Project Title: Sands Bethworks
Location: Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, United States
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Built
Firm: SWA Group
Firm Website: www.swagroup.com
Project Team Members: Ying-Yu Hung, Gerdo Aquino, Alex Robinson, Michael Hee, Trent Okumura, David Gal.

Project Description: While the US industrial revolution of the 1800s slowly recedes into the depths of national consciousness, the collective memory of rustbelt towns refuses to fade. Massive physical remnants of US industrialization, once considered fantastic achievements in manufacturing and engineering, lay in-situ, slowly decaying, overshadowed by current technological advancements, and given the acknowledgement equivalent to the weeds that now surround these relics. 

Sands Bethworks stands as an exemplary model of what landscape architects can bring to our nation’s post-industrial sites. The former home of Bethlehem Steel, this remediated brownfield illustrates how historic investigation can lead to salient features celebrated within a design. Most importantly, this adaptive re-use project has shown catalytic performance through its revival of South Bethlehem and the ensuing developments Sands Bethworks has engendered.

One of the most prominent examples of re-directing the environmental legacy of a post-industrial landscape can be traced to the south banks of the Lehigh Canal, in the city of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. Comprising approximately 1,800 acres (20 acres of which were used for this project), or 20% of Bethlehem’s total land mass, is the former headquarters of Bethlehem Steel Corporation (BSC). Founded in 1904, Bethlehem Steel’s role during the industrial revolution was critical to the economic growth and prosperity of the United States and region. The headquarters in Bethlehem continued to operate until 1998 when US manufacturing divestment, foreign competition, and short-term profit goals finally led to its demise. After almost a century of operation, the effects of Bethlehem Steel’s closure on the city were heartbreaking as thousands of jobs disappeared instantly, along with 20% of Bethlehem’s total tax base. All that remained was a city facing impending bankruptcy, and the largest Brownfield site in the country.

The primary intent of the design was to preserve and elevate the historic industrial setting while capitalizing on the site’s current potential as an engine for economic growth. Following the closure of operations in 1998 and before the design team approached the project, Bethlehem Steel Corporation, the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and the US Environmental Protection Agency enacted a cleanup agreement to begin the largest Brownfield conversion plan in the nation. Approximately 375 tons of soil contaminated with heavy metals and toxic compounds was excavated and transported to a permitted landfill, then backfilled with clean fill. Along with the excavation and removal of soil, removal of petroleum products and pathway elimination were implemented.

Collaborators:
Architect: RTKL Associates Inc.
Civil Engineering and Geotechnical: French & Parrello Associates, PA
Lighting: LDC – Lighting Design Collaborative
Interior Design: Walsh Bishop Associates, Inc.
Structural Engineer: Desimone Consulting Engineers, PLLC
Signage Design: Redmond Schwartz Mark Design
MEP Engineer: R.G. Vanderweil Engineers, LLP
Traffic Engineer: Lublanecki Engineering
Cost Consultant: VJ Associates, Inc.

Project Title: CleanTech Corridor
Location: Los Angeles, CA, USA
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Unbuilt
Firm: Mia Lehrer + Associates
Firm Website: www.mlagreen.com
Project Team Members: Mia Lehrer + Associates (landscape architect)
Astrid Diehl
Zhihang Luo
Buro Happold (engineering)
Steve Chucovich
Ron Elad
Krista Flascha Laney
Jim Suhr (economist)
Elizabeth Timme (architect)

Project Description:  The CleanTech Corridor is a 4 mile long district on the eastern edge of Downtown Los Angeles, stretching from the Los Angeles State Historic Park in the north, to the CleanTech Manufacturing Center in the South, and includes both the east and west banks of the channelized Los Angeles River.

The 2,000-acre development zone which encompasses a mix of industrial areas along the Los Angeles River was recently designated as the “Los Angeles Cleantech district”: the cornerstone of the Mayor’s vision to put Los Angeles at the forefront of the clean tech revolution and to transform the old, downtown industrial core of Los Angeles into an incubator for green jobs, technology and the growth of LA’s economy. The Clean Tech Corridor is envisioned to bring together researchers, designers and manufacturers dedicated to the development of clean technology products and solutions to climate change challenges.

To imagine the Cleantech district, the team answered an open ideas competition organized by SCI-Arc’s Future Initiatives program, the Mayors’ office and The Architect’s Newspaper.

To move beyond industrial use and create an integrated economic, residential, clean energy, and cultural engine for the city, the team, led by ML+A, explored high performance infrastructures and innovative landscape strategies to develop a highly contextual strategy based on re-using existing and under-utilized resources on the site. The team targeted three major urban infrastructural resources for reuse: the historic bridges crossing the Los Angeles River, the industrial urban fabric, and the LA River itself.

Hypothesis

The urban character of the Los Angeles industrial corridor is a paradoxical blend of functionality and disregard. Currently most of the cities distribution, shipping and freight storage occur within this zone. However, there is no structural logic or organization to this corridor. Freight modal hubs are littered along Alameda and Olympic. This blanket of industry is now a barrier between the Eastern Los Angeles community and downtown cutting off a large residential community from accessing the economic center of the city. Due to the lack of organizational clarity to these transit systems, 20-30 percent of the ‘industrial’ buildings that populate the site are outdated with no inherent flexibility or market value – currently shuttered, and left derelict. Conversely, this is part of what makes the clean-tech corridor site so provocative – its raw space and potential for industry and innovation. However, to function within a modern metropolis, the corridor needs a systemic overhaul, a retrofitting to transition into an intermodal landscape in which systems for energy creation (including solar arrays and hydroelectric power), waste management, transportation, and water runoff are integrated.

Solutions

1. The Bridges as destinations
The team chose to perceive the heroic and monumental bridges along the river as untapped opportunities for dynamic, flexible public space. Largely overlooked, the series of concrete bridges traversing the LA River are a major urban element that imposes a unique identity to the corridor. Major pieces of urban infrastructure, the bridges are an iconic remnant of a once useful and coherent transit system, before the freeways and cars, when the Los Angeles population moved in a less nodal, disparate fashion. The architectural bridges are programmed to integrate the community east of Los Angeles into the site, and formally stitch the two sides of the river.

2. The re-use of existing industrial fabric
The “high performance ruin” is one such strategy of remediating the current vacancy of the site and propagating the development of an interior small business corridor. By editing elements of existing building stock down to elemental form (and retaining a connection to the utility grid) new uses can be integrated with minimal investment. Ideally, the urban ruin is a flexible building platform allowing for different uses to be installed facilitating an adaptive, urban flexibility responsive to shifting business models and volatile markets.

3. The recalibrated LA river
The clean-tech corridor has a symbiotic relationship with the river channel and the periodic events of storm water. The district is re-envisioned as a water filter and percolation zone, while the river itself is redefined as a waterway to support ecological services and social recreation. Also addressing the current inadequate preparation for a 100 year event flood, flood pockets and open space have been introduced along the river as flood control devices to relieve the river in periods of excessive storm events.

Additional Information: Sponsored by SCI-Arc and The Architects Newspaper, 70 entries were received from architectural firms and students in 11 countries. The competition asked architects, landscape architects, designers, engineers, urban planners, students, and environmental professionals to create an innovative urban vision for the CleanTech Corridor. Entrants were encouraged to challenge conventional wisdom and move beyond industrial uses—creating an integrated economic, residential, clean energy, and cultural engine to re-invigorate the industrial district into a thriving mixed-use center. This design is a winning submission.

Project Title: Infiltrated Cultural and Ecological Urbanism
Location: Kaohsiung city, Taiwan
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Unbuilt
Project Year: 2011
Firm: Maxthreads Architectural Design
Firm Website: www.max-threads.cm
Project Team Members: Max Yang, Eve Lee, Amy Millar, Wayne Chang

Project Description: Kaohsiung Ecological District lies on the edge of the Kaohsiung city, along the Wan Shu mountain. The project represents an example of infrastructure-led gridded planning resulting in a cohesive network of new road systems and urban landscape along Kaohsiung port station.

The proposal draws inspiration from the grid of the historic train tracks and uses it as a planning base. A leaf-like spin channels through the site, lending a distinctive identity of its urban planning system. The proposal also exemplifies essential aspects of sustainable urban planning including an integrated mixed-use community that encompasses living, working and leisure within a compact city form and is complemented with a balance of civic and natural spaces.

Further, the development is inspired by the culturally and biologically responsive between the new city urban fabric and existing old town Yen Chan district. The guiding principle of the master plan proposal is to inspire a meaningful sense of community and a shared commitment for social and environmental responsibility. The proposal also introduces a series of urban agriculture farming and historically integrated parks. The strategy is to infiltrate and to conceal the community and biological diversity from the nearby Wan Shu mountain. It also reflects the historical transformation of Kaohsiung city from industrial city to a contemporary cityscape.

Presentation animation material: http://vimeo.com/31656812

Project Title: Reclaiming the Shoreline:  Redefining Indiana’s Lake Michigan Coast
Location: NIPSCO coal generating station, Michigan City, Indiana, USA
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Unbuilt
Project Year: 2011
Student Name: Dane Carlson
University: Ball State University

Project Description: The coal generating station in Michigan City, Indiana is one of a series of industrial complexes which have dominated the shoreline of Lake Michigan for decades, bringing with them pollution of ground and water and crippled shorelines. This design solution utilizes the framework of industrial infrastructure to return the site to ecological and community function; as ecological processes develop through a series of phases, human inhabitation brings the site to life.

Program: The program consists of three primary components: ecological development, creation of a public realm and spatial network, and community development. Rather than creating the site as a destination, the program intends to extend all surrounding elements directly into the site design.

Ecology: Reestablishment of tiered dune ecosystems is the primary component of ecological restoration. The introduction of new sediment flows through littoral drift and longshore current, in addition to the creation of a semi-permeable jetty, allows for the accretion of sand along the shoreline, and this process is accelerated by the staggered formations of sheet pilings driven into the lakebed. As a new layer of dunes form here, landward sand becomes stabilized by pioneer vegetation, allowing it to host new and varied plant communities.

Four intradunal wetlands, also known as pannes, and one coastal wetland replace the series of ash settling ponds along the shoreline. The remaining layer of sheet piling, together with a sub-grade sheet of clay, forms a waterproof barrier leading to the accumulation of water at the bottom of each depression. The wet feet of each depression make them uniquely suitable to host rushes and sedges which form the basis of panne plant communities.

The creation of dune forests inland of the shoreline mimics the natural progression of successional dune ecologies. The ini­tial layer of dunes begins organic matter accumulation with cottonwood and dunegrass. Jack pine forest and oak savannah inhabit the layers of dune beyond this, and oak/hickory forests beyond these. Introduction of these tiers of dune evolution creates the basis for a permanently evolving, functional ecological system which mimics that of the national lakeshore to the south.

Community: Introduction of dense residential development allows the site to be a place of inhabitation as well as a destination. Located directly north of an existing neighborhood, this new community provides pedestrian connections to existing streets and al­lows residents from surrounding communities to access pedestrian circulation routes into the heart of the site. Community development lies on the site’s southern portion, maintaining the northern reaches as a place for ecological growth, ecotour­ism, and education. All homes front on open space and residents can easily access woodland canopies or recreational hotspots through aerial circulation systems. A central node makes basic services, such as daycare and grocery, within walking distance of homes.

Public Realm: The most iconic features of the generating station, in addition to most of the auxiliary structures, are adapted into public amenities. In the west, the cooling tower becomes a hotel, providing a viewing platform for the public and creating an anchor for the aerial circulation system. This system extends eastward through the community, carving a path for the creation of a green avenue defined by woodland plantings. To the east, both boiler houses host sport courts and adventure recreation due to their proximity to the creek’s waterfront. Here, an extension of the Franklin Street corridor forms the primary com­mercial and open public space on site. Access extends northward, connecting this attraction to the public beach through a series of woodland and waterside pathways open only to pedestrians.

Project Title: Brooklyn Bridge Park
Location: Brooklyn, NY
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Built / In Design
Project Year: 2010 – Piers 1, Pier 6;
2012—Pier 5;
2013—Pier 2, Pier 3/4 Uplands.
Firm: Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, Inc.
Firm Website: www.mvvainc.com
Project Websites: Brooklyn Bridge Park NYC 
An interview with Matthew Urbanski (Places Journal) 

Project Team: MVVA, Team Lead, Landscape Architecture / Urban Design
AECOM, Marine & Site Infrastructure
Ysrael A. Seinuk, P.C., Structural Engineering
Nitsch Engineering, Stormwater Reuse Consultant
Maryann Thompson Architect, Architecture for Pier 2 and Warming Hut
Richmond So Engineers , Pier 2 Park Building & Warming Hut Structural Engineering
Domingo Gonzales Associates , Lighting Design
Open , Graphic Design
Pine & Swallow Associates , Soil Science
R.J. Van Seters Company , Water Feature Consultant
Paulus, Sokolowski and Sartor, Park Buildings Architect & MEP

Project Description: Currently under construction, Brooklyn Bridge Park will eventually encompass approximately eighty-five acres and 1.3 miles of waterfront. The park’s goals are both ambitious and straightforward: to preserve the dramatic experience and monumental character of the industrial waterfront while reintroducing self-sustaining ecosystems to the site and investing it with new social and recreational possibilities.

MVVA took a broad mandate of sustainability and applied it across a range of spheres—ecological, structural, cultural, and economic. Sociological diversity, programmatic flexibility, and a robust post-industrial nature are threaded together to create a park that can function both as a metropolitan park on the scale of Olmsted’s landscape infrastructures and as a collection of smaller, nested neighborhood parks.

Brooklyn Bridge Park’s design took on a site with limited access points, a narrow overall width, extreme noise pollution from the adjacent elevated highway, a complex structural waterline condition, and a goal of capturing and recycling stormwater. Excess stormwater is collected from buildings, paved areas, lawns, and planting areas, conveyed into underground tanks, and then cycled and cleansed through rain gardens, supporting a lush swath of rain garden plantings. This runoff collection system, in conjunction with the increased use of water-absorbing lawn and planted areas, dramatically curtails the discharge of stormwater runoff into city systems and lowers the likelihood of combined sewer overflow.

Pier One and Pier Six function as “urban junctions,” entrances to the park that will attract families and individuals on a daily and year-round basis with programs such as playgrounds, picnic tables, benches, areas of accessible natural plantings, a dog run with water, and park concession buildings with restrooms. This first phase of Brooklyn Bridge Park provides vital new social spaces and urban programs while bookending the site and laying the foundation for a continuous waterfront park to grow in between. The salt marsh landscape on Pier 6, sports fields and courts on Piers 2 and 5, a community lawn space on Pier 3, a beach, and other park amenities will come with future phases of park construction.

Project Title: Henry Palmisano (Stearns Quarry) Park
Location: Chicago, Illinois
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Built
Project Year: 2009
Firm: Site Design Group, Ltd.
Firm Website: www.site-design.com

Project Team Members:
Client/Owner: Chicago Park District
Photography Credit: Ron Gordon Photography and Site Design Group, Ltd.
Site Design Group Ltd. – Architect of Record, Landscape Architecture and Project Management
Ernest C. Wong, Principal-in-Charge; Michelle M. Inouye, Project Manager and Designer; Hana Ishikawa, Associate Project Manager;
Weston Solutions, Inc. – Civil and Environmental Engineering
Applied Ecological Systems, Inc. – Wetland Engineering
Kowalenko & Bilotti, Inc. – Environmental Engineering
Continental Associates – Electrical Engineering
Gagarin Farruggia Gibisch Reis, Inc. – Structural Engineering
Clauss Brothers, Inc. – General Contractor
Midwest Fence Corporation – Metalwork

Project Description: Henry Palmisano Park holds in its history an evolution of uses and values. Long operated as a quarry from 1830 through 1969, the site later became a landfill for the City of Chicago’s construction waste. Located in the neighborhood of Bridgeport, it is now a twenty-seven-acre environmental park designed to engage residents and support native eco-systems. As a joint project involving three Chicago agencies, the park exemplifies the city’s commitment to sustainability by the reuse of a post-industrial site as a place for exploration and discovery of natural systems.

Palmisano Park provides several native ecosystems, including prairie plant communities, simulated wetlands, and a large two-acre pond. These native ecosystems with bird and fish habitats have become a popular destination for thousands of Chicagoans. Tours and even overnight campouts are conducted by the city, universities, and organizations and draws the interest of sustainability activists throughout the United States. All stormwater on site, including from the massive hill—dubbed “Mount Bridgeport” by locals—is directed toward the pond and wetlands instead of the city’s sewers. The water flows through tiered educational wetlands that connect the community with nature and allows children and adults alike to walk amidst native plantings.

Exposed quarry walls, recycled materials, reclaimed limestone boulders, concrete outcropping, and remnants of abandoned infrastructure are as much a part of the park experience as the natural systems the site supports. With unusual terrain for the Chicago area, the central mound reaches a height of almost forty feet where visitors can view an impressive view of the Chicago skyline among native grasses and flora. This combination of experiences—natural, industrial, urban, residential—anchors the surrounding community to this new destination park, providing a local identity of urban sustainability.

Project Title: Buffalo Bayou Promenade
Location: Houston, Texas 
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Built
Project Year: 2010
Firm: SWA Group
Firm Website: www.swagroup.com
Project Team Members: SWA Group, Landscape Architect.
Lead Designer: Kevin Shanley; Project Team: Tim Peterson, Scott McCready, Lance Lowrey, Rhett Rentrop,  John Brandt.
Ann Olson, President, Buffalo Bayou Partnership.
Joe Turner, Director, City of Houston Parks and Recreation Department.

Project Description:  Since Arthur Comey did his city plan for Houston in 1912, people have talked about making the city’s bayous into linear parks. It was not until the 1970s and 80s that the pieces began to fall into place. But serious gaps remained. The 1.2 mile long Buffalo Bayou Promenade was a critical missing link, tying the pastoral Buffalo Bayou Park to the west with the theater district and Houston’s downtown to the east. The Buffalo Bayou Partnership hired SWA Group to provide an early conceptual master plan transitioning urban bayou treatments to the pastoral bayou east and west of downtown which had been encircled by freeways and arterials. More recently, SWA was commissioned to complete the design of the west connection, addressing the unique physical constraints and challenges of the site while celebrating its urban and natural context in the heart of the city.

Traditionally, development had turned its back to this portion of the bayou. Towering freeway structures criss-cross the corridor, blocking out sunlight and spilling concentrated sheets of water off their sides during rain storms. Debris, trash, and silt travel along the waters of the bayou and are constantly deposited on the banks. Pedestrians who venture into this segment are more than thirty feet below the grade of surrounding streets, out of view, and with few access and egress points. Severe erosion occurred on excessively steep banks, while overgrown and invasive plantings created unsafe walking conditions for pedestrians. Recognizing these challenges, the design team employed a number of site specific solutions to make a successful pedestrian environment.

Extensive re-grading of the site enabled the team to lay back slopes, thereby helping to improve views into the park while also reducing the impact of erosion and improving flood water conveyance. The design used exposed concrete, recycled crushed concrete, and galvanized steel for their durability, cost effectiveness, and contextual relevance. The planting design re-established a living green tissue into an otherwise sterile environment leading into to the urban core. Groves of re-introduced native trees soften the harsh urban infrastructure, buffer noise, and mitigate the scale of the freeways.

Because Buffalo Bayou is the principal drainage system for much of Houston, the design team had to treat the waterway and its banks with special care. Gabion edge treatments offer visual clarity and therefore safety while utilizing over 14,000 tons of recycled crushed concrete. The stepped design accommodates changes in water levels while filtering floating storm debris. The open gabion cages also allow tree roots and riparian ground covers to form a natural edge while providing a porous foundation for the riparian benthic community.

The success of the park is measured, in large part, by its ability to function as a safe pedestrian environment at night. The landscape architects conceived of three orders of lighting to illuminate the park: a primary trail lighting system, a system of lights to wash through “dark nooks and crannies,” and an art-driven lighting component.

The 1.2 mile stretch of the Sabine-to-Bagby Promenade passes many of Houston’s historic and present day landmarks. Integrated within the wayfinding system, interpretive signage highlights the history of the waterway and the city of Houston. The design simultaneously celebrates historical infrastructure like the concrete foundations of Houston’s first civic center while educating pedestrians about flood-resistant native plants.

Photography Credits:  Tom Fox, Bill Tatham, SWA Group.

Additional Project Credits:
Architectural Lighting: HerveŽ Descottes; Stephen Korns, Artist
Public Art Sculpture: John Runnels, Artist
Geotechnical: Fugro South, Inc.
Civil Engineering: United Engineers, Inc.
Structural Engineering: Ken Tan and Associates
Electrical Engineering: Ferguson Consulting, Inc.
Planting Design: Mary L. Goldsby Associates – Landscape Architect
Irrigation Design: Ellis Glueck and Associates
Contractor: Boyer, Inc.

Project Title: LAX Airport Cultural Planning Study
Location: Los Angeles Airport, California
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Built
Project Year: 2010
Firm: Osborn Architects
Website: www.osborn320.com  |  www.facebook.com/osborn.architects
Project Team: Michael Pinto, Principal-in-Charge; Kate Harvey, Project Manager; Janica Ley, Designer; Chelsea Cordero, Intern

Project Description: The airport is both autonomous and hyper-connected. Separated from the city it serves, the airport also provides connections to an array of destinations, near and far. Yet its remote and generic qualities result in an indistinct character lacking both temporal and geographic contexts. The LAX Cultural Planning Study proposes a counterpoint to this turbidity by introducing tangible connections, with renewed cultural engagement and a traveler’s lens for discovering art. It incorporates art and culture into the airport, while simultaneously situating the airport within the larger landscape of the city.

In 2010, Osborn was commissioned to embark on a cultural planning study for the LAX Art Program, a collaboration of the Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) and the Los Angeles Department of Cultural Affairs (DCA). The proposal for the LAWA Art Program acts as a strategic plan, implementable over time, on a terminal-by-terminal basis. The plan was conceived as a series of layers superimposed on the existing airport facilities to create a network for art and cultural engagement.

The four layers, attractors, knots, strings, and art space typologies, each support the strategic plan. The attractors act as cultural living rooms, carving out places from the conventional terminal space for new programming. These places offer divergent experiences separate from the airport’s extensive waiting areas. The strings act as connective tissue. Taking the form of graphics or mobile exhibitions, they provide a cohesive narrative of art and culture. The knots are fixed and distributed nodes, in the form of maps, mobile applications, or interactive screens. These punctuate the travelers’ flow and provide a guide for navigating LAX’s cultural amenities. Art space typologies exploit the existing airport spaces to accommodate any of the aforementioned layers or simply provide a wall to hang art.

The superimposition of the layers reinforces a new grain for navigating LAX and perceiving the city beyond its walls. LAX holds rising cultural potency and offers a new urban network of cultural tourism.

Find out more:
Osborn Architects: www.osborn320.com
Culture LA: http://www.culturela.org/
Los Angeles World Airports http://www.lawa.org/

Image captions:
1-2: Art-Space-Typology. A matrix of art space typologies categorizes the spaces that the airport offers for the installation of art.  Various precedents from airports, streetscapes, to convention centers were investigated to evaluate the typologies’ attributes.    

3: Attractor.The attractors were conceived as a series of dense, thematic airport programs that function as content-driven lounge areas. 

4: Layers. Each layer exploits its own media but material, graphic, and interactive consistency lends a cohesiveness to the overall system.

5: Site Axonometric. The DCA-LAWA cultural master plan conceives of four new layers to be deployed throughout the airport’s 8 domestic terminals.  These lay the groundwork for the DCA/LAWA art program to have a more pervasive and significant presence in defining LAX. Opportunities for art were evaluated as a percentage for each level, of each terminal.   

6: Site Plan.

7: Terminal 1 Axonometric. Terminal 1 was used a as case study for early implementation.  Existing surfaces, skylights, and gardens were all appropriated to support the master plan’s layers.  Opportunities for new attractors and knots were identified.  

8:Terminal 1, Case Study, Level 01 – Arrivals.  

9: Terminal 1, Case Study, Level 02 – Departures & Ticketing.  

10: Terminal 1, Case Study, Level 03 – Concourse.  

Project Title: Cleveland Flats Connections Plan
Location (City, State, Country): Cleveland, OH, United States
Project Year: In development (2009).
Firm: CMG Landscape Architecture
Firm Website: www.cmgsite.com
Project Team Members: Willett Moss, Scott Cataffa, Calder Gillin

Project Description: Building Cleveland by Design (BCbD), a joint program of ParkWorks and Cleveland Public Art, has retained CMG to lead a design process for key connections in Cleveland’s historic Flats neighborhood. The scope of work calls for planning and schematic design for connections that will both bring greater unity to the central city neighborhood and link it more strongly to surrounding areas. Cleveland’s Flats is rich in historic and environmental value. CMG has emphasized ecological design through the planning and design process as a fundamental way to treat and re-frame the area’s rich but complex conditions with sensitivity.

CMG has worked with BCbD in a nimble and responsive manner, often providing material, designs and exhibits to enable community visioning and stakeholder communication on an as needed basis.  Simultaneously CMG has developed an open space framework plan to inform future public and private development of the historic Flats.  Various project sites are addressed in detail within the flats framework plan.  These discrete sites include: an 8 acre linear park with integral storm water treatment and habitat creation program; a remnant landscape that is nominated as a National Archeological Site that CMG has framed as an urban wild, again with an overlay of storm water treatment and habitat creation; a temporary one acre landscape installation to occupy an old parking lot.  The Connections planning and design is to knit together private and public investments in the district, helping ensure that residents and visitors can move easily between new neighborhoods and parks on both the East and West banks of the Cuyahoga River. By solidifying connections, the Flats can become a complete, walk-able neighborhood, attracting people, energy and investment back to the center of Cleveland.

Project Title: Re-Cultivating the Forest City
Location: Lower Cuyahoga River Valley, Cleveland, Ohio, US.
Built, Unbuilt or Under Construction: Unbuilt
Firm: PORT Architecture + Urbanism
Firm Website: www.portarchitects.com
Project Team Members: Christopher Marcinkoski, Andrew Moddrell, Kyle Reynolds, Richie Gelles, Bradford Goetz, Maren Allen and Jeff Mikolajewski

Project Description: At its economic and political height during the mid-20th century, the city of Cleveland proper had a population of nearly 1 million people. The city was building and investing in infrastructural and civic projects for a projected growth that would double the city’s population before the turn of the century. Instead, the industrial economy quickly evaporated and the population declined by more than half its 1950s high (est. 430,000 in 2009), leaving a vast swath of post-industrial land at the geographic center of the city.

This vacant territory is directly tied to Cleveland’s two most significant natural features – its Lake (Erie) and its River (Cuyahoga). The well-known environmental degradation of these two water bodies was the direct result of the now lost industrial vitality of the City and Region. And while both of these water bodies are notorious for significant environmental issues in their recent history, both have stabilized and by most accounts have significantly improved from an ecological and environmental perspective. However, in an ironic twist of fate, the improvement in the ecological health of the Lake and River has occurred just as the City’s economic and social health has commensurately deteriorated. Our project proposes to correct this relationship, by advancing the City’s economy through the active enhancement of its ecology and its urban infrastructure by modifying and managing the lower Cuyahoga River Valley.

The industrial valley’s position at the center of the municipal territory, rather than at its periphery, is a distinguishing characteristic that allows any transformation of the area to have a direct reciprocal impact on the core of the city. Additionally, what makes this territory fertile ground for intervention is that just south of the burnt-out landscape of the lower valley lays the equally spectacular, lush, green canopy of the Cuyahoga Valley National Park which is home to the deep forests, rolling hills, and open farmlands that comprise the upland areas of the Cuyahoga River, as well as other landscapes of cultural and historic significance such as the Ohio-Erie Canal.

Re-Cultivating the Forest City looks to reclaim and re-imagine the entirety of the 8,200-acre lower Cuyahoga River Valley, from the terminus of the National Park at the territory’s southern edge, north to the river’s mouth near downtown Cleveland at the shores of Lake Erie. Our approach utilizes a strategy of productive re-colonization, combining economic, ecological and social initiatives to transform the lower Cuyahoga River Valley into a new River Landscape Infrastructure that enhances and expands the ecological value of the river corridor, while simultaneously serving to reorient the economy and urban form of the City of Cleveland.