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Event: Fit-City 4: Promoting Physical Activity through Design  Courtesy AIANY “We have engineered physical activity out of our lives,” said Dr. Thomas Farley, the new Commissioner of the NYC Department of Health and Mental Hygiene (DOHMH); more than 75% of people don’t engage in exercise. While it was only his first day — actually his first hour — in his new position, he looked the part: “He has the lowest BMI of any commissioner,” commented David Burney, FAIA, Commissioner of NYC Department of Design and Construction. All joking aside, obesity, and the chronic diseases associated with it, is a serious problem in the U.S., and NYC is no exception. How can design — applied to infrastructure, urban planning, and buildings — alleviate this public health epidemic? Fit-City 4 sought to address this question by bringing together public officials, health professionals, architects, and designers to participate in a series of panel discussions at the Center for Architecture. The DOHMH with the Departments of Design and Construction, Transportation, and City Planning have developed New York City Active Design Guidelines. Available this fall, the document will present design strategies to support the integration of healthy behaviors into the daily lives of all NYC residents. As a dense urban environment, the city affords the options of biking and walking. “‘Pedestrian’ may mean boring elsewhere, but in NYC it means ‘fabulous’,” believes Alex Washburn, AIA, chief urban designer at the Department of City Planning. Biking, however, is much more popular in Europe, cited Rutgers Professor John Pucher, who has lived car-free in New Jersey for 37 years. He pointed out that fewer women and seniors ride bikes in the U.S., probably because of safety concerns. Dept. of Transportation Commissioner Janette Sadik-Kahn discussed initiatives to create a safer biking environment in the city, such as the newly segregated lanes on 9th Avenue. So far, she says, 200 miles of new lanes have been created as part of PlaNYC. Betty Chen, AIA, vice president for planning, design, and preservation for Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation, added that Governors Island, where cars are prohibited, recently invited the public to participate in Free Bike Fridays. Event: Design Awards Symposium — Project Winners 
(L-R): Gangbuk Grand Park by Joel Sanders Architect (Honor); PSi: Summer Blow-Up by Stageberg Architecture: Bade Stageberg Cox (Honor); Sheikh Rashid Bin Saeed Crossing by FXFOWLE Architects (Merit). (L-R bottom) Merits: Marriage Bureau by Johannes M.P. Knoops; Wandering Ecologies by Weiss Manfredi; Xochimilco Master Plan and Aquarium by TEN Arquitectos. Courtesy AIANY With discussion about how many conceptual projects often take decades to realize, the winners in the Projects category of the 2009 Design Awards may be impervious to the current economy, whether they are planned for construction or not. Thus, the presentations felt more like a salon than a symposium. The two projects that received Honor Awards most likely will never be realized. Stageberg Architecture: Bade Stageberg Cox’s PSi: Summer Blow-Up was short-listed in this year’s P.S. 1/MoMA Young Architects competition to design a temporary installation for the P.S. 1 courtyard, but not selected. The team wanted to explore “how to do the most with the least” by rethinking where materials are sourced and transported, said Tim Bade. The goal was to fit the entire installation in the back of one pickup truck, and the design solution used inflatables that could be easily set-up, deployed, and reinstalled in another space. Gangbuk Grand Park, by Joel Sanders Architect, won second place in a competition sponsored by the city of Seoul. The design sutured two sides of a valley with three bridges, linking a park to the city center and surrounding communities. According to Joel Sanders, AIA, the firm wanted to create a hybrid of architecture and landscape with bridges and programmatic overlaps. Three different types of trails were proposed — “learn, play, relax” — affording park-goers the chance to invent their own experience. The bridges, stated Sanders, thicken the trails, providing for built-in activities such as skateboarding. When Johannes M.P. Knoops, Assoc. AIA, FAAR, heard about the Mayor’s plan to move the Manhattan Marriage Bureau from the McKim, Mead, and White Municipal Building to Worth Street, in a facility designed by Drake Design Associates, he developed a plan to elevate the institution, literally and figuratively. Knoops wanted couples to be both in love with each other and with the city, and what better way to do that then atop the 40-story Municipal Building. The roof would be wrapped in translucent panels emulating a wedding veil blowing in the wind. “The public is hungry for new and serious ideas about architecture and ecology,” claimed Michael Manfredi, FAIA, when speaking of Weiss Manfredi’s shortlisted plan for the Lower Don Lands in Toronto. Accepting the nature of the existing flood plain, the team set out to reintroduce wetlands and create recreational fields out of spillways. The firm also proposed preserving an overhead expressway, referencing the area’s industrial history. TEN Arquitectos is currently working on the Xochimilco Master Plan and Aquarium, straddling ancient Aztec lakes in southern Mexico City. Intending to restore the area as a major tourist attraction, the master plan establishes cohesiveness among a flower market, rowing park, aquarium, and water treatment plant. According to firm associate David Maestres, the challenge is “to bring nature to its original essence, making sure there is balance between architecture and nature.” When the Sheikh Rashid Bin Saeed Crossing is completed in Dubai in 2012, the bridge will hail as the longest spanning arched bridge in the world. Sudhir S. Jambhekar, FAIA, LEED AP, senior partner at FXFOWLE Architects, dispelled the notion that Arab countries are unconcerned with mass transit, claiming, “Their aspirations may surpass ours.” The bridge will have six traffic lanes in each direction, able to carry 20,000 vehicles per hour, with a center track and station in the middle of the bridge for Dubai Metro’s Green Line. Originally planned as a single span, the firm proposed two separate arches that meet on an artificial island. Event: Building Type Awards Symposium — Health Facilities Winners 
(L-R): CHOMP Expansion by HOK; Building for the Third Century by NBBJ; The center for Wellness by ikon.5. Courtesy AIANY Utilitarian and sterile, the modern hospital has typically favored function over form. But recently, medical professionals have started considering the evidence that good design contributes to patients’ wellness. The Health Facilities category of the AIANY and Boston Society of Architects Building Type Awards recognizes architecture firms that have brought excellent design to health care-related building projects. A symposium brought together representatives from the three winning firms: Joan L. Saba, AIA, FACHA, NCARB, of NBBJ, for the Building for the Third Century at Massachusetts General Hospital; Charles Siconolfi, AIA, of HOK, for the Community Hospital of Monterey Peninsula (CHOMP) Expansion; and Joseph Tattoni, AIA, of ikon.5, for The Center for Wellness at the College of New Rochelle. The Building for the Third Century will provide much-needed patient rooms and procedure spaces for the busy Harvard-affiliated hospital. Saba described NBBJ’s design, which includes open atria and garden spaces organized around a “cracked square” — the floor plan features a diagonal line of public spaces that interrupts the broad areas of private patient rooms and nurses’ stations. Similarly, HOK’s addition to CHOMP elaborates an existing diagonal that organizes the hospital’s floor plan. For this project, the intention is to respect the overall shape as well as the fine details of the original 1972 building by Edward Durell Stone. With floor-to-ceiling windows at corridor terminations and in patient rooms, HOK sought to improve patients’ experience by visually connecting them with the surrounding bucolic coastal landscape. The design of ikon.5’s Center for Wellness aligns with the College of New Rochelle’s educational mission, according to Tattoni, by aiming “to educate about total wellness, a complete body/mind preparedness to approach the world.” It does so through spaces that guide students through the center’s several functions: gymnasium, classroom, meditation spaces, and natatorium. The center’s use of granite blocks inside and out, as well as its broad roof garden, integrates the building with the college campus aesthetics. Although each project dealt with very different circumstances and clients — from a leafy college campus to a cramped urban teaching hospital — symposium moderator Richard Thomas challenged the award winners to describe the themes common to each project. “If we were here 10 years ago, I don’t think we would be seeing projects with this concern for the whole of the human experience,” said Siconolfi. Thomas agreed, citing health care clients’ increased attentiveness to the “principles of patient-friendly design,” backed by scientific studies that show the measurable effects of architecture on patient outcomes.
Event: High Line Section 1 Media Preview 
Scenes along the High Line. Bill Millard Most park designers wouldn’t deliberately direct views to the flow of nearby city traffic. But an amphitheater peering down onto 10th Avenue is just one of many ways the recently opened High Line offers fresh views of familiar West Side cityscapes. With the surface of the public park some 30 feet above street level, “you see the city from perspectives you normally would never have access to,” remarked James Corner, principal of landscape architecture firm Field Operations, which led the design of the new park on a former elevated railway. The High Line’s sense of calm and seclusion seems to suit its role as a “slow park,” one designed for leisurely strolls. More than 60,000 people visited the park in the first week alone. As a group of journalists wandered the nine-block stretch of Section 1 (Section 2 opens next year), we encountered a succession of areas with distinct characters, united by a common design vocabulary of long, thin concrete planks and simple, linear furnishings. The planks rear up to merge with wood benches, a flourish that seems sleek but not slick. On the southern end at Gansevoort and Washington Streets, the journey begins in a woodland; further north, visitors pass through grasslands and elements such a sundeck — complete with oversized deck chairs and a shallow water feature good for cooling one’s toes — and the amphitheater, where people can look down upon the bustling avenue, as if the street life were a form of dramatic spectacle. One visitor was reminded of the highly focused view offered by the Mediatheque at Boston’s Institute of Contemporary Art, designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, the High Line’s architects. The High Line has spurred a much-publicized wave of development in the area, and walking along Section 1 reveals a parade of construction cranes and recent creations by Frank Gehry, FAIA, Jean Nouvel, Della Valle Bernheimer, and others. (Polshek Partnership’s Standard Hotel is unmissable, straddling the park like a giant robot.) To the west are sweeping views of the Hudson River, and a Spencer Finch art installation in one tunnel celebrates the river’s ever-shifting hues. The new design is geared to “set up really great and unusual situations where you can view the city,” Corner said. In deference to those views, the designers chose an understated aesthetic for the park itself. However, their contemporary take on the historical structure offers subtle visual pleasures of its own. Where the planks and plantings meet, they blend together in a comb-like pattern; vegetation sprouts up between thin concrete lines. The notion of a hybrid “agri-tecture” was inspired by the once-wild state of the vegetation there, when the High Line became a postindustrial ruin after trains stopped running in 1980. For now, the northern area near 20th Street, where the plantings went in earliest, best demonstrates the untamed effect. Benches and a water fountain echo the linear forms of the planks and the rail lines themselves, most of which have been retained and restored. The designers and engineers faced their share of challenges along the way. With shallow soil, wind, and extremes of temperature, “that’s an extremely difficult environment to get plants to grow,” Corner said. Many of the 210 plant species had to be chosen for their hardiness and their ability to survive at their specific location within the park. As for the hardscape, the different rates of thermal expansion and contraction of the concrete planks and of the steel structure underneath led to fears that the planks would soon shift out of place, so engineers at Buro Happold devised a special system of expansion joints for the planks that could accommodate the movement of both materials, said Herbert Browne, Buro Happold senior project manager. Ultimately, the park serves as a testament to the way that — with some ingenuity and imagination — old infrastructure can be put to new uses. “The big story about the High Line is the sort of economic revitalization that it has brought to the West Side, and other cities can learn from that,” Corner said. “The High Line, I think, opens the door for a little bit more experimentation with what public spaces could be.”
Event: Meeting of the Minds 2009 The tone at futurist conferences has changed, in part because of last year’s elections and financial crash, but perhaps also because of a shift in interpretive frameworks on the part of people in a position to translate them into action. It’s less about cries of alarm nowadays, more about intersector partnerships and pragmatic incentives for progress. The background level of disturbing scientific, demographic, and economic information remains constant; even the most optimistic promoters of technological approaches to city design and resource use regularly face questions about whether any imaginable response can affect climate change and entrenched poverty. But Meeting of the Minds 2009 indicated a broad agreement that cities — particularly medium-size cities of 500,000 to 1 million residents, projected to host even more of the world’s growth than megacities — are both the site of the most critical problems and the key to workable solutions. As organizer Gordon Feller suggested at one point, a collision between “citizen engagement” and “legacy institutions” is imminent. Among the different kinds of organizations trying to adapt to these conditions, the ones represented here agreed that none can accomplish much alone. As inventors, entrepreneurs, and corporate officials look to disruptive technologies for quick fixes, they also acknowledge planners’ and civic officials’ point that new gadgets alone won’t improve cities’ performance without corresponding social engineering. Conversely, public-sector representatives and academics recognize that green-tech solutions need economic viability: products that jaded consumers will accept, infrastructure that strapped cities can afford. Keynoter Tom Cochran, one of several panelists who agree with Saskia Sassen that “national governments can talk, talk, talk, but municipal governments have to act,” highlighted innovations at the city and regional levels while pinpointing the states (unfortunately positioned “between reality and money”) as the dinosaurs that nimbler agents need to maneuver around. Existing and imaginable technologies are replacing speculation with concrete planning, stressing information over mobility and “multiscalar systems of enormous complexity,” as Sassen described cities, over familiar spatial forms. If Mario Gandelsonas, FAIA, is right that today’s teenagers fetishize cell phones more than cars, preferring being driven over driving, then this “culture of immediacy” is changing more than a decades-old symbol of adolescent freedom: it represents the sort of behavioral shift that reconfigures cities, provided public and private actors can jointly figure out what this new public space might look like. Large adopters of technologies (such as mobile networks or governments) tend to wait for a leader to move, as Qualcomm’s Len Lauer observed, but “once a large operator agrees to adopt a technology, suddenly the other operators become paranoid” and rush in to avoid being left behind. This pattern means that a future cityscape formed by the combination of a smart power grid and widespread wireless systems will probably emerge in fits and starts. Gathering the day after General Motors filed for bankruptcy, this audience expressed an acute awareness that old paradigms are collapsing, particularly in the realms of transport and urban greening (where PlaNYC, represented here by Alexandros Washburn, AIA, and Janette Sadik-Kahn, is becoming an exemplary recurrent case study). Toyota spokesman Irv Miller was willing to broaden his firm’s future definition as a “mobility company,” not just a car company, not only able to make its Prius hybrid a charismatic brand but to coexist with alternative systems such as auto-sharing. Zipcar’s Scott Griffith articulated a model whereby people view transportation as a variable cost, not a fixed or sunk cost, and thus behave smarter and greener. Earl Gales’s Personal Rapid Transit, a maglev-based railcar system moving each car on less power than the average incandescent bulb uses, would add a bit of Jetsons-style aerial infrastructure to any neighborhood, but it’s not just fanciful; Gales, recalling the much-lamented Los Angeles Red Cars of his boyhood, has collaborated with former NASA engineers at Ames Research Laboratory to create a feasible prototype. Other improvements require little or no new technology at all: Ron Dembo proposes massive-scale urban re-cladding to improve buildings’ 40% contribution to national greenhouse-gas emissions, and Susan Zielinski’s “open-source transportation” network rearranges multiple services into “mobility hubs” that ease mode shifts and vehicle shares. Surfing these unpredictable waters calls for both realism and imagination. But does anyone in America’s hardest-hit city have the vision to rebuild GM as General Mobility?
Event: The Architecture of Writing: Wright, Women & Narrative, film premiere and discussion 
Courtesy www.bwaf.org Urban myths and a number of literary works about Frank Lloyd Wright are often laced with tales of egoism, philandering, and an unbridled predilection for attention. A new film produced by The Beverly Willis Architecture Foundation (BWAF) entitled, “A Girl is A Fellow Here” — 100 Women Architects in the Studio of Frank Lloyd Wright,” may edit Wright’s story and radically change the view of women’s history in architecture. An interdisciplinary conversation about the untold legacy of 20th-century female architects followed a premiere screening of the film directed by Beverly Willis, a legacy in her own right. The short film unearths the experience of more than 100 female fellows at Taliesin with a focus on six individuals who have carved a place for themselves in the legacy of women in architecture. Marion Mahoney, Isabel Roberts, Jane Duncombe, Eleanore Pettersen, Read Weber, and Lois Davidson Gottlieb all spent years studying and working under Wright at Taliesin, a place which, according to Gottlieb, “changed my life completely.” The film’s inception lies in the discovery by Willis that Roberts, for decades documented as a Taliesin bookkeeper, was in fact an architect highly recommended by Wright to the AIA. This silent truth, glossed over in history, is one of many edited facts that comprise Wright’s unknown legacy and the record of women architects. The film’s narrative, with first-person interviews, a scholarly investigation of the six women, and personal insight into life at Taliesin, unearths the equality with which Wright ran his studio. Founded in 1932, the Taliesin Fellowship required participants to not only work in the studio, but also fostered a communal living of crop raising, cooking, cleaning, house repairs, and manual labor. However, Wright did not assign these chores based on traditional gender roles. In fact, men did most of the domestic duties while the women fellows were out in the cornfields or making building repairs. Willis’s film subjects sing a chorus of praise to Wright as an inspiring, impartial, approachable, and provoking mentor. Gottlieb remembers him as a doer, not as a teacher. “I learned I could do almost anything.” The confidence and passion with which Wright equipped his female fellows produced a roster of women who impacted his work and the tale of 20th-century architecture. Mahoney became the second female to graduate from MIT and one of the first licensed women architects in the world; Pettersen was the first female architect in New Jersey and also the first woman to open her own practice in the state; Gottlieb and Duncombe established a firm of their own years after Taliesin. Wright welcomed the women to his studio, providing each with opportunities for professional and personal growth that society was not prepared to offer. So why haven’t we heard about these women in architectural history, nor about this side of Wright’s character? It is because of the innate exclusivity of writing and the disparity between the actual and edited truths, according to panelists after the film. Carol Gilligan, after recently publishing Kyra — a fictional work with a female architect as the protagonist — admits that she wasn’t aware that it was a novel endeavor to cast such a character and reflects that in her research there was a discernible lack of humanity and family life in the biographies of architects. Panelists agreed that the premise of the autonomous genius as a requisite for a successful design career perpetuates a limited view of both male and female architects, and does a disservice to the social and communal nature of the profession.
Convention edition cover (left); notes on the second edition for the third. Norval White In the Fall of 1965, the AIANY Chapter, preparing for AIA’s 100th anniversary in 1967, called for proposals for a guidebook to NYC. Elliot Willensky, FAIA, and I were figuratively waiting at the doorstep, having talked of such a guide since we first met in the office of Lathrop Douglass in June 1955. We were commissioned to prepare a prototype sample that would serve to show advertisers how they could participate, front and center, at the convention. Chapter PR consultant Andrew Weil sold 80 ads that paid for out-of-pocket expenses, a secretary, photo processing, a graphic designer, mechanicals (pre-digital), and the printing of 10,000 copies given to every convention attendee. We were effectively, in the name of the Chapter, the publishers. For that convention edition (and its duplicate trade edition, complete with ads that MacMillan found too expensive to remove) Elliot and I acted as authors of parts, editors of the whole. John Morris Dixon, FAIA, had a major role, covering much of Midtown Manhattan, Lincoln Square, and Grand Army Plaza/Prospect Park. Richard Dattner, FAIA, wrote Upper Manhattan; Roger Feinstein, Harlem and the Bronx; Mina Hamilton, Staten Island; Greenwich Village, Ann Douglas; Central Park, Henry Hope Reed and Sophia Duckworth. The balance was split between Elliot and me. But a horde of supporters in all editions added detail that none of us could have produced alone. Since 1966, when research on the first version of the Guide began, innumerable individuals have contributed information, ideas, comments, corrections, and considerable moral support. Previous editions and reprintings have recognized their contributions in the acknowledgments. This fifth edition is a linear descendant of the original, self-published version feverishly prepared over a nine-month period for the 1967 AIA convention in NYC. Because its approach profoundly influenced subsequent updates of the Guide, it seems appropriate to credit once again those who helped the authors to set the first edition’s tone: writers John Morris Dixon, FAIA, Ann Douglass, Mina Hamilton, Roger Feinstein, Henry Hope Reed, Jr., Sophia Duckworth, and Richard Dattner, FAIA. The second edition by MacMillan, and the third with Harcourt Brace were jointly rewritten and expanded by Elliot and myself, again with an expanded legion, upwards of 180 supporters, who contributed anything from a correction of punctuation to a suggestion for a new entry. The fifth edition by White & Willensky and Fran Leadon, AIA, will appear Spring/Summer 2010 with Oxford University Press.
Since its June 9 opening, I have visited the High Line twice — once during the day and once at night. While I have some criticisms, overall the park, designed by Field Operations with Diller Scofidio + Renfro, is a new amenity to the Meatpacking District and an example of how good design can produce successful public space. A couple of Sundays ago, even though the line stretched down the block to 10th Avenue, I only waited about 10 minutes to ascend the stairs at Gansevoort Street. As my friend commented, it was like walking through all of the renderings we’ve seen over the last couple of years, with a mix of people and kids of all ages crouching at the plants and pointing to the skyline. The amphitheater that allows visitors to view 9th Avenue recalls Diller Scofidio + Renfro’s ICA in Boston, setting up a familiar vocabulary to followers of the firm’s work and also demonstrating a unique way to solve ADA requirements with a ramp that winds along the seats. When I saw that some of the benches had been vandalized already, at first I thought it was unfortunate. Then, I began to think that street art could add another layer to the park, referencing the city’s past in addition to the preservation of the train tracks. My biggest criticism of the High Line is the lack of shade structures. Other than the shelter from the buildings that straddle the park, there are no opportunities to escape the hot summer sun or the occasional scattered shower. By the time I descended from the park, I needed water to rehydrate. At night, the low lights (both in setting and luminescence), designed by Hervé Descottes, provide visitors with uninterrupted views of the cityscape. The lighting under the building overpasses is sparse, and could provide areas for future light installations as well. The only area where the limited lights are not successful — even treacherous — is at the amphitheater. I almost fell as I tried to descend the stairs to the seating area. There is no question that the High Line is a great addition to the city, already publicly recognized as an achievement (See “Architecture Takes the Stairs,” by Murrye Bernard, LEED AP, and “High Line Offers New Slant on City Views,” by Lisa Delgado, in this issue). I plan on visiting it frequently in all seasons to experience the change in foliage, and I am excited for Section 2 to open, supposedly next summer. I also hope that the success of Section 1 will convince the city and developers to preserve the full Section 3 at the West Side Rail Yards. In this issue: Rhythm Comes Alive in Midtown 
Cassa. TEN arquitectos TEN Arquitectos celebrated both the firm’s 25th anniversary and the unveiling of a new project, Cassa, a Midtown Manhattan hotel condominium designed in collaboration with Cetra/Ruddy. The building will rise 48 stories and contain 57 residences and 166 hotel rooms. The building’s windows have a punctured rhythm that are the façade’s only ornament, intending to bring the activities of residents and guests to life. Assa Properties and Desires Hotel are developing Cassa, which will include a world-class restaurant, spa, private terrace, and lounge. Construction has already begun and the project is fully funded for completion by mid-2010. “Project of the Year” Transforms SoHa 
SoHa 118. GF55 Partners SoHa 118, a 14-story building in South Harlem designed by GF55 Partners and developed by Artimus Construction, has been named “Project of the Year” by the New York State Association for Affordable Housing (NYSAFAH). The 185,000-square-foot, mixed-use project consists of 93 one-, two-, and three-bedroom apartments offered at both market and affordable rates. SoHa 118 marks the completion of a block on Frederick Douglass Boulevard between 118th and 119th Streets. Artimus and GF55 Partners have worked together to transform this formerly neglected district into a vibrant community, with large-scale urban development on two adjacent blocks, containing five sites and seven residential buildings, with a sixth site containing a newly renovated church. Mini Golfers Take On Rocket Science 
Rocket Park Mini Golf. Lee H. Skonick Architecture + Design Partnership The New York Hall of Science in Queens, the city’s hands-on science and technology center, has added a new permanent exhibition called Rocket Park Mini Golf. Designed by Lee H. Skolnick Architecture + Design Partnership, the park uses space-age colors and graphics reminiscent of the 1960s. The exhibition features two authentic NASA rockets and a nine-hole course that was designed to allow mini-golfers to encounter scientific concepts such as propulsion, thrust, gravity, escape velocity, launch window, gravitational assist, and more. For example, the hole called “launch window” forces players to pick the right time to launch their “rocket” through turning, intersecting elliptical orbit with planets and other celestial matter that will hinder its trajectory and hamper their trip to Saturn. Court of Appeals Rules D.C.’s Judiciary Square 
Historic Courthouse of Judiciary Square. Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners Following a four-year restoration and renovation program developed by Beyer Blinder Belle Architects and Planners, the Historic Courthouse of Judiciary Square in the nation’s capital will become the new home for the District’s highest court, the D.C. Court of Appeals. Originally designed by George Hadfield in 1820 to serve as the D.C. City Hall, the Historic Courthouse is a National Historic Landmark and one of the oldest public buildings in the district. Vacant since 1999, the courthouse was in need of a comprehensive overhaul to be restored to its original grandeur, while also in need of being transformed into a fully functioning modern courthouse. Beyer Blinder Belle integrated the expanded facilities and modern systems with minimal disruption to the historic structure. The most significant challenge was the excavation of the new ceremonial courtroom beneath the grand south-side portico, where the original stone and brick support structure below needed to be entirely removed — with the portico in place — and replaced with a complex, steel structural framework. The new facilities, including a grand ceremonial courtroom, reception and exhibition space, and administrative facilities, were built below-grade, thereby maintaining the integrity of the historic façade. This configuration also allowed mechanical equipment to be located in the residual space between the existing foundation wall and the foundation of the new parking garage, further minimizing impact on the historic structure. Library is a Learning Landscape in Baltimore 
Multi-use “park bench” with computer work stations. © Erik Kvalsvik To meet the Bentalou Elementary School’s goal of improving literacy through independent study that incorporates adventure and discovery, NYC-based W Architecture and Landscape Architecture re-imagined the Baltimore school’s library as a “learning landscape.” The 2,016-square-foot flexible space was created from three smaller spaces, and includes an oversized “park bench” doubles as a casual reading area on one side, with a docking area for computers on the other. A green circular carpet provides a more casual reading area. Nine wall clocks installed over the bookshelves tell the time in Baltimore and eight sister cities around the world. Behind the librarian’s desk, a former door to the corridor is now a window allowing visibility into the space as well as displaying special reading material. Storage space was hidden behind a wall of doors, and most of the existing shelving and furniture was adapted for re-use, while new lighting, solar shading, and a more efficient HVAC system all help save energy. Exoskeleton Cools Dubai 
O-14. © lmresolt.com The exterior shell of O-14, the 22-story commercial tower perched on a two-story podium in Dubai, recently topped out, revealing a full-height concrete exoskeleton. Designed by NY-based Reiser+Umemoto in collaboration with the Creek Side Development Company of Dubai, the project is located along the extension of Dubai Creek on a waterfront esplanade. High-strength self-consolidating concrete was cast around a basket weave of steel reinforcement resulting in a perforated exterior shell. The concrete shell provides an efficient structure that frees the core from the lateral forces and creates highly efficient, column-free open spaces in the building interior. In addition, the shell acts as a sunscreen open to light, air, and views. A space nearly one meter deep between the shell and the glazing creates a chimney effect; this passive solar technique contributes naturally to the cooling system, thus reducing energy consumption by 30%. O-14 is expected to be completed in the Spring of 2010. In this issue: NYC Turns Old Into Green AIANY Committee on the Environment (COTE) co-chairs Patricia Sapinsley, AIA, and Charlie Griffith, AIA, with AIANY Policy Director Marian Imperatore, AIA, have been busy gathering support for four green building bills coming before the City Council Friday, June 26. The NYCC Buildings Energy Legislation (# 476A Benchmarking, #973 Lighting Upgrades, #564 NYC Energy Code, and #967 Audits and Retrofits) — prepared by the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability — will extend the reach of the city’s energy rules. The bills will ensure that, for the first time, New York State’s Energy Code will apply energy standards to the city’s existing building stock. It requires, among other things, that building owners audit their energy use and upgrade their buildings’ energy profile when they renovate (previously, that energy upgrade had only applied to major renovations). The legislation will cut down on NYC’s carbon footprint and improve the city’s building stock. AIANY and the USGBC are supportive, but there will be significant opposition from some NYC property owners. To contact your councilmember, click here. More on the vote in the next edition of e-Oculus. Transportation Reform Rolls Into Washington Last week the House Transportation and Infrastructure committee released the summary of their Surface Transportation Authorization Act of 2009. Drafted by Committee Chairman Jim Oberstar (D-MN) and Ranking Republican John Mica (R-FL), the six-year, $450-billion bill brings 75 different programs under one, sustainability-minded umbrella. For the design community, the most important component of the act is the new Office of Livable Communities. The U.S. Department of Transportation-based office would bring transportation and community planning together as never before. However, the Senate still has to respond, and Congress members aren’t sure where the budget will come from. President Obama suggested the bill wait 18 months for more funds, as the current transportation financing, in The Highway Trust Fund, is running close to empty. Proposed Energy Code Sets New Standards for Clean Energy The New Buildings Institute and AIA announced their plan for a new International Energy Conservation Code. They are proposing that the International Code Council adopt the new standards — which would improve energy performance, reduce emissions, and improve efficiency in new commercial buildings by up to 30% — for their next update, which is due out in 2012. Read more about the proposal here. ARE Prices Increase You have until October 1 to schedule Architect Registration Exam (ARE) appointments at the $170-per-division price. On that day, prices for each division will increase by $40. The National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB) explains that this security and development fee is due to recent content disclosure incidents. The upshot of a few candidates posting ARE questions on the Internet created new content development, administrative, and legal fees. The cost to NCARB: $1.1 million. Click here for the full story. Tribute: Bernard Rothzeid, FAIA, Architect, 83 Bernard Rothzeid, FAIA, a leading New York architect and founder of RKT&B Architects, died of leukemia on May 25, 2009. He was 83 and lived in Park Slope, Brooklyn. Although Bernie Rothzeid was 10 years my senior, we had much in common (we both attended Stuyvesant High School and MIT, followed by a Fulbright Traveling Grant). It was natural for me to look to him as a leader in our profession, and a most serious and dedicated architect. After his Fulbright to Italy and on his return to New York, Bernie became a project architect at I.M. Pei and Partners, supervising the design and construction of such large-scale projects as the Place Ville Marie in Montreal. Bernie became a pioneer in the adaptive re-use of existing structures. Turtle Bay Towers, a former commercial building, received a First Honor Award from the AIA and was, at the time, the largest residential conversion in the city. In 1963, he founded his own architectural firm and rapidly acquired major clients. By 1974, as Bernard Rothzeid & Partners, the firm continued to prosper, and in 1981 became Rothzeid Kaiserman Thomson & Bee, converting and renovating buildings of all types, many of which received city, state, and/or national awards for innovative design. Historic preservation became an RKT&B specialty. Bernie was elected to the College of Fellows of the AIA in 1979, and in 1986 he received the Augustus Saint Gaudens Award from The Cooper Union from which he graduated before getting his Master’s at MIT. (Prior to Cooper Union, he served in the U.S. Army in the Philippines during World War II from 1944-1946.) He served on the boards of The Cooper Union, New York Methodist Hospital, and the Citizen’s Housing and Planning Council, and was active in numerous other organizations. He also taught at The Cooper Union and at the School of Architecture and Environmental Studies at City College in New York. The National Endowment for the Arts awarded him a grant in 1980 to study the chattel houses in Barbados. He was highly esteemed by students, clients, and associates alike as a devoted mentor, exemplary colleague, and loyal friend. I often sought him out for advice, especially in the area of preservation, mixing old and new. He is survived by his wife of 55 years, Madge, his daughter Mitzie and his son Alexander. In addition to his lifelong commitment to his family and to architecture, he was an avid theatergoer, reader, gardener, and New York Giants fan. But among his preoccupations in recent years, none took hold with greater passion than his return to drawing and painting, which he had first learned as an art student at Cooper Union. “There’s something very beautiful about a well-crafted drawing,” he recently remarked. “You don’t get it with a machine drawing.”
Student proposal for Manhattanville. Courtesy Center for Architecture Foundation The evening of June 16 marked a commencement of sorts for sixth-grade students at P.S. 161 in Harlem. A presentation of models for a future Manhattanville was created by the students in response to Columbia University’s expansion in the Manhattanville/West Harlem neighborhood, a few blocks away from their school. Throughout the presentation, a wealth of knowledge was shared by the students who provided their own perspectives on how Manhattanville should be transformed. Ideas such as ferry terminals, hospitals accessible to everyone, recycling centers with green roofs, college dorms with practical amenities nearby, and open space were on the top of the list of programmatic elements. The student investigation of Manhattanville was conducted by Jane Cowan, a design educator for the Center for Architecture Foundation. A partnership with the school first began when the students were in the fourth grade, and has continued as part of the Foundation’s Learning By Design:NY in-school residency program. The focus of the residency was to introduce the students to the history and architecture of Harlem with an emphasis on the inevitable notion of change in the city and in our lives. Students investigated the community’s history through its landmarks — constructing models of 25 significant sites, and writing and performing plays using those landmarks as the backdrop to historical and social events. Then they focused more specifically to the history of Manhattanville, where they researched buildings in the expansion area, photo-documented the streetscapes, and conducted interviews with people in the neighborhood. A visit to Columbia provided students the opportunity to learn more about the university’s plans, as well, giving the students a perspective on the professional side of development and an opportunity to envision themselves on a path toward higher education. The resulting work was a synthesis of the many projects which took place during the residency. The students have been exposed to Manhattanville’s historic and architectural fabric and are informed of the changes to come. Their documentation of the area is an important record, and hopefully their memory of this neighborhood will remain with them and be passed on to the next generation of Harlem residents. In addition to the participation and input of students and staff at P.S. 161, Leila Vujosevic of OMNI Architects and Hermes Mallea, AIA, from M(Group) offered their support, sponsorship, and time to the endeavor. For more information about the programs offered by the Center for Architecture Foundation, visit www.cfafoundation.org. If it ever stops raining, take advantage of this recession-friendly program over the summer. More than 200 bikes are available to ride around five miles of car-free paths on Governors Island, for up to one hour. The entire 2.2-mile promenade that circles the island is open for the first time, including Picnic Point, a new eight-acre picnic area at the southwestern corner. On Fridays through 10.09.09, Governors Island is open from 10am-5pm. Bikes are available to rent on Saturdays and Sundays, and visitors are also permitted to bring their own bikes. For more information, visit the Governors Island website. While you are on the Island, also check out the city’s first public art quadrennial, Plot 09: This World & Nearer Ones, to be produced by Creative Time. The exhibition, which opens 06.27.09, will feature 19 public art commissions by international artists from nine countries, including Patti Smith and Mark Wallinger. 2009 Lumen Awards Winners include, in the following categories: Lumen Citation for Art Installation in a Public Space, “This Way” — Under the Brooklyn Bridge by Tillett Lighting Design, Inc. and KT3D; Lumen Citation for Featured Visual Element, GSC Group by Cline Bettridge Bernstein Lighting Design, and Skidmore, Owings & Merrill; Lumen Citation for Integration of Light, Architecture and Signage, TKTS Ticket Booth by Fisher Marantz Stone, Inc., Perkins Eastman, and Choi Ropiha Architects (Competition Architect); Lumen Citation for Merchandise Lighting, Elizabeth Arden, Fifth Avenue by RS Lighting Design and Highland Associates, NYC; Lumen Citation for Technical Lighting Achievement, NYC Waterfalls by Jaros, Baum & Bolles; Lumen Award of Merit, Bar Boulud by Tirschwell & Co., Inc., Design Bureaux (Design Architect) and Michael Zenreich Architects (Arch. of Record); Lumen Award of Merit, Royalton Hotel by Focus Lighting Team; Lumen Feltman Award of Excellence, Vera Wang New York Flagship Store by Tillotson Design Associates and Gabellini Sheppard Associates; and Lumen Award of Excellence, Museum of Islamic Arts — Interior by Fisher Marantz Stone, Inc. and I.M. Pei Architect… The AIA New Jersey Chapter, Preservation New Jersey, and the DOCOMOMO-US New York/ Tri-State Chapter were recognized with a Historic Preservation Award for Bell Labs Charrette… Parsons The New School for Design has appointed William Morrish as dean of the School of Constructed Environments, which houses Parsons’ programs in Architecture, Interior Design, Lighting Design, and Product Design… The Executive Committee of the NYC Economic Development Corporation (NYCEDC) elected Victor F. Ganzi as Chairman, succeeding John Chalsty who resigned in March after 15 years of service… Ted Moudis Associates announced an alliance with London-based MCM Architecture Ltd… Alfred Moreno has joined Stantec as a Principal and Airport Terminal Leader for the U.S… 06.16-17.09: AIANY manned a table at Green BuildingsNY at the Jacob K. Javits Center. 
Suzanne Mecs, AIANY Director of Membership (left), with Judith Chavez-Webster, International Assoc. AIA, LEED AP, a member of the AIA Long Island Chapter. Courtesy AIANY
05.20.09: A ceremony took place at BellTel Lofts, 365 Bridge Street, Downtown Brooklyn, to mark its designation as a City Landmark by the New York Landmarks Preservation Commission.
05.28.09: Award-winning kites from FlyNY were auctioned off during a cocktail party and exhibition at the Knoll showroom in Chelsea. Proceeds will be donated Architecture for Humanity New York.
First Prize-Winning Kite on Display: Heinrich Hohmann’s “City of Glass” (German version of Japanese edo kite). Courtesy Aurelie Paradiso, Creative Director and Co-Founder, FlyNY 05.28.09: openhousenewyork (OHNY) held the first of a series of benefits, called private spaces/private access parties, at the Flag Art Foundation. 
Pictured: Scott Lauer, founder of OHNY, and Richard Gluckman, FAIA, partner, Gluckman Mayner. Odette Veneziano
06.11.09: The second private spaces/private access party to benefit OHNY at an 1830s Federal-style townhouse restored and renovated by AND Architects and developed by Blesso Properties.
Pictured (l-r): Andrea Steele, AIA, of AND Architects; Scott Lauer, founder of OHNY; Matthew Blesso, Blesso Properties; and Renee Schacht, OHNY executive director. Ari Burling Photography 2009 Oculus Editorial Calendar Winter Issue: Health & Architecture. Architecture designed to promote fitness, health, and wellness will be profiled. Projects selected from within this growing field will demonstrate sensitivity to generational and demographic issues, sustainability, and technology. 06.29.09 Call for Entries: Arquitectum Architecture Competition: Paris 2009 07.15.09 Call for Entries: Idea for Action Kaohsiung International Competition 07.27.09 Call for Entries: Green Garage Inventors Competition 08.23.09 Call for Submissions: Design it: Shelter Competition 10.14.09 Call for Entries: AIAS/Kawneer 2009 Student Design Competition 11.17.09 Call for Entries: 2010 Skyscraper Competition Center for Architecture Gallery Hours Join an Architalker for a Hosted Tour of Center for Architecture UPCOMING EXHIBITIONSA Space Within: The National September 11 Memorial & MuseumJune 25 - September 14, 2009
On September 11th, 2001, what had been one of the world’s most densely developed business districts became, for many, hallowed ground. Soon after, questions emerged. What comes next? How could one site serve the needs of victims’ families, survivors of the attacks, members of the surrounding communities, business interests, and visitors? The answer required a clear separation of the sacred and the secular; a defined, eight-acre space, serving as a tribute, would be created within the larger development. A Space Within is a public showcase of the memorial and museum that are now taking shape at the heart of the World Trade Center site. Memorial design by Michael Arad and Peter Walker Exhibition and related programs are organized by the AIA New York Chapter in partnership with the Center for Architecture Foundation and the National September 11 Memorial & Museum. Partner: CURRENT EXHIBITIONSNew Practices San FranciscoJune 04 - September 19, 2009
New Practices San Francisco is the 2009, West Coast premiere of AIA New York’s annual portfolio competition and exhibition. New Practices San Francisco is a platform for recognizing and promoting new and emerging architecture firms within San Francisco that have undertaken innovative strategies — both in projects and practice. The New Practices program was launched in 2005 by AIA New York to showcase promising new architectural firms. New Practices San Francisco will be on view at the Center for Architecture from June 4, 2009 through September 19, 2009. It will then be on view at the Center for Architecture & Design, San Francisco, from November 12, 2009 through January 29, 2010. The exhibition will be accompanied by a series of programs organized by the AIA New York Chapter in collaboration with the New Practices Committee and AIA San Francisco. Congratulations to our 2009 New Practices San Francisco Winners: * CMG Landscape Architecture Exhibition Design: Matter Practice, 2008 New Practices New York winning firm. Graphic Design: Organized By: This exhibition is made possible through the generous support of the following sponsors: Lead Sponsor: Presenting Sponsor: Hafele The Global Polis: Interactive InfrastructuresMay 15 - August 29, 2009
What is infrastructure? For much of the twentieth century, the answer to this question was guided by the ideology of functionalist urbanism, a school of thought that said that all healthy cities served four major needs – work, housing, recreation, and transportation. Today, we no longer take this view for granted, for it is a perspective that makes no provisions for community, identity, or history. At the same time, we still lack an alternative model for visualizing the city that can deal adequately with the public health and quality-of-life issues that the early functionalists sought to address. Our capacity to balance urban development with the demands of ecological imperatives and social needs has only worsened in recent decades, and this exhibition asks whether the trend can be reversed. Global Polis: Interactive Infrastructures documents a series of contemporary experiments in planning, architecture, and design that treat cities and their environments in holistic terms, as a complex social, political, and ecological matrix – not just as an assembly of buildings, roadways, bridges, pipes, and tunnels (although each of these is important). Infrastructure cannot be divorced from the structure of democracy, from the environment at large, and the contributions to this exhibition highlight the important role that community, communication, participation, and the sharing of knowledge can play in informing understanding of the urban fabric. This spring and summer, a series of workshops and public programs will be held to generate discussion and debate about civic participation, urbanism, and design. Drawings and diagrams produced in the workshops will be incorporated into the exhibition as an evolving presentation of ideas. Exhibition and related programs organized by AIA New York in partnership with Architecture for Humanity New York (AFHny) , The Austrian Cultural Forum, and the American Institute for Graphic Arts New York (AIGA NY). Curator: Nader Vossoughian SPONSORS Underwriter: Center for Architecture Foundation
Supporter: Consulate General of The Netherlands Friend: Times Square Alliance Through 06.27.09
Digital drawing made by thesis student Lythia Xynogala, “Title: Heat and Desertification in the Mediterranean: Cooling down through Architecture.” Courtesy Cooper Union Students at The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art formally exhibit their works. The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture presents work ranging from architectural drawings and detailed scale models to computer-aided renderings of famous sites and emerging developments. The Cooper Union Through 07.17.09 2009 
Courtesy The Architectural League of New York This year’s Architectural League Young Architects Forum focused on the theme “Foresight.” Entrants considered how architectural ideas might resonate beyond professional boundaries and address how to align the ambitions and capacities of architecture with the needs and desires of a diverse and changing world. Urban Center Through 09.27.09
Frederik de Wit, Map of Amsterdam, 1698. Courtesy National Maritime Museum Amsterdam/Nederlands Scheepvaartmuseum Amsterdam Celebrating the 400th anniversary of Henry Hudson’s discovery of New York Harbor, this exhibition investigates the connections between Amsterdam and New Amsterdam to reveal their shared history of entrepreneurship and economic innovation, republican political protest, and diverse religious views. The exhibition is the first of three exhibitions in conjunction with the Quadricentennial. Museum of the City of New York eCalendar includes an interactive listing of architectural events around NYC. Click the link to go to to eCalendar on the Web. The Public Information Exchange (PIE) is an AIANY initiative designed to create an archive of NYC projects, proposals, programs, and exhibitions presented or discussed at the Center for Architecture. It is a forum for public discussion, both general and professional, that includes continuous commentary from users and participants. Click the link to take part. ADVERTISE IN THE eOCULUS CLASSIFIEDS! Would you like to have your message featured in eOCULUS? Spotlight your firm, product, or event as a marquee sponsor of eOCULUS, the electronic newsletter of the AIA New York Chapter. Sponsors receive a prominently-placed banner ad. Your message will reach over 10,000 architects, decision-makers in the building industry, and design enthusiasts via e-mail every two weeks (and countless others who access the newsletter directly from the AIA New York web site). For more information about sponsorship, contact: enemens@aiany.org or 212.358.6126. Looking for help? See resumes posted on the AIA New York Chapter website. ARCHITECT LEVEL 2 Requirements: A valid New York State registration as an Architect and five years of full-time experience in Architecture including experience as a major contributor or a project leader. Desired Skills: In depth knowledge of the capital construction process in design and construction, and an overall ability to function effectively within that process by applying the standards of project management while utilizing effective oral and written communication skills. Ref. Number: 005055 AIA Ms. Valerie Tookes NBBJ New York is looking for Medical Planners with 15+ years’ experience in all facets of Medical Planning. Join a fully integrated practice where Architects work with Planners from Concept through Construction. See http://www.nbbj.com/#join for details and to apply.
At the scale of the individual structure, panelists agreed that designers can effectively promote activity through stair design. Victoria Milne, director of creative services for the Department of Design and Construction, believes that stairs should be “prominent, primary, pleasant, and preferred.” A successful exterior stair, according to Charles McKinney, ASLA, chief of design of capital projects for the Department of Parks & Recreation, is the entry to the newly opened High Line, designed by Field Operations with Diller, Scofidio + Renfro. Pedestrians climb an elongated staircase, gaining a new perspective while transitioning from city to park. Designers can make stairs more accessible and appealing by adhering to optimal dimensions and using interesting, innovative materials. Andrew Dent, vice president of materials research for Material ConneXion, suggested products including fire-resistant glass with embedded LEDs for wayfinding as an option for stair enclosure, and durable, photo-luminescent signage for paving stones to indicate stair location. An even more straightforward approach to encouraging stair use is the installation of “point of decision prompts,” such as the green signs that suggests taking the stairs to burn calories. According to Nancy Biberman, president of Women’s Housing and Economic Development Corporation, these prompts have been very successful, increasing stair use as much as 67% in one 10-story affordable housing development. Skip-stop elevators are also a good strategy to encourage stair use in tall buildings; for example, workers in Los Angeles’s Caltrans building by Morphosis are two times more likely to take the stairs, stated Jean Oei, architectural designer at the firm. Also by Morphosis, the new Cooper Union Academic Building in NYC aims for similar success by encouraging interaction between students and faculty in the corridors and stairs that wind through its 11-story atrium. Active design does have its perceived roadblocks, including ADA Guidelines and clients themselves. While one might expect Matthew Sapolin, commissioner for the Mayor’s Office of People with Disabilities, to be an opponent of active design, he believes that people with disabilities are open to walking or traveling farther if the appropriate programming is in place, such as rest stops or informative signs along a long, low-sloped ramp — an alternative to the traditional ADA ramp with guardrails. Kirsten Sibilia, Assoc. AIA, LEED AP, chief marketing officer for JCJ Architecture, suggested ways that architects can market active design to their clients. They should engage the clients in a dialogue, she recommends; identifying established concepts clients will understand such as Energy Star ratings and LEED certifications, metrics that effectively illustrate the benefits of active design. While codes in the 19th century focused on fighting infectious disease, posited Karen Lee, MD, MPH, deputy director of the Bureau of Chronic Disease Prevention and Control at the DOHMH, the codes for the 21st century should counteract obesity-related chronic diseases. The panelists concurred that designers must take responsibility for public health by programming activity in and out of buildings. While many people prefer to take the path of least resistance — in this case, the car or the elevator — we must design provocative alternatives.
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