Revisiting the High Line as sociopolitical project

Proceedings 24th ISUF 2017 - City and Territory in the Globalization Age

The High Line, an abandoned elevated railway structure on Lower Manhattan's West-side, converted into the public park is among the most innovative urban renovation projects. The meatpacking district with industrial taste, transformed to one of the most fashionable areas in New York would not be realized without the impact of this unique Urban Park, the high Line. The story of how it came to be is a remarkable one: two young citizens with no prior experience in planning and development collaborated with their neighbors, elected officials, artists, local business owners, and leaders of burgeoning movements in horticulture and landscape architecture to create a park celebrated worldwide as a model for creatively designed, socially vibrant, ecologically sound public space. 5 millions of visitors are counted annually. The research will clarify the process of the High Line’s execution, its mechanism of urban transform, and impact to the neighborhood chronologically, and will discuss...

people.virginia.edu

A site out of mind is familiar territory to many city residents, but unseen and uninhabited in significant ways. These edges and leftover spaces, where urban and architectural scales and uses collide or social and economic divisions are manifest, are rarely considered worthy of design attention. Ugly, ordinary and out of the way, they present difficult existing conditions and unglamorous realities. Of the many types of sites out of mind, perhaps most challenging are the linear cuts incised through the morphological continuity of the city by railway and highway construction. Produced by changes in the technologies and cultures of mobility, this condition is found within dense North American cities largely developed before extensive 1950's highway construction. The resulting interstice, "a space that intervenes between one thing and another," 1 often generates seemingly uninhabitable zones and problematic discontinuities in the physical and social fabric. Yet these sites may also be understood as fortuitous seams that offer "found" land in apparently built-out urban areas, thereby reducing rural development pressures and increasing public engagement through greater physical density and design. Reconceptualization and inhabitation of these "compromised" sites with dense and sustainable urban infill is a potent alternative to greenfield development and sprawl. The air rights above and the leftover spaces beneath and along elevated highways, rail lines and other immense infrastructural elements are particularly compelling conditions through which to question contemporary conceptions of the public realm. How can publicness be constructed on a site that has yet to exist or exists in a marginalized space, literally in the margins, of high-speed movement? Highway air rights discussions often search for all-purpose "solutions" to the difficulties and opportunities of inhabiting these locations, but there is nothing generic about such conditions. Each (non)site has a history and specific characteristics that must be examined and understood during the design process. There are general principles, but these should be carefully articulated in flexible ways. EXPAND FURTHER?

The High Line, an innovative promenade created on a disused elevated railway in Manhattan, is one of the world’s most iconic new urban landmarks. Since the opening of its first section in 2009, this unique greenway has exceeded all expectations in terms of attracting visitors, investment, and property development to Manhattan’s West Side. Frequently celebrated as a monument to community-led activism, adaptive re-use of urban infrastructure, and innovative ecological design, the High Line is being used as a model for numerous urban redevelopment plans proliferating worldwide. Deconstructing the High Line is the first book to analyze the High Line from multiple perspectives, critically assessing its aesthetic, economic, ecological, symbolic, and social impacts. Including several essays by planners and architects directly involved in the High Line’s design, this volume also brings together a diverse range of scholars from the fields of urban studies, geography, anthropology, sociology, and cultural studies. Together, they offer insights into the project’s remarkable success, while also giving serious consideration to the critical charge that the High Line is “Disney World on the Hudson,” a project that has merely greened, sanitized, and gentrified an urban neighborhood while displacing longstanding residents and businesses. Deconstructing the High Line is not just for New Yorkers, but for anyone interested in larger issues of public space, neoliberal redevelopment, creative design practice, and urban renewal.

2009

INTRODUCTION This paper analyses design strategy and tools for planning and designing urban transformation areas, from the point of view of practitioners. In our rol e as concept developers, who are directly participa ing in urban transformation, social housing & real estate project development, are closely involved in projec ts with many investing participants. In these projects we e xperience the need to of find new ways to join forc es and to enjoy working together. We also notice that the economic value of urban design is no longer mainly appreciated from traditional short and long term fi nancial perspectives. There is thus a question for a different approach to the development of economic v alue. This asks for design strategies that can guid e this development of the economic value on the long term. In this paper we exemplify how we interpretate this economic change and introduce a practical case in which we used a design strategy that met these chan ges. We will describe stra...

In contrast to other urban renewal projects that erased the presence of minority and working-class residents, the design of the Center City Plaza in downtown Kansas City, Kansas, was an attempt to provide a democratic space for a diverse citizenry. Initiated by local officials, the project was intended to alter the "image" of the downtown. Environmental planner Elpidio Rocha was hired to design a pedestrian mall that included abstract sculptural forms. In the context of deindustrialization and suburbanization, however, urban renewal did not halt downtown decline and local political interests dismantled the pedestrian mall, setting the stage for a new round of redevelopment. urban renewal; Kansas City, Kansas; advocacy planning; urban design 331 AUTHOR'S NOTE: I would like to acknowledge the generous assistance of

Transportation Research Record, 1996

This paper examines the relative emphasis of urban and design in theories and practices of urban design. Traditionally, urban design has been conceived as a discourse in design and has been practiced as an extension of architecture, urban planning, and civil engineering. Post-modern critical thinking, in recent literature, questions the design dominance and calls for understanding complex relationships of politics, economics, sociology, behavior, and environment embedded in the urban context. In the prevalent paradigm, urban designers are primarily trained as architects, planners or engineers, each having one’s own design bias. Architects see design as formal orientation in space. Planners conceive design as implementation of policies reflecting social and economic values. Engineers understand design as efficiency in production. This eclectic approach of urban design creates a partitioned education model with conflicts and contradictions. This paper posits an inclusive model with the focus on urban instead of design. Such an approach defines the uniqueness of urban design. It allows opportunities of interrelationships and interactions among multiple disciplines and diverse issues. The inclusive approach is teleological (process oriented), relevant (specific), and catalytic (empowering). Rethinking the pedagogy of urban design is critical in understanding diverse roles urban design can play in the process of placemaking and in defining specific responsibilities urban designers can have in the society. Balance of urban and design in teaching should be explored. Proportion of the two may vary based on specific needs and individual programs. This is significant in developing urban design courses reflecting heterogeneity and complexity of the current urban environment. Further opportunities exist in applying this pedagogic model in areas of sustainable development, smart growth, and design research. Keywords: Urban Design, Pedagogy, Urban theory, Placemaking

WIT Transactions on Ecology and the Environment

This study focuses on those new (unconventional) public spaces generated through the existing urban infrastructures transforming interventions. The case study is the regeneration of the urban district of Mexico City crossed by a local railway line, the Ferrocarril de Cuernavaca, still partially in use. After an international competition, the entire area has been recently transformed, basing on the urban regeneration "Bosque Urban Ferrocarril del Cuernavaca" project made up by the Gaeta Springall Arquitectos Office. This project can be shown as a "model", as a good design practice to develop new "third places of density", capable of managing the existing urban conditions complexity and generating new urban qualities, new liveable spaces: innovative public spaces are generated along a linear park of 4.5 km which crosses 22 different neighbourhoods with different social, economic and spatial conditions; new urban functions, formal/informal hybrid forms of living/using the city (or its parts) are settled or simply suggested. It follows "common" design topics of various interventions able to increase social, economic and spatial values and to completely change the existing urban condition by adding space, in-filling life. Following a case study approach, this study reports the results of a joint workshop, conducted by the "Laboratori Metropolitani" research group of the IUAV University of Venice and by professors and students of the Ibero-Americana University. Three projects, set up during the workshop and completed in three Master's degree theses in architecture, will be shown and described; necessary multidisciplinary approaches, core issues and design topics will be highlighted to characterize and to increase dialogues between academia and professional practice; to show different possible ways to use free design exercises (especially those developed through workshops and seminars) as useful tools to address shared reflections for further urban projects developments and to imagine other possible interventions to improve urban quality life.