Similar views or not?
We couldn't help but notice some similarities in these two pictures. At far left is a view of midtown Manhattan from Greenpoint (from the nyc-architecture site). At left is the view of the proposed Atlantic Yards footprint from Flatbush and St. Marks.Do we think the Greenpoint'ers complained when they built the Citicorp Center building in 1977? Did they complain that the Citicorp Center was too large and didn't fit in the scale and context of this immigrant neighborhood? Did they even have a voice then as they were immigrants and not affluent Brooklynites like in Prospect Heights?
Sure, Greenpoint and Midtown Manhattan is separated by that thing called the East River, but it looms just as large if not larger in these pictures. Something to think about perhaps.
13 Comments:
If you're joking, I don't get it.
i'm not joking. i'm sure people will have their opinions, and you're welcome to chime in on how you 1. think i'm an idiot or 2. think i'm making a valid point.
Um, isn't there some difference between a view at a mile and a half or so, and a view from a few blocks away? Past that, if we predicated all our urban planning on, gee, there was a monstrosity built there, why not here... Well, I guess we'd have a lot of really happy developers.
Surely you've checked NoLandGrab:
http://www.nolandgrab.org/archives/2006/05/gehry_jedi_mind.html
itjbukem,
you are a stupid jerk for even thinking that this is the same situation. greenpoint is a haven for polish people . the towers are across a river which makes a huge difference. NYC is meant to be big not Greenpoint. the same goes for Brooklyn. Ratner's towers of greed will divide Brooklyn creating unhealthy conditions for generations and intolerable gridlock, and be a burden on the infrastructure.
but for the Great Depression, Atlantic Yards would have been big. The Williamsburgh Savings Bank Building was the start, then the market crashed, post war white flight, 70s urban decay, now gentrification and we're back to building the area again...
Seriously, ltjbukem, you should rethink this, it really sounds like you havn't done your research... I don't think the Yard's opposition's primary point is "This looks really bad from a mile away." Eminent domain, traffic/pedestrian congestion, cost to taxpayers ($1-2 billion), and not one building but twenty 20-50 story buildings in an area mainly made up of 3-5 story buildings. No one is saying don't build there, there are just way better ways to do it (the Extell plan was a start)
point well taken. a lot of times, what i post on this blog is not well-thought out, but more a running commentary on what i see on the web and what comes to my mind. some ppl may be a lot more careful than myself, ensuring that they cover all the bases, but i'm more here to throw out ideas and if ppl lambast me for it, then so be it. i can take it , as well as dish it out. really, no offense taken. blast away. i can take it. thanks for reading! my whole purpose here is to elicit different responses, good or bad.
i myself am on the fence about the whole thing. when i saw the greenpoint photo, it just struck me how similar it looked to the new gehry/ay pics. go figure...
Maybe a comparison to the Citicorp Building in Long Island City would be more appropriate. It really shows how 'out of place' a high density highrise is compared to surrounding lowrise buildings.
http://www.skyscrapersunset.com/skyscrapercity/nyc/040911-02/37.jpg
http://www.skyscrapersunset.com/skyscrapercity/nyc/041106/07.jpg
http://www.forgotten-ny.com/STREET%20SCENES/lic2/46av.jpg
http://www.forgotten-ny.com/STREET%20SCENES/queensblvd/33citicorp.jpg
I'm trying to imagine what a dozen such building would look like.
Would it be on the scale of Battery Park City, or larger?
if there are a dozen it will be much more in context! It looks kinda strange if there is just one, you gotta build a whole skyline to make it fit.
It'll also be more in context because there are other mid to high rise buildings in the immediate area which is not the case with the citicorp building.
visualize the tip of lower manhattan with 20 skyscrapers along atlantic ave. you get the idea. it's so out of whack with brooklyn. this whole project is driven by greed and sleeze. fuck the people who live and love brooklyn.
You've got the pictures reversed. The one at far left is the rendering of the Atlantic Yards.
ltjbukem,
If the only impact of a big development project were the view and the shapes that buildings create on the skyline, then you might have a point.
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