and appeasing the money (in the form of developer interests, something the they are better at than most think), is trying to maintain an open dialogue by asking Landscape designers to offer alternative proposals organized around the simple query ‘Why Not a Park?’(offered as part of their ‘Architecture’ issue of the Magazine; it’s also nice to see that the issue isn’t simply a survey of high-end interiors). The proposals manage to look both naive and hyper-aware of the simple absurdity of the program (would you have a picnic in such a park?). They tend towards the ‘activist’ response, though Ken Smith, who has the favorite (at least in terms of web voting) is least inclined towards this, evident in his title (‘Respite’). Field Operations proposes a complete reimagining of lower Manhattan that looks like rejected Superstudio imagery or story boards for ‘The Day After Tomorrow.’ Julie Bargmann and D.I.R.T. Studio have a well-reasoned idea, one that might even be the genesis of a ritual that could perhaps be an act of remembrance and honor that has enough precedent in our culture (tree planting as act of hope and remembering) to make the campaigning for such an idea palatable, but it is undermined by cartoony visuals, which I expect were intended to try and make the project as explicable as possible to people other than fussy architects. It’s an impossible presentation quandary, and their response is not a failure, but nor does it resonate in the same way as the concept itself.
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Porn and Liberty Bonds, both hard to come by in Times Square.
The Times reports that financing has been secured for their new building in Times Square, but apparently it won’t be an extended journey on the government gravy train that funded the site acquisition (and this was a deal that raised truly bipartisan hackles, though of course the freepers couldn’t help but make jabs to the effect that liberals weren’t adequately outraged). Developer Bruce Ratner (who is busy buying some really expensive apartments in Brooklyn this week) had requested that the building be funded in part by Liberty Bonds, further proof that real estate developers would piss on any grave they can to make a buck, but was denied, forcing him to go elsewhere (GMAC, specifically). Now, you can attribute this to good government oversight, or wonder suspiciously if there was a little quid pro quo going on elsewhere.
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The big, bad FDR.
Well, Boston thinks it’s a good idea! Normally, such a sentiment wouldn’t hold sway here in the big city, but since that’s referring to the Big Dig, we’re supposed to be all impressed, just like we were supposed to be when Robert Moses told us it was such a great idea to build all this shit in the first place. The Old Gray Lady does her usual PR/Google placement service by listing bunches of people she knows, or at least met at parties, most prominently SHoP (that’s a bunch of people named Sharples who designed the Porter House and the new bridges over West Street), who are talking about dismantling the lower section of the FDR (south of the Brooklyn Bridge), so that the most desolate stretch of lower Manhattan can be reunited with the most desolate stretch of waterfront south of 96th Street. Of course, the plans don’t end there. Expect all manner of zooty renderings from cleverly-named architects to distract us while the backrooom workings are set in place to produce another pukingly ugly development. You’re co-opted(tm)!
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Incidental Insight.
The Times has a piece on the status of the US Embassy in Berlin (apparently the plan to hire Jeff Koons to make a humongous stainless steel ‘Surrender Monkey’ fell through). This is not a ‘local’ story, but the accompanying photo provides a good in-progress view of the Monument to the Murdered Jews of Europe, which was designed by Peter Eisenman. Eisenman’s weakness has always been too much of a gap between drawing and form (or, sometimes, a too literal transformation). Though I’m in no position to judge, and indeed don’t even necessarily have a negative conclusion to present, it is an interesting image to see after all these years of wireframe CAD renderings projected at a much lower angle.
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ICFF.
The Architect’s Newspaper provides a round up on ICFF, which kicks off Saturday at the Javits Center (the print-only version has an extensive listing of events and related parties). Note, ICFF is for ‘trade’ only, so you’d better hurry and get some fake business cards printed (tip: use a Williamsburg address and lots of radius corners for the graphics).
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Richard Schwartz and his calculator.
For a by the numbers tabloid piece on the WTC site, read this. It’s the usual pap: pseudo populist voice (they lawyers are vultures! the PA is a poorly run bureaucracy!), laments lost goals presented as fait accompli, even as they are still heavily contested. And it’s unfortunate, since he also makes several compelling arguments. The lawyers are vultures, and the Port Authority, net, has benefited New York far less than New Jersey. And the Calatrava station is a boondoggle, even allowing for a newfound desire for design excellence. He provides only an implied alternative, which is that infrastructure investment should be minimized so we can provide subsidized office space (there is currently so little demand for space that adding several million square feet of new space would depress Class A so much rents that the buildings would end up underwater from Day 1) in a neighborhood that, excepting a one time blip in the late 90s (that was already tapering, before 9/11), had been a contracting commercial real estate market for two decades. But we must build, we must. Underwhelming commercial real estate is what makes this country great. If that’s so, Richard Schwartz should move to Tysons Corner.
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More signs of the apocalypse.
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Thoms of Mayne.
The Times does a sprucing-up-the-flagging-career bit for Thom Mayne, who is on tap to complete a building for the Cooper Union (if memory serves, it is the site directly north of the Great Hall, which involves a tear down of the existing, unmemorable engineering building). A elder stateman who practices in the region once said to a friend in reponse to a query about their work ‘Hmm? Oh, yes, I remember them. I never understood why they used so many bolts.’ Well, words to that effect. I don’t have the haughty aristocractic mien to pull off the paraphrasing adequately.