Share Now that I found my notes, I can make some hopefully intelligent comments about Philip Bess’s interesting, although two-hour long, lecture on Wednesday. And since it’s already late, I’ll make this an introduction to a series of short posts about his lecture and ideas. But first, I must mention that it was too bad [...]
Tag Archives: Downtown
A better Barr Street, or a barren one?
Share (Jon) We at The Good City are all for downtown development, but I wonder if the improvements happening on Barr Street will have anything more than a cosmetic effect. Above is the artist’s rendition of what the area will look like. The Journal Gazette said this: Over the next three months, the city will [...]
Why the public hates publicly funded art
Share (Jon) If public art has the power like no other to “brand” a city — think of the Eiffel Tower and the Gateway Arch — then why is the public so often against the expenditure? Dan on Cyburbia thinks it may be the style of art that’s been typically commissioned in the last half [...]
Pedestrians and one-way streets
Share (Jon) A recent letter to the editor in The News-Sentinel: Traffic much better Traffic flows much better now with Wayne and Berry being one-way streets than it will if changed to two-way traffic. It’s true, a lack of foresight in closing off the important north-south through street of Harrison was a mistake, but don’t [...]
Downtown design guidelines: Never implemented?
Share (Jon) While looking for information to bolster my previous post about the new downtown Subway restaurant, I came across the Fort Wayne Downtown Design Guidelines (PDF). At the bottom of the cover, it says, “Proposed Effective Date: Jan. 5, 2004.” But it doesn’t seem it was ever implemented. Can anyone point me to a [...]
Walkable urbanism
Share (Jon) Can walkability save a downtown? Christopher Leinberger in his new book, “The Option of Urbanism,” makes just such a case. This column by author Neil Peirce begins with a little suburban history lesson: (A)fter World War II, with Americans’ rush to thousands of new suburban locations, a never-before-seen norm appeared. Leinberger calls it [...]
Indy’s new downtown library
Share The Indianapolis Central Library opened today in downtown Indy, and The Indy Star gave its front page to a review by architecture critic Lawrence W. Cheek. He finds the library astonishingly well done, despite budget overruns and delays. But I thought his discussion of the purpose of the library’s glass atrium may be applicable [...]
Packed houses
Share Congratulations to Castle Gallery and The History Center for hosting wildly successful downtown/West Central events over the weekend. Castle Gallery was packed Friday night for its Holiday Show and Artist Reception. The house was packed with well-wishers from door to roof. The building must be seen to be believed. If you go, be sure [...]
Allowing a city to look like a city
Share Most zoning codes in America no longer allow you to build what you’d call a traditional urban cityscape — mixed-use buildings, constructed up to the sidewalk, with retail below and apartments above. For the most part, such zoning was written right after World War II, when America was high on automobiles, highways and suburbs. [...]
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