Urbanista!

Andres Duany goes to New Orleans

Very interesting piece in The Atlantic magazine’s November issue on the the small-scale experimentation in the design and construction of homes now underway in New Orleans neighborhoods. Called ”Houses of the Future,’’ it describes how various architects, Hollywood stars (one Brad Pitt) and other do-gooders are trying to fill the vacuum left by government paralysis.

Among those featured: Miami’s Andres Duany, co-creator of the New Urbanism, who as usual makes plain his disdain for architectural frippery in blunt language not suited for a family newspaper blog.  The architect and planner – whose firm, Duany Plater-Zyberk, just nailed a major accomplishment with passage of the Miami 21 zoning code – also delivers some characteristically Duany-esque observations, like this one:

“When I originally thought of New Orleans, I was conditioned by the press to think of it as an extremely ill-governed city, full of ill-educated people, with a great deal of crime, a great deal of dirt, a great deal of poverty,” said Duany, who grew up in Cuba. “And when I arrived, I did indeed find it to be all those things. Then one day I was walking down the street and I had this kind of brain thing, and I thought I was in Cuba. Weird! And then I realized at that moment that New Orleans was not an American city, it was a Caribbean city. Once you recalibrate, it becomes the best-governed, cleanest, most efficient, and best-educated city in the Caribbean. New Orleans is actually the Geneva of the Caribbean.”

Read more here.

PROGRAM NOTE: I’m off for a few days studying up on the Census. Hope to resume blogging next week.

MAM debuts Herzog & de Meuron’s fleshed-out design

”Accessible and welcoming.’’ “A new civic hub.’’ “Iconic.” “Really spectacular.’’ Someone even saw Classical echoes of the Parthenon (Urbanista! will stipulate that it’s square, has columns all around and steps leading up to a platform, and that acolytes will go there to worship at the altar of Contemporary Art).

The superlatives flew by Wednesday evening at a packed Lincoln Theater in Miami Beach as Pierre de Meuron and partner-in-charge Christine Binswanger unveiled the Swiss firm’s fully fleshed-out design for the new Miami Art Museum, to be built on Biscayne Bay downtown. Granted, all but the last one came from MAM people. But at least we know they’re happy with the results (this a view looking north with the bay on the right):

If you missed the lecture and extensive slide show, and can’t tell too much from the rendering above, which doesn’t look all that different from older images, sorry. This is all we have. Blame Herzog & de Meuron’s parsimonious rendering-release policy: Nothing for reproduction until they’re done with “’all the finishing touches,’’ MAM says

You think they could be a bit more eager to let the public see what it’s paying $100 million for? A $10-a-head lecture is no substitute.

Carping done, this amateur finds little not to like about the design. The audience seemed to like it, judging from the “Aahs’’ that greeted some of the images (if only you could have been there).

As MAM director Terence Riley said, quoting a quip from sometime Miami Herald architecture critic Beth Dunlop: “Of course everyone likes it. The Modernists like it because it’s a Modern building. The Classicists like it because it looks like a Classical building, and the Regionalists like it because they think it’s a Regionalist building!’’  

Rare for starchitects, Herzog and de Meuron have no signature style, and they’ve evidently expended great effort to give Miami a very open Miami building which looks like nothing they’ve done before.

In brief: No radical departures from the conceptual design, but lots of refinement. We now know the materials: Concrete, wood and – to a degree unusual in a museum -- lots of glass, to maximize views of the bay and the promised Museum Park outside.

The galleries and interior spaces are contained in three levels of unevenly stacked cubes or blocks under a very broad, lattice-like canopy. Long, vine-like hanging plants and extensive plantings create a jungle-like feel and act to “bring the park in’’. The base is a platform atop an open ground-level parking garage filled with natural light and plantings. Together with the plants, water pumped up from the ground to the platform will create a hoped-for, cooling “microclimate’’ for visitors under the broad eaves.

Less satisfying, perhaps, was the design team’s response to the first question from the audience, which touched on doubts about the site’s accessibility to pedestrians, which has been a thread of discussion on this blog (see below).

Granted, the site away from Biscayne Blvd. was MAM’s choice, not the architects’. The team could not have designed a more open, visitor-friendly museum building. And it does have a broad staircase meeting the planned baywalk at the water’s edge (this is a previously released image):

So maybe Binswanger was absolutely correct when she brusquely responded, to guffaws from the audience:

”It’s a reality. Miami is built for cars….You will have some pedestrians, at some point. My conviction is, if you want to cross Biscayne Boulevard, you can. People don’t do it because there is nothing on the other side.’’

Good point, yes. But maybe she hasn’t tried to cross the Boulevard on foot, either.

The Downtown Development Authority apparently has. We hear they are working on a new crosswalk plan for the boulevard. Stay tuned.

UPDATE: The city commission approved MAM’s Major Use Special Permit today. That’s the green light for development of the project.

Biking for climate change (legislation)

Here is a contribution from our environmental department:

With bike rides, dune plantings and rallies in Miami-Dade and yoga classes, street cleanings and rallies in Broward, environmental and social activists from South Florida will take part in a campaign on Saturday advocating climate change legislation.

The events are being held in conjunction with 350.org, an international grass-roots effort intended in the United States to urge Washington lawmakers to strengthen and pass energy legislation to reduce green-house gas emissions.

The public is invited to join a Miami bike ride, which begins at the Vizcaya Metro Station at 11:15 a.m. Saturday, that will expect to include from 50 to 100 activists, veterans and green-energy business representatives, said Andrea Cuccaro, Florida organizer for 1Sky, an affiliated campaign.

“They see clean energy as something we should transition to,'' she said.

The ride will conclude at Bicentennial Park, where participants will hear a talk from a research sailing vessel that will be moored nearby the American Airlines Arena. At 2 p.m., participants plan to form the number 350 for a group photo, she said. That's the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide in parts per million that many scientists consider the target for slowing global warming. Current levels are 390.

In Fort Lauderdale, the South Florida chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council, the Audubon Society and other groups plan to meet at 10 a.m outside the Museum of Discovery and Science for a rally and talks and to later march through downtown. Other smaller events are planning across South Florida as art of more than 4,000 events are planned in 170 countries. For more information, see www.350.org.

Miami Marine Stadium added to the World Monuments Fund Watch

Supporters of saving the Miami Marine Stadium have scored another coup, landing the iconic but neglected site on the World Monuments Fund's list of endangered places for 2010 -- along with Macchu Picchu and the gingerbread houses of Port-au-Prince.

The listing by the fund, a New York-based organization dedicated to saving world architectural and cultural treasures, follows the stadium's inclusion earlier this year  on the National Trust for Historic Preservation's list of 11 most endangered historic sites in the country.

And it comes less than a month after Friends of Miami Marine Stadium, a non-profit group leading the fight to save it, released an ad spot in which singer-songwriter Jimmy Buffett urged his fans to support the shuttered city facility's renovation.

“This is a special and important and iconic place that is at risk,'' Amy Freitag, the director for U.S. programs at the World Monuments Fund, told the Associated Press. “We can't let this fall down. And it's rare that you can mention the World Monuments Fund and Jimmy Buffett in same sentence.''

The City of Miami last year named the 45-year-old stadium, considered a singular feat of architecture and engineering, as a historic landmark. The World Monuments Fund has also funded a $50,000 engineering study to determine the extent of needed renovation work.

The fund's Watch list, issued every two years, aims to call attention to “cultural heritage sites around the world that are threatened by neglect, vandalism, conflict, or disaster,'' according to the organization.

The 2010 list includes 93 sites in 47 countries, including nine in the United States and 15 from the 20th Century.

MAM’s Riley responds

The Miami Art Museum’s Terence Riley has posted a cogent response to Transit Miami blogger Tony Garcia’s critique (see item below) of what Tony says is the proposed new museum building’s excessively auto-centric design, a position which echoes concerns aired by the city’s Planning Advisory Board last week.

In the interest of furthering discussion, I’m posting Riley’s response right below  – followed by Tony’s further riposte. Hemmed in by notions of traditional journalistic objectivity, Urbanista! is inclined to split the difference, but will hold his fire, hoping others will weigh in. All I will say at this point is that MAM – obviously lacking a location directly on Biscayne Boulevard – can only do so much to address the street, and the notion of the building as a buffer to Interstate 395 seems valid.

Here is Terence Riley wrote:

“We are so pleased citizens are taking such interest in this project and are grateful for this feedback. With the new Miami Art Museum at Museum Park, the community will have both a great museum and a great park. Architect Christine Binswanger noted in Urbanista’s article "Miami Planning Board Endorses MAM Plan" that the museum is being designed to have no real “back,” so it will be inviting from all angles. It is positioned along the highway to act as a buffer between the highway and the park. Its location is meant to encourage full use of the park as people drive, walk or cycle up to it, meandering through the park and landscaped sculpture garden. The siting of the museum will also ensure that valued waterfront space is accessible to all visitors, pedestrians and cyclists alike. The building and site together are being created to comprise a continuous, open civic space -- a comfortable public verandah where community, nature, architecture and contemporary art are harmoniously conjoined. Pierre de Meuron and Christine Binswanger will present the final design for the building at a lecture entitled “Work in Progress: A Talk by Herzog & de Meuron,” on October 21 at the Lincoln Theater on Miami Beach. For information, please visit www.miamiartmuseum.org.””

And here’s Tony Garcia:

“With all due respect to Mr. Riley - the front of a building is where people enter the building. By virtue of the fact that the majority of users will enter through the rear, the other sides will not be active, whether you call them 'fronts' or not. As a former resident of New York City, I would expect him to know what a pedestrian friendly building looks like. The Metropolitan Museum of Art has many sides, but only one front: facing 5th avenue. The lack of pedestrian accommodation in the current plan ensure that it will be as distant and difficult to access as the current MAM facility. Location, as our current museum shows, is not everything when considering how people will access and use the building. The current design is big on ideas, but misses the biggest idea of all: museums should be most accessible by people walking down the street. I would challenge the museum designers (and Director) to study the design for the recently revamped MOMA, and take lessons from what makes healthy sidewalks work.’’

Anyone else?

Miami’s DawnTown design competition is back a second time

DawnTown, the inventive Miami boosters who brought you Pulse, Texas architect Helen Pierce’s eye-popping proposal to disguise the ugly sewage pump station on Biscayne Boulevard with a tentacley, writhing orange blob – surely you remember that -- are back for a second assault (I mean that in the very best way) on the senses.

The target for the 2009 architectural competition: The long-closed Metromover station at Bicentennial Park, which would reopen once the planned new Miami Art Museum and Miami Science Museum are completed in what is to be Museum Park. The station is hardly the aromatic eyesore the pump station is. But DawnTown maven Andrew Frey and his merry co-conspirators thought it a bit drab given the architectural dazzle that is soon to be deposited at its foot. 

So they solicited proposals worldwide for a new station. Registration closed on Wednesday. Like last year, it’s drawn lots of interest. The website, www.dawntown.org, received more than 18,000 unique visitors and scores of designers registered. Entries are due Oct. 28.

The unveiling of the winner, timed for Art Basel Miami Beach, will be Dec. 4 at the Marquis, the condo tower across the street from the park. The keynote speaker is a coup: Star-quality Dutch landscape designer Adriaan Geuze, whose firm, West 8, recently snagged the high-profile job to design a companion park to the New World Symphony’s new concert hall by Frank Gehry. West 8 took over the park job from Gehry, who walked away from it -- no pressure for Geuze’s team, though.

On the competition jury, among other luminaries, is Miami-Dade Transit chief Harpal Kapoor. Does that mean something could actually come of this?

(Note: I originally had the wrong date for the awards above. Dec. 4 is the right date. My apologies.)

Downtown Hollywood stumbles as Downtown Miami and South Miami are resurgent

Even if you do most things right – designing for pedestrians, enacting incentives -- reviving legacy downtowns is slow,  bumpy work. I long wondered what happened to once lively downtown Hollywood,  which seemed to have many of the elements in place but seemed to be going backwards as other urban centers, from Las Olas Boulevard in Lauderdale to Coral Gables, South Miami and Brickell came back to life with a vengeance.

 

My colleague Amy Sherman assays the reasons in her piece on Hollywood today in The Herald.  For some other relevant case studies, see my piece this summer about the revival of Biscayne Boulevard north of downtown, and my colleague Elaine Walker’s smart stories about the incredible burgeoning scene in downtown Miami and the urban success story that is downtown South Miami. Both detail how sound planning decisions helped resuscitate dormant areas to most everyone’s benefit even amid a crippling recession.

 

Here is what Amy wrote: 

In downtown Hollywood, you can eat crepes at a French restaurant, splurge on homemade chocolate truffles, buy artsy glass night lights and enroll in an African dance class. This is not your typical South Florida shopping strip, with few chains in sight.

Unique? Definitely.

Successful? That's tougher to gauge.

After decades of investments and plans, Hollywood's core is sprinkled with hits but also littered with misses.

Some shop owners say the city's signature moves -- building a unique ArtsPark and green-lighting high-rise condos -- have not lured the crowds envisioned. Shoppers notice it too.

``It used to be a little bit more hopping,'' said Anne Rosenthal, who has driven from North Miami Beach for years and was downtown recently for lunch at Sage. ``It's really cute. They have good restaurants. Unfortunately it seems to be going down. It used to be more people would walk around.''

Downtown Hollywood has gone through cycles of success and struggles for years, and elements of both are present today.

For more, go here.

Miami 21 to city commission on Oct. 22

   The sweeping and controversial Miami 21 zoning plan will go to the city commission for a second and presumably final vote on Oct. 22.
   The commission approved the plan, a centerpiece of Mayor Manny Diaz' administration, on first reading by a 4-1 vote in a special meeting on Sept. 4. That vote was seen as the critical test for the plan, which would replace the city's auto-centric zoning code with rules designed to foster more urban-oriented, pedestrian-friendly development.
   The second vote will come during the commission's regular meeting, the final one before the term-limited Diaz leaves office.

More on MAM: From our friends at Transit Miami.com

For more than three years, Transit Miami.com has been the leading local online voice for better and more-sensible planning and urban design. Its bloggers are practitioners, so their advocacy rests on a base of knowledge and – since they’re mostly (I believe) young – growing real-world experience. Their own Mike Lydon (who has, alas, moved to New York) was the principal author of the city’s newly approved Bicycle Master Plan (see more below). Other causes and events they have pushed and promoted range from Bike Miami Days to the Miami 21 rezoning plan.

Planner and blogger Tony Garcia says their roots are in “the growing generation Y citizen advocate movement in Miami that is seeking better transportation options and walkable urbanism, and is using social media to accomplish these goals.’’

After reading a provocative post by Tony on the urban (-unfriendly, in his view) plan for the new Miami Art Museum, I invited him to synthesize his view for Urbanista!

We’re hoping for a discussion here, folks, so ante up. Please comment. This project (along with the new Miami Science Museum and Museum Park) represents a public investment of hundreds of millions of dollars, and no one wants to repeat the failed experience of Bicentennial Park.

Tony’s take is especially timely since the city planning board spent lots of time the other night praising MAM’s architecture (check out this newly released rendering of Herzog and de Meuron’s increasingly refined design) while raising worrisome issues about the site’s general disregard of pedestrians and cyclists – a fault most seemed inclined to lay at the city’s feet.

Here is what Tony wrote:

The Sidewalk Critic: MAM Design Turns Its Back on Biscayne

Pedestrians are the lifeblood of great streets, and their presence is a function of the buildings that surround them. While all structures are accountable to the urban realm, civic buildings in particular have a special responsibility in activating streets and fostering pedestrian life. Museums, schools, and government buildings represent the highest values and aspirations of a community - which is why the latest design for the MAM in Bicentennial Park is so disappointing.

The design, while conceptually intriguing, has a tenuous relationship with the public realm. It turns its back on the street, and inhabits Bicentennial park rather than taking an active role in proclaiming its presence on Biscayne Boulevard. Recent analyses have shown that 90% of the estimated 200,000 visitors to the museum will arrive by car. The museum designers have touted a flurry of green features, from ample outdoor spaces, to actual vegetation growing within the building but the greenest building of all is the one that encourages pedestrians and cyclists. With I-395 forming a barrier to the north, no defined street edge along Biscayne, and 90% of users entering the building by car people will have little reason to walk to the museum.

In its auto-centric design, the museum has missed one of its fundamental missions: to act as a gateway to Bicentennial Park. How can it monumentalize the entrance to the park when most visitors to the Museum will never have to engage the park in the first place. The recent rebirth of Biscayne Boulevard has not been an accident. It is the result of intentional decisions to attract pedestrians by activating the street and giving people a reason to inhabit the sidewalk. With such a large setback and lack of a strong border along Biscayne Boulevard, the area surrounding the entrance to the park will become a dead zone. Some have contended that the setback of the museum was intentional an attempt at opening up the view of the park from Biscayne, but it is precisely a strong border that Biscayne needs. The edges of large single use districts, as famed urbanist Jane Jacobs noted, are apt to be stagnant a condition that precedes decay. By not engaging the street, the designers have ensured that pedestrians and cyclists will have trouble reaching this part of Biscayne and delight in our Central Park.

Miami commiss: Bikes yes; Virginia Key plan… not just yet

Miami commissioners on Thursday put off Mayor Manny Diaz' star-crossed proposal for remaking environmentally scarred Virginia Key after a stream of activists complained the plan doesn't do enough to safeguard and showcase the island's natural treasures.

The deferral of the Virginia Key plan until May means the term-limited Diaz, who has been pushing to win approval of several key goals less than a month before leaving office, won't be at City Hall to see the completion of one of the cornerstones of his administration.

But the commission, by a 4-0 vote, did approve Diaz's ambitious blueprint for more than 200 new miles of bicycle lanes and routes throughout the city, as well as a package of ``green'' measures that include requirements for heat-dispersing roofs for new commercial and residential projects. Commissioner Angel Gonzalez was absent.

In deferring the Virginia Key proposal, the commission made plain its goal is to give city planners time to incorporate ideas from environmentalists, parks activists and others who have been working on alternative ideas for the barrier island's restoration.

See the full story here.