THE URBAN POLDER: WHAT NEW YORK’S WATERFRONT CAN LEARN FROM THE DUTCH
Please RSVP to rsvp@vanalen.org.
This program is presented with The Consulate General of the Netherlands in New York. It is part of Archtober, NYC’s month-long festival of architecture activities, programs, and exhibitions.
NYC Waterfront Construction Competition
The New York City Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) is seeking proposals for innovative and cost-saving solutions for completing marine construction projects in New York City (NYC).
One of NYC’s defining features is its diverse and expansive waterfront. A maritime city with 565 miles of waterfront, NYC has more shoreline than Boston, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle combined. Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has made the re-imagination and reactivation of New York’s “6th Borough” – the “Waterfront” – a central economic development priority. The City of New York has worked to transform its shoreline, creating jobs, building new parks, and cleaning its waterways.
Despite this ongoing transformation, problems on the waterfront still remain. Nearly half of NYC’s 565 miles of shoreline is owned by the City and includes a wide range of structures, some of which are deteriorating. These structures will require rehabilitation or replacement in the coming years and decades. This work has become increasingly expensive, driven by the cost of materials, labor, outdated construction methods, technologies, regulations, and other factors.
Through this Request for Expressions of Interest (RFEI), NYCEDC is seeking competitive proposals that will change the course of waterfront construction and help the City of New York build and maintain waterfront infrastructure in the most cost effective and long-term sustainable manner.
Submissions should provide creative approaches to address critical factors that drive the cost and duration of maritime construction in NYC. The winning submissions should generate meaningful cost savings and include a detailed plan outlining the steps required to implement the proposed solution.
The Grass Looks Greener On The Riverside
WNYC Transmitter Park Waterfront (Photo Credit: juliewoodnyc via Instagram)
Green outdoor space, outside of Central Park, is often thought of as a rare commodity in New York City; but now it doesn’t have to be. The recent opening of WNYC’s Transmitter Park on the East River in Greenpoint, Brooklyn is one of the many projects that will be improving over 500 miles of shoreline across the city.
Breaking ground back in 2010, Transmitter Park is now finally open for the public to enjoy. As part of the Waterfront Vision and Enhancement Strategy(WAVES) citywide initiative, Transmitter Park supports the plan’s vision to provide more open recreational space for the city’s residents and a functional waterfront that will no longer display decaying industrial sites. The park is also a result of the 2005 Greenpoint-Williamsburg rezoning meant to provide local residents and visitors with continuous public access to the waterfront. The new park includes1.6-acres of open space with an esplanade for passive recreation, a new overlook to the south, new seating, and a pedestrian bridge built across an excavated historic ferry slip. The center of the park offers a large open lawn with a nautical themed children’s play area that reflects the site’s context, spray showers, and nature gardens.
Sao Paulo’s Infinity Tower
Rising almost 400 feet (120 meters) above Sao Paulo’s financial district, reminiscent of a ship setting sail, is the Infinity Tower designed by Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates. With its cutting edge technology and unique design, one of Sao Paulo’s first Class-A towers is attracting high profile tenants, including Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, Bloomberg, Facebook and Louis Vuitton.
Video> Progress at the World Trade Center Site on 11th Anniversary
For the eleventh anniversary of September 11, The Architect’s Newspaper has been reviewing progress at the World Trade Center site. Last Thursday, AN visited SOM’s One World Trade to survey the view from the 103rd floor and check in on construction of the tower’s spire. Friday, a trip to the top of Fumihiko Maki’s Four World Trade on Friday showed the less-publicized view of the site. From both vantage points, the hum of activity—both from construction crews and visitors to the memorial plaza—was readily apparent.
Of particular interest were substantial developments at the Vehicle Security Center, where a new entryway on Liberty Street will send security measures beneath a new St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church. It was heartening to read in today’s New York Times that the conflict between Governor Cuomo and Mayor Bloomberg over the Memorial Museum, reported here last year, was resolved in time for ceremonies this morning.
For all the talk of delays, an extraordinary amount work has been accomplished. As a tribute, AN has compiled a video montage showing continued progress at the site on this historic day.
Bloomberg: Bike Share Delayed Until Spring 2013, Duh
(Montage by The Architect’s Newspaper)
Mayor Michael Bloomberg announced this morning on his morning radio show that New York City’s forthcoming CitiBike bike-share program—already mired with delays caused by software problems—would be further delayed until at least next spring, confirming rumors that the system’s bugs weren’t being worked out quickly enough. On his radio show, the mayor delivered the bad news, “The software doesn’t work, duh.” He maintained that, “we are not going to put out the system until it works.” The highly anticipated program is set to become the largest is North America when it opens and was a signature piece of the mayor’s bike infrastructure plan for the city.
Brooklyn Navy Yard Announces Blockbuster Media Plan
Brooklyn Navy Yard hope to build media hub with Steiner Studios.
Brooklyn Navy Yard and Steiner Studios have come up with a gigantic plan for a media hub to be spread across 50 acres of the former ship yard. According to the New York Times, the $400 million project depends on an influx of $35 million from the state and $2.5 million from the federal government to build out water, sewers, and electric infrastructure.
Navy Yard CEO AndrewKimball gave a pointed shout out to the governor and mayor in the Times piece, indicating yet another project making a mad dash to get on the boards before Mayor Bloomberg’s tenure comes to an end in 2013. Though the Navy Yard lost out on its bid to be the locale for the city’s new tech campus that ended up on Roosevelt Island, it does occupy an all-important corner to the Brooklyn Tech Triangle, where nearly 10,000 people work in that sector.
Proposals About New Microapartments Highlight Benefits and Drawbacks
Planning commissioner Amanda Burden, Mayor Bloomberg, and HPD Commissioner Wambua stand in a spatially accurate visualization of a possible Micro-Apartment layout for New York City’s Kips Bay competition. (Courtesy of NYC Mayor’s Office)
Take a minute to imagine what you would do if you had to cram your life into 270 square feet. In a typical ranch-style home, 270 could be a master bedroom, or a small living room, or a one-car garage. Now how about 220 square feet? It might make a shed or a bedroom. Now imagine this 15 by 18 foot or 15 by 15 foot space as your home.
Though it might sound more like another Ikea advertisement, two high-rent cities—New York and San Francisco—have been playing with the concept of permitting very small “micro-apartments” to alleviate high rents. By creating smaller housing, the idea goes, prospective renters will have a less expensive option and the city will be able to increase the density of residential units without increasing building size, always a contested point in neighborhood planning.
Growing Season in Full Swing at New York City’s Largest Rooftop Farm
Mayor Bloomberg, Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Strickland, Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation CEO Kimball and Brooklyn Grange CEO Ben Flanner today toured the largest rooftop farm in New York City. (Edward Reed)
Urban rooftop farming is on the up-and-up in New York City and across the country. Putting his official stamp of approval on the movement, New York Mayor Bloomberg stopped by the city’s largest rooftop farm, the 43,000-square-foot Brooklyn Grange atop a building in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. With the growing season in full swing, the plants were towering nearly as high as the Manhattan skyline in the distance.
As was widely expected, NYU cleared its next to last major hurdle yesterday when City Council approved the university’s expansion plan. The only thing left to do is to obtain the assured signature of Mayor Bloomberg. Amidst cries of “Shame!” coming from the public seated in the balcony, the council passed a plan that was reduced in size by 26 percent from the original proposal after all the ULURP parties had weighed in.
Will New York’s Bike Lanes Last? Gil Penalosa Addresses the Planning Commission
The 8th Avenue Complete Streets program keeps cyclists safe from cars and their doors. (Courtesy NYCDOT)
With only 75 weeks left in New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s administration, cyclists the city over will inevitably be concerned about the next mayor’s stance on bike lanes and street designs lest initiatives put in place under Bloomberg fall from grace. One need only to recall Marty Markowitz’s parodic tricycle stunts poking fun at bike lanes or former NYC DOT commissioner Iris Weinshall’s efforts to remove a protected bike lane from Brooklyn’s Prospect Park West to realize that the concern is not unfounded.
At yesterday’s regularly-scheduled City Planning review session, former Bogotá Parks Commissioner Gil Penalosa was invited to give a pep talk, placing a particular emphasis on bike lanes. He warned an audience filled with commissioners and planning staff that as the weeks wind down before the mayor leaves office, they’d better get cracking at PR and permanence: the public needs to become even more familiar with the bike network and the infrastructure needs to become permanent—and striped bike lanes won’t cut it!
Andrew Blum Book Talk: Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet
Andrew Blum Book Talk
Tubes: A Journey to the Center of the Internet
(Ecco, an imprint of HarperCollins; June 2012)
Everyone thinks they know the Internet. The most powerful information network ever conceived—an indispensable tool and constant companion in both our professional and personal lives. We’re all connected but connected to what? In TUBES: A Journey to the Center of the Internet by Andrew Blum, acclaimed young journalist Andrew Blum takes readers on a fascinating journey to find out.
Andrew Blum writes about architecture, infrastructure and technology for many publications, including The New Yorker, the New York Times, Bloomberg BusinessWeek,, Slate, and Popular Science. He is a correspondent for Wired, a contributing editor to Metropolis, and lives in his hometown of New York City.
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