Brooklyn Bridge Park: anticipating the new softer edge

On a walkabout on the Promenade this morning, I got to thinking about hard and soft edges for urban waterfronts, the BQE rumbling below, the concrete piers extending into the East River, the overgrown and decayed pylons. The piers seem so crisp, even in disrepair, and foreign against the river. Yet on Pier 3 sits a stand of many varieties of trees, and with them the promise of a new future for Brooklyn Bridge Park.

I'm looking forward to seeing how Brooklyn Bridge Park will ultimately reinvent and soften the waterfront edge. Ecologically speaking, the recreation of salt marshes and wetlands will create healthier and more dynamic tidal ecosystems along the shoreline, while the reinsertion of permeable surface will create recharge zones that will help reduce pollution from urban stormwater. Environmentally responsible methods are being employed in the park's construciton as well. I'm impressed by the level of care being taken to recycle and reclaim materials from demolition in the park's construction, such as stones from the Willis Avenue Bridge and timbers from the demolished Cold Storage Warehouse.

Back in May the trees for Piers 1 and 6 were set into a temporary space on Pier 3 (above). Pier 1 will be the first to open this winter. Next month there are construction tours on tuesday nights. RSVP requested. Who wants to go with me?

Construction Updates
Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy
Brooklyn Bridge Park Development Corporation

Burn: Oroussoff on Atlantic Yards

Nicolai Oroussoff's review in the New York Times of the Ellerbe Becket design for the Nets new arena at Atlantic Yards is scorching. It is at once an indictment of the project's current state, but also decries the most odious aspects to large-scale urban development today: greed and a lack of concern for the public realm, Oroussoff writes:

"Its low-budget, no-frills design embodies the crass, bottom-line mentality that puts personal profit above the public good. If it is ever built, it will create a black hole in the heart of a vital neighborhood.

"But what’s most offensive about the design is the message it sends to New Yorkers. Architecture, we are being told, is something decorative and expendable, a luxury we can afford only in good times, or if we happen to be very rich. What’s most important is to build, no matter how thoughtless or dehumanizing the results. It is the kind of logic that kills cities — and that has been poisoning this one for decades."

But he also gives Frank Gehry's design its due, acknowledging its thoughtfulness and creativity, regardless of what early detractors said.

Go-Go-Gowanus

I love the idea that Brooklyn's Gowanus Canal is both eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places and a proposed Superfund site.

The Gowanus Canal is an industrial waterway, flanked by industry, overpassed by a subway viaduct, and surrouned by yuppified/gentrifying neighborhoods (Park Slope, Carroll Gardens, Red Hook). It is a strongly industrial place marred by pollution, but also a cultural landscape that has remains due to continued use. Originally the area was tidal wetlands and creeks that were host to early millworks. The canal was built to meet the needs of increasing industrial production in the mid-1800s. Marshes were drained (more on those in a future post) and the 1.5 mile Gowanus Canal quickly became an important maritime and commercial hub. But after more than a century of industrial and municipal pollution, the Gowanus Canal is so degraded it may become a Superfund site.

So environmental and preservation groups are as interested in what happens as the state and local government are. But what’s next for the Gowanus Canal remains anybody’s guess:

• The Gowanus Canal Conservancy has a vision for the Canal’s environmental restoration and green development.
• New York City Department of City Planning has issued its Gowanus Canal Corridor Framework for rezoning 25 blocks around the Canal to reflect the retreat of industrial uses and make way for housing, mixed-use development on appropriate sites, while maintaining some industrial presence.
  
• The Army Corps has studied the canal, and New York State may designate the canal as a Superfund Site, and there are lots of strong opinions on both sides of this debate.
  "Gowanus Canal, Polluted for Many Decades, May Become Superfund Site" (NY Times, April 10,2009)
  "On the Gowanus Canal, Fear of Superfund Stigma" (NY Times, April 24, 2009)
• A 2008 Columbia Historic Preservation Studio studied the Canal’s resources. This year, Pratt students completed a studio on the industrial landscape. The Municipal Arts Society recently surveyed the Canal’s historic resources.

Today's industrial canal may yet be tomorrow's historic waterfront property.

Preserve Admiral's Row

Preserving Admirals Row from MAS on Vimeo.

Check out this video from the Municipal Arts Society about Admiral's Row at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

There is a meeting tonight that is part of the Section 106 process related to the preservation/development and demolition of Admiral's Row. To support the preservation of these buildings email the National Guard .

UPDATE: The demolition of most of the Admiral's Row buildings has been approved, and only two buildings will be saved.

Fulton Stall Market

On Friday the new Fulton Stall Market will debut at South Street Seaport. In 16 former fish monger stalls between Fulton and Beekman streets, a veritable bounty of local and specialty foods is promised. There will be Hudson Valley produce, New York wines, artisan cheese, and aptly fresh fish.

The Fulton Market's history is clearly on the mind of the new market's creators. The Fulton Market opened in 1822, selling fish but also produce, dairy products and meats. Fish, of course, became the principal product until the market relocated to Hunts Point in 2005. That the location of one of New York's most historic markets is being repurposed to host one anew is not only an excellent marketing strategy given public interest in local foods, but also a move toward recapturing this tradition and adding life to South Street Seaport. This is a wonderful opportunity for New Yorker's to support regional food systems, but also to eat well.

Landscape in Motion

For those of you wondering what on earth historical ecologists do, here's a great article from the San Francisco Chronicle: "Historical Ecologists Map a Changing Landscape", by Eric Simons.

Robin Grossinger , historical ecologist , is quoted saying: "Each generation kind of loses the knowledge of what this place was like, and we find ourselves 200 years later with very little knowledge of what was there... So very basic things like octopuses in tide pools catch us by surprise."

So basic, indeed.

Simply understanding that a landscape is not static, but systems continually in motion, is a critical first step for anyone concerned with landscape restoration. Historical ecologists basically search for evidence and an understanding of a place's layered natural heritage, amid/despite human interventions. Whereas, we cultural landscape historians try to read this "unwitting autobiography," as Peirce Lewis wrote, in the sense that landscape is a reflection of culture in every way.

Fiske Terrace - Midwood Park

Yesterday morning, I came out of the subway at Newkirk Ave to construction and noise. Out onto Foster Ave I walked, and hung a right on East 18th into another world. Fiske Terrace - Midwood Park is one of New York City's newest Historic Districts, and kudos to LPC for designating this beautiful neighborhood. Large turn of the century homes sit shoulder-to-shoulder along lush tree-lined streets, whose greenery is augmented with planted medians. Also, this being spring, it was fully abloom. I think the neighborhood must have gotten a deal on pink azaleas at some point, as nearly everyone has one. This is a real gem.