Buffalo Rising Online

Excellent post as always, Steel. Two observations:

"You can go anywhere in your car!" has become "You can't go anywhere *without* your car." The same fate awaits us geeks, by the way: "You can do anywthing on the internet!" will become "You can't do anything without the internet." But I digress.

Highways destroy everything within 100 yards or so, especially property values. Highways are why everyone thinks American cities, not just Buffalo, are so pathologicallly hopeless. They see them only from highways, which are the most damaged zones in every city. The west side would not have the charm and value it has today had Richmond Avenue been turned into an expressway, as was once proposed. So highways didn't just destroy some buildings and neighborhoods, they destroyed Americans' faith in urban viability.

Go back about three decades, and you'll find a very interesting plan for using the land inside the Skyway loop: a Brutalist-style concrete dome that would have formed the roof of a Metro Rail station. Bus loading lanes would have been underneath the ramp itself.

There seems to be a lot of talk about how expressways have cut up the ciy, but nothing is said about how railroads did the same thing in the mid-1800s. it might not matter to those living on the West Side and in North Buffalo, where the density of railroad lines was sparse, but some parts of the the East Side and South Buffalo were sliced into tens of tiny enclaves, blocked off from their neighbors by imposing viaducts. The scars are still there years after abandonment; street grids remain disconnected, rights-of-way empty with no plan for reuse, and the collective memory of the barrier preventing residents from seeing their small neighborhoods as part of a greater whole. Lovejoy and Sloan are still very different, very separate places, even though the railroad line that once divided the two communities is now long-gone.

Great topic. It is still amazing to me how anyone in their right mind thought it would be a good idea to butcher Humboldt Parkway, severing Delaware Park in half. I know the waterfront gets most of the attention in this debate, and rightfully so, but can you imagine what Delaware Park would be like without that brutal roadway running through its heart.

Two very thoughtful comments from BIA and Dan above.

Railroads and highways have acted not only to destroy but also to create neighborhoods and communities. The history of both reflects the predominant pattern of American development as one of constant spatial expansion-- and abandonment of the older for the newer by many of those who could-- a luxury historically made possible by the enormity of our land mass and our wealth. It's still very hard to convince Americans that there isn't more space for them just over the next ridge. (Where else in the world would people accept the insanity of driving two hours or more to work just to have the biggest house and yard possible?)

Some of the so-called streetcar suburbs of the 19th and early-20th-centuries-- many actually within the corporate limits of cities-- and the early railroad suburbs of Chicago, Boston, New York, etc., are still among the most desirable places to live in America. There's no doubt that in making them accessible, older city neighborhoods were often cut up and damaged. Worst of all, railroads locked up the waterfronts for industry.

The interesting thing about rail transit is that today's technology can make it relatively quiet and environmentally friendly, and existing rights of way could carry vastly greater numbers of people and goods than they ever did before (without expanding physically) just by running more frequent trains.

But what can be done to reign in the land consumption of highways or to make them quieter as ever greater numbers of vehicles-- almost all the time carrying one person each-- are added to the road system?

Since we don't have the political will and public support to just say no to more roads and parking in most parts of the country, only a major, painful, and prolonged disruption in the feed tube is going to change things significantly.

Beautiful projects! Western New York needs to learn to love radical ideas again. We cannot catch up to other more propserpeous places in the US by retracing their steps. We need to be unique. Frankly, in the US it is easy to be radical and get alot of attention from it. Buffalo needs to think radically different from other american cities.

Another excellent article, Steel. Looking forward to reading the rest of your series.

I hate that loop.

I hate you too

Sometimes I'm baffled that architecture schools are still encouraging their students to think "radically" about reshaping the city -- reinventing the wheel every time, treating the city like a peice of sculpture, disregarding all the values that make traditional cities liveable and workable. I wonder if, as a student, I would be ridiculed if I simply proposed the downgrading of this interchange to free up the vacant parcel beneath it, on which of course any rational mixed-use development could emerge. Would I be a laughing stock if I didn't propose something "bold" and breathtaking and instead resorted the lost art of city-making, still so eschewed by ivory tower theorists?

Well, here is my take on Buffalo's highways 1) Michigan Street Bridge to outer harbor....I support 2) Remove all toll booths within the Buffalo city limits: Niagara Expressway, I90 and South Buffalo / Lackawanna..move them all to the Erie County line. 3) downgrade the Niagara Expressway to a parkway 4) downgrade the Sqajaquada Expressway to a parkway 5) built Humboldt Parkway above the Kensington Expressway where the Kensington is below grade (re-integrate the neighborhood) 6) Originate/Terminate the Kensington at the beginning of the Fruit Belt. Put traffic back on Spring, Virginia, Harriet Tubman, Cherry, Best, Broadway, Genessee, etc. 7) Extend Buffalos Light Rail 8) replace Skyway with a lift bridge 9) Support the Gateway plan by New Millenium Group for the Peace Bridge Expansion, Niagara Street and Front Park 10) Get rid of all the on/off ramps within the urban core....and move them further away....put more traffic on the inner city neighborhoods to support residential and commerical viability.

Now is a great time to start rethinking the way we handle traffic and put as much thought into dismantling some of its worst features.

You are so right, EB Blue.

Would anyone really want to live (or even work) in the middle of those spaghetti bowls?

Take down these ramps, Mr. Gorbachev.

Well EB,

your fear of the new would have us still living in the middle ages. It is your so called ivory tower theorists who have brought us all of our modern conveniences. We should value and use the successes and lessons of the past but we should not let them paralyze us. The cities of the 1890's have left us a spectacular legacy. They were, however, not pleasant places to live in at that time. Our ivory tower theorists have brought many marvelous things. They are not necessarily reinventing the wheel...rather they are inventing the jet engine. Think about that next time you want to go travel to California.

word

When I lived in San Francisco, it was clear to me that the old "wheel" of the city was just right -- and the "jet engines" plopped into the middle of the old fabric had mostly had no positive effect. I would also apply that to the new blob designed by Morphosis for the new Federal Building in SOMA. It wasn't only the city of the 1890s that gave us a good legacy -- cities followed unwritten rules for years that worked again and again in cities of every geographic location and cultural foundation. The architecture schools are still discarding that legacy in favor of the nonfunctional artwork you see above. I credit the students for creating nifty peices of sculpture, but they will never be able to take those renderings into the real world -- and thankfully so.

As a student at UB I'm forced to agree with EB Blue. Too little emphasis is placed on projects that can be realistically created. Go down to the Atelier on South Campus today or tomorrow and explain to me what much of the work is supposed to represent - I certainly can't, and I'm in the planning program!

As a student at UB and a lifelong Buffalonian I agree with Steel. We are forced to think outside of the box because it is our respondsibility. There is a huge emphasis on research, precedent, and a sensitivity to the user. If you can't understand most of the work in Crosby Hall, it may not be the school's fault, it may be your own. If you're confused, then ask the authors of the work, they are probably around somewhere in the building. We spend day and night scrutinizing the urban experience and yes even challenging it. Would you rather we made something familiar to you, something that didn't provoke you, that didn't demand intellectual growth and progress?

And I cannot believe that you thought that cities functioned better under the "unwritten rules" of the 1890s. And maybe we can conveniently forget about all the injustice and unsanitary conditions that also existed in those grand citites. Thomas Mayne of Morphosis came here to UB one year ago to present his work. He presented and we asked questions. Imagine that, a world famous architect being forced to justify a decision because he was challenged by a student in Buffalo. That is called accountability. Our school teaches us that you need to be able to justify your decisions and ground them in a solid logic informed by research and data. If you don't you will get ripped by critics. What Buffalo needs right now from its leaders is less assumptions and nostalgia and more innovation rooted in accurate data and current technologies. We need to progress and we need to modernize. We won't fix Buffalo by planting some elm trees, or rebuilding the Larkin Building.

"Tradition is the tending of the fire, not the worshipping of the ashes." -- Goethe

This discussion sounds remarkably similar to the back-and-forth arguments between Robert Moses and Jane Jacobs. In fact, Moses postulated the same arguments about unsanitary conditions and crowded streets in the "old city" that some writers above are insinuating. Indeed, we're not going to save the city by planting Elm trees -- though it would certainly help -- but we'll destroy the city if we ignore age-old lessons in urbanism and worship at the altar of architectural "innovation" which has neither the humility or respect to give credence to hundreds of years of building vibrant, liveable cities. Even modernist architecture can obey the unwritten rules of the traditional city, serving people and not vague architectural philosophies and "methaphors." The Darwin Martin House does that -- and so did the Larkin A Building -- and it was still breathtakingly innovative. The ridiculous, nonfuctional sculpture that architecture schools are encouraging students to dream up is neither fit for the present or the future.

I very much like the Goethe quote. Very apt. too many are worshiping ashes.

As for Moses...He may have used the squalor of our historic cities to advance his ends...that does not mean it did not exist.

We should plant trees

We should not promote concepts for the sake of inventiveness alone. The inventiveness needs to be in support of a need and should not destroy something valuable in the process. Innovation does not mean the past is being destroyed

We should not be afraid of innovation because it breaks from the past. We should not worship that past to the extent that we are paralyzed by it

The highway interchange in the example has been a vacant void for half a century. It is a place that no one has thought of or cared for many years. It is exactly the kind of place that needs new exciting and innovative thinking.

You are the one who is still in an era of Jane Jacobs vs. Robert Moses. I don't have to choose between the two. Modern architecture can and does create liveable cities through innovation. But don't call the work in Crosby Hall nonfunctional or vague just because you can't or won't try to understand it. Its unfortunate that most of these students will graduate and move on to design in more prosperous cities than my own. Unless we make our city one large museum, innovation is our only hope. If youre interested in "humility and respect" call the school, plan a visit, join us for our final critiques or come to our lecture series.

My iproblemi is that so much of what is done is a ischolaris luxury.i There seems to be very little focus on designing realistic, tenable solutions for a troubled world. You should read Duany, Plater-Zyberk, and Speckis criticisms of modern architecture schools.

At Buffalo at least, it really depends on which electives or studios you choose. Some of us enjoy theory and history while others enjoy design build projects (Brad Whales's bus shelters, etc.), sustainable design, universal design, interactive/electronic/technology based architecture or urban planning.

also....I have not been convinced that "new-urbanism" addresses the troubles of our world.

Since we're exchanging literature, I found this perfect article by Michael Sorkin online: (i hope the link works!) http://www.metropolismag.com/html/content_0898/aug98wha.htm

I did not say that New Urbanism was the answer either, although some aspects of it I believe are better than traditional suburbia, especially concerning efforts to integrate developments with public transportation while establishing mixed uses and mixed-income housing. I find it abhorrent that some of these projects are built isolated on greenfields with low densities and burdensome aesthetic controls. The article is a good critique of this popular approach.

Perhaps I should restate my earlier complaint. I believe that addressing the environmental problems and gross inequities facing our society should not always take a back seat to design theory and artistry, which, I agree, are valuable. Sometimes it seems as if too much value is placed on making ideas/structures as complicated/abstract as possible.

In addition, cost should be a factor in the development process, especially in a city such as Buffalo; Iive seen some wild designs, but I wonder whether it would be better to focus on creations that may actually get built and improve the region. This applies not just to what we do in school, but to development projects as well; It is inexplicable that people believe that an expensive signature bridge will bring visitors to Buffalo.