This was my project in provocation. Powell Street is the most central and longest street in Emeryville. It is the only street that connects this bayside community to the water. Yet, the street functions as a nasty traffic sewer. It's virtually impossible to use the street as a bicyclist and pedestrian and the city overall has no parks (yet) and few families are willing to live there. I designed a huge elevated bicycle and pedestrian parkway for the city of Emeryville and made a convincing argument that it would solve all their problems. It was the last project I presented in my design studio and instead of doing what everyone else did, I wanted to add some bananas to the mix. I was hoping to get a harsh critique. I wanted to the reviewers to debate whether, as planners and designers we are really doing our job when we just build over conflicts in the urban fabric (often creating new probles int he process) instead of mitigating them in other ways. Even my design board, which is cut up into three pieces above, was an affront to what is "supposed to be done." Instead of the standard sizes, mine was one giant, 11 foot-long board.
I was aiming to be shot down in a storm of criticism and the project was not a success: people really liked it and it was considered an extreme but successful design. Frustrating.
This was my project in provocation. Powell Street is the most central and longest street in Emeryville. It is the only street that connects this bayside community to the water. Yet, the street functions as a nasty traffic sewer. It's virtually impossible to use the street as a bicyclist and pedestrian and the city overall has no parks (yet) and few families are willing to live there. I designed a huge elevated bicycle and pedestrian parkway for the city of Emeryville and made a convincing argument that it would solve all their problems. It was the last project I presented in my design studio and instead of doing what everyone else did, I wanted to add some bananas to the mix. I was hoping to get a harsh critique. I wanted to the reviewers to debate whether, as planners and designers we are really doing our job when we just build over conflicts in the urban fabric (often creating new probles int he process) instead of mitigating them in other ways. Even my design board, which is cut up into three pieces above, was an affront to what is "supposed to be done." Instead of the standard sizes, mine was one giant, 11 foot-long board. I was aiming to be shot down in a storm of criticism and the project was not a success: people really liked it and it was considered an extreme but successful design. Frustrating.
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