{"id":543440,"date":"2010-04-26T13:30:56","date_gmt":"2010-04-26T17:30:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dirt.asla.org\/?p=4434"},"modified":"2010-04-26T13:30:56","modified_gmt":"2010-04-26T17:30:56","slug":"master-plan-for-governors-island-unveiled","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/543440","title":{"rendered":"Master Plan for Governors Island Unveiled"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nDutch Landscape architecture firm West 8<\/a>,\u00a0working together with Diller Scofidio + Renfro<\/a> and Rogers Marvel<\/a>,\u00a0has released the master plan for Governors Island<\/a>, a 172-acre island off the southern tip of Manhattan. The first phase of the master\u00a0plan\u00a0details the roll-out of\u00a02.2 miles of waterfront promenades and a new\u00a040-acre park.\u00a0The new design features artificially-created hills that\u00a0focus attention on\u00a0the park’s center, as well as a “hammock grove,” a\u00a0grotto-like shelter,\u00a0athletic fields and marshlands,\u00a0writes the\u00a0The New York Times<\/a><\/em>. The New York City government has allocated more than $40 million in funds to the new plan, but will need to raise more than $220 million for future phases of development. Control of the island recently passed from New York state to the city<\/a>, enabling Mayor Bloomberg’s plans for the island to move forward.<\/p>\n

The Governors Island master plan\u00a0includes the development of a new\u00a0ferry landing area and shaded lawn overlooking the Lower Manhattan skyline. According to Fast Company<\/a><\/em>, a\u00a0man-made canyon\u00a0will also\u00a0create framed views of the Statue of Liberty.\u00a0The\u00a0entire master plan\u00a0call for a network of promenades to circle the entire\u00a0island, but\u00a0the\u00a0first phase will cover only the northern half.\u00a0Walking along\u00a0the promenade, visitors will get\u00a0views of everything from the Statue of Liberty to Brooklyn Heights.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the future stages of development, pathways will lead further south through sloping lawns, leading to the hammock grove. Nicolai Ouroussoff, architecture critic for The New York Times, <\/em>describes the area: “Scores of hammocks will be suspended in a forest of oak and birch trees. In a rendering that shows the hammocks sagging under the weight of people napping inside them, they bring to mind human-size cocoons.” Also, under development is a new cafe designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro at the water’s edge. “A lawn expands out onto the building\u2019s roof, where visitors will be able to climb down through a large hole into a grotto-like shelter open to the water.”<\/p>\n

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\nThe southern end of the island will feature man-made marshes and tidal basins. “A raised concrete walkway wraps around the marshes at the tip of the island, so that visitors should feel as if the edge of the land were dissolving around them. To add to the sensory experience, [Adriaan] Geuze [of West 8]\u00a0plans to plant the area with strong-smelling plants, like sea asparagus and lavender.” The marshes may be designed as “green” or “soft” infrastructure, providing a natural system to\u00a0accomodate sea level rises that threaten New York City. Geuze of West 8 seems very\u00a0focused on climate change and\u00a0incorporating adaptation schemes into his designs (see earlier post<\/a>).\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ourrossoff says the site’s building plans are still in flux. New York University is exploring adding dormitories and classroom space. There’s also discussion about luxury hotels or a conference center.<\/p>\n

He also contends that while Mayor Bloomberg’s ambitious park plans are “democratic” and will benefit many New Yorkers, they also end up raising property values of buildings nearby, accelerating gentrification. “Sitting in the middle of the harbor,\u00a0[Governors Island]\u00a0ought to be accessible to working-class families from Staten Island and the Lower East Side of Manhattan, as well as to wealthier downtowners and Red Hook\u2019s bourgeois bohemians. The nature of the developments that flank the park will be critical to determining whether the island feels as if it belongs to all of them, or just to those few who can afford to pay for its upkeep.”<\/p>\n

Despite the equity issues that will need to be addressed, Ouroussoff concludes that the new park, together with Michael Van Valkenburgh’s new set of parks along the Brooklyn waterfront (see earlier post<\/a>),\u00a0mean a “shift in the character of the city\u2019s park system as a whole that is as revolutionary as Robert Moses\u2019 early public works projects or Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux\u2019s Central Park.”<\/p>\n

Read the article<\/a> and see a slideshow of renderings of the new Governors Island<\/a>. Also, learn more about the upcoming changes to the Island’s governance<\/a> with its move from New York State to city control.<\/p>\n

In other Governors Island news,\u00a0Ann Ha and Behrang Behin\u2019s \u201cLiving Pavilion\u201d<\/a> won the City of Dreams Pavilion competition sponsored by FIGMENT, the\u00a0Emerging New York Architect Committee (ENYA) of the American Institute of Architects New York Chapter (AIANY), and the Structural Engineers Association of New York (SEAoNY). The winning project will be assembled on Governors Island this spring, and will be open to the public from June 6 through October 3. \u201cLiving Pavilion is a low\u2010tech, zero\u2010impact structure that employs reclaimed milk crates as the framework for growing a planted green wall surface.”<\/p>\n

Image credit: West 8; Rogers Marvel Architects; Diller Scofodio & Renfro; Mathews Nielsen; Urban Design +<\/em><\/p>\n

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Dutch Landscape architecture firm West 8,\u00a0working together with Diller Scofidio + Renfro and Rogers Marvel,\u00a0has released the master plan for Governors Island, a 172-acre island off the southern tip of Manhattan. The first phase of the master\u00a0plan\u00a0details the roll-out of\u00a02.2 miles of waterfront promenades and a new\u00a040-acre park.\u00a0The new design features artificially-created hills that\u00a0focus attention […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-543440","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543440","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=543440"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/543440\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=543440"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=543440"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=543440"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}