Archinect - News

Studio Gang, SCAPE complete work on transformative $61 million Tom Lee Park in Memphis

2023-11-06T15:35:00-05:00

Studio Gang and SCAPE have shared new photos following the completion of work on their $61 million Tom Lee Park redevelopment project in Memphis, Tennessee.

The 31-acre riverfront space puts Memphis squarely in league with a host of contemporary restorative urban green space projects slated for other major American cities, including San Francisco's new Presidio Tunnel Tops and the partially completed Freshkills Park in Staten Island.

Its ecological restoration work and accessibility to the residents of one of the city’s most impoverished neighborhoods make it an instant industry standard-bearer. The project creates a connection between downtown and the Mississippi River, also providing new ADA-approved access at three different points for the first time.

Image © Tom Harris

Studio head Jeanne Gang says: “Insights and input from the Memphis community were essential to this project from the very beginning, to make sure the park’s programming reflects how Memphians from across the city ...

Frank Gehry & OLIN break ground on new LA River revitalization Headwaters Pavilion

2022-11-21T17:28:00-05:00

In Canoga Park, a groundbreaking ceremony held on November 7 by City and County officials marks the official start of work on a new entry pavilion to the Los Angeles River Greenway. The new pavilion will consist of two buildings, framing an entrance to the river greenway, each featuring public restrooms. The new structures will support a shade canopy displaying public art. Other components include picnic tables, bike racks, and a drinking fountain.

The pavilion is the spearhead of the new “kit of parts” LA River revitalization master plan that was adopted by the county in May and includes the $1 billion-plus Taylor Yard G2 site and a total of 22 other new projects spread along the 51-mile-long course stretching from the San Fernando Valley to its southern terminus in San Pedro.

Previously on Archinect: Frank Gehry gets back in on the LA River action with a new Headwaters Pavilion design

OLIN is a collaborator on the project, which provides restrooms and a shade structure to frame the park's entrance at Bassett Street and Alabama Avenue. Total estimated costs for the design is $5.1 million.

Frank Gehry gets back in on the LA River action with a new Headwaters Pavilion design

2022-08-08T18:04:00-04:00

A few short weeks removed from the greenlighting of its proposed Ocean Avenue project in Santa Monica, Gehry Partners has revealed a new design for a Headwaters Pavilion to the LA River Greenway located within a city-owned plot in the San Fernando Valley neighborhood of Canoga Park.

Image courtesy Gehry Partners, LLP

Urbanize LA is reporting the firm will present its proposal to the city’s Cultural Affairs Commission on Wednesday. It was designed in collaboration with OLIN and will reportedly entail a sculptural shade canopy and public restrooms which frame the park entrance from the north-facing Bassett Street and Alabama Avenue. The total estimated cost of the design is $5.1 million.

Image courtesy OLIN

Pedestrian improvements and added seating amenities are planned for the site as well, along with added water retention infrastructure. Both entities have been involved in the LA River project since its inception seven years ago. Gehry’s role in the project has been heavily-scrutiniz...

Los Angeles County releases final LA River Master Plan

2022-05-23T19:29:00-04:00

The multi-year process that will eventually engender a string of entirely reimagined waterfront plots along the LA River has entered its next phase after county officials released their final master plan last week.

The documents offer an update to the County proposal first introduced in 2016 by Supervisors Hilda Solis and Sheila Kuehl. The plan will now be submitted to the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors for review at a meeting scheduled for June 14th.

Image via The LA River Master Plan, courtesy Los Angeles County.

Said to create a “kit of parts” that potentially includes the $1 billion-plus Taylor Yard G2 site and a total of 77 others (22 of which are considered new), the master plan is said to provide a “toolkit” for community revitalization that addresses core areas of climate change, biodiversity, homelessness, and gentrification.

Previously on Archinect: L.A. River masterplan updates unveiled

The master plan incorporates the state’s Lower LA River Revitalization Plan a...

A circular floating pathway will allow visitors to walk atop Philadelphia's Schuylkill River

2021-05-24T18:35:00-04:00

A captivating, one-of-a-kind structure will allow visitors to seemingly walk atop the Schuylkill River, right along the southern shoreline of Philadelphia’s Bartram’s Garden. Set to arrive in 2022, FloatLab is a large, walkable art installation and learning lab. It is a new project from Mural Arts Philadelphia with support from the William Penn Foundation and is being designed by Boston-based firm Höweler + Yoon Architecture.

The lime green, ring-shaped pathway will change in elevation as visitors walk through it, creating points where one is walking above the water and others where one is eye level with the river. Approaches in architectural design, marine engineering, and naval architecture inform a system of eight ballast chambers below the structure’s surface, which allow FloatLab to remain consistently level and stable as the tide moves in and out.

Image: Höweler + Yoon Architecture and Brick Visual

FloatLab was designed as a means to explore the river and reconnect visitors to...

Requiem - Lahdelma & Mahlmäki’s Museum for the Defense and Siege of Leningrad

2018-01-16T23:44:00-05:00

Lahdelma & Mahalmäki Architects have unveiled Requiem, their competition proposal for the Museum for the Defense and Siege of Leningrad, St. Petersburg. The project was undertaken in partnership with Ralph Appelbaum Associates who, together, formed the only international team amongst the four final designs. The design sees an elegant spiral, buried in the landscape, reaching up from the exhibitions which are buried in a vast cavern underground. The route corkscrews out the top of the riverside, reaching outwards to give views over the new St. Petersburg.

Images credit to: Brick Visuals

The Museum for the Defense and Siege of Leningrad and its several components form a powerful spatial composition, connecting to the character and history of the city. The Thread of Life, the Memorial of Heroes of Leningrad and the Square of Testimony all sit against the backdrop of a newly created tranquil river side park.

Images credit to: Brick Visuals

The ‘Thread of Life’ refers to the museum and ex...

Studio Gang releases design for Memphis Riverfront Concept

2017-07-18T19:19:00-04:00

Shaped from survey responses from over 4,500 Memphians at multiple public events, The Memphis Riverfront Concept proposes to transform six miles and five distinct zones of the historic and culturally significant part of the city.

Many of the Concept’s proposed uses, from an iconic adventure playground to a special outlook where people can listen to live music at sunset, come directly from community members’ suggestions.

With hopes of increasing the riverfront’s use, vibrancy, and economic potential, the project seeks to foster civic pride, restore natural conditions and the native ecology, and connect various assets along the river.

The Concept focuses on showing how five zones—the Fourth Bluff, Mud Island, Tom Lee Park, MLK Park, and Greenbelt Park—can leverage their particular strengths to become distinctive places offering activities and experiences that appeal to people of all generations, incomes, races, and backgrounds.

Elevating visitors above the river in Greenbelt Park,...

MVVA-designed Dallas Trinity River Park to become America's largest urban nature park

2016-11-29T15:16:00-05:00

The Trinity River Park, which will be 10 times the size of Central Park in New York, will be made up of 7,000 acres of the Great Trinity Forest, 2,000 acres of space between the Trinity River levees and 1,000 acres of already developed space. MVVA’s design will build on municipal efforts to connect the river with the city. It envisions the space as a “beautiful and naturalistic network of trails, meadows and lakes living in harmony with the river”.

A thriving ecosystem of shorebirds calls the LA River's concrete bottom home

2016-08-31T13:26:00-04:00

“By accident, we’ve created the perfect habitat there. People don’t think about that because they think that this part of the river is ugly and concrete, but it’s a critically important habitat for these shorebirds.” [...] As the city makes its decisions about the river’s future, it is called upon to be sensitive to all life that has managed to grow around it, despite its not-so-green surroundings.

For more on the LA River's redevelopment:

A look at some cities revitalizing their blighted rivers

2016-08-24T13:52:00-04:00

Los Angeles wants to rethink its river. [...] And LA isn’t the only metropolis looking to reclaim its once-mocked waterway. Cities around the world are realizing that water can be a cultural and recreational asset, not something to hide or pillage, and it seems no waterway will be wasted for long.

Los Angeles River revitalization: prosperity for all or just a chosen few?

2016-03-14T14:50:00-04:00

“If we do it right,” Gehry said at an event in September, “we can really make the High Line look like a little pishy thing.” Given that Manhattan’s elevated park, at merely 1/35th the length of the river, has helped transform the surrounding neighborhood into a playground for the rich, residents of LA’s river-adjacent communities are right to be concerned.

The LA River development project previously in the Archinect news:

London Garden Bridge will track visitors' phone signals, submitted plan says

2015-11-11T04:00:00-05:00

Visitors to the garden bridge in London will be tracked by their mobile phone signals and supervised by staff with powers to take people’s names and addresses and confiscate and destroy banned items, including kites and musical instruments, according to a planning document. [...] Caroline Pidgeon [...] said she feared the bridge was following “a worrying trend of the privatisation of public places, where the rights of private owners trump those of ordinary people”.

Previously on Archinect:

The architect who wants New Orleans learn a lesson or two from Amsterdam

2015-09-03T14:54:00-04:00

David Waggonner is an urban and environmental architect. Since Hurricane Katrina decimated his city, he’s been focusing on urban stormwater management, mapping out designs for New Orleans that would mimic the way Dutch cities like Amsterdam and Rotterdam deal with water. In the Netherlands, people “invite water into the city,” meaning water is visible everywhere. [...] “In New Orleans, we’ve hidden and squandered the asset.”

Related on Archinect and our sister site Bustler:

Gehry to prioritize hydrology in LA River revitalization strategy

2015-08-10T19:04:00-04:00

Gehry insists that he isn't interested in the river as the site for new landmarks. He says he told the Revitalization Corp. board members who first visited his office last year that he would take on the job only if he could look at the river primarily in terms of hydrology. [...] "I told them I'm not a landscape guy. I said I would only do it on the condition that they approached it as a water-reclamation project, to deal with all the water issues first."

Following up on last week's news that Gehry had been attached to the LA River redevelopment strategy, a few more details have surfaced – no distinct plans yet, but an overall approach has emerged. Summed up by Christopher Hawthorne, the LA Times' architecture critic, the plan is: "Gehry thinks [the LA River] could be turned into an entirely different kind of machine, one that could store and even treat storm water."

In the 1930s, the riverbed was coated in concrete by the Army Corps of Engineers to manage stormwater flooding, and has since turned the river into a piece of civic infrastructure foremost, a public space second. With that traditional understanding of the river's utility, Gehry's approach "stresses how little sense it makes to prohibit the public from using the river or its banks when risk of flooding is low — which means the vast majority of the time."

At least by that note, it appears Gehry's plan for the river will not push waterfront residential development at the expe...

California drought sucks San Jose's Guadalupe river dry

2015-08-10T13:44:00-04:00

The river that runs through America's 10th-largest city has dried up, shriveling a source of civic pride that had welcomed back trout, salmon, beavers and other wildlife after years of restoration efforts. Over the past two months, large sections of the Guadalupe have become miles of cracked, arid gray riverbed. Fish and other wildlife are either missing or dead, casualties of California's relentless drought.

The Guadalupe River had undergone a massive revitalization effort in 2005, when the Army Corps of Engineers and the Santa Clara Valley Water District spent $350 million on a huge park and garden by the river, as part of a larger flood control project. Despite this very recent improvement in the riparian corridor, the drought has proved too much to keep it flowing – the district's reservoir levels are so low that water managers simply can't afford to release water from the tributaries into the river as frequently, now leading to the dry beds.

Waterways throughout the state are stressed by the drought, and any infrastructural adjustments to rivers will require a future-focused attention to drought conditions. Last week, news broke that Frank Gehry would be leading a master plan of the entire 52-mile stretch of the Los Angeles River, as well as a revitalization effort, but specific plans as related to the drought are not yet available.

With water in such limited supply, letting the Guada...

As Garden Bridge procurement process is headed for review, London group claims that 30 new parks could be funded instead

2015-06-22T13:24:00-04:00

[...] has ordered a review of the procurement process for London’s garden bridge design after the Architects’ Journal revealed apparent irregularities in the tendering process. [...] Heatherwick’s £173,000 fee was more than three times more expensive than the £49,939 offer by Wilkinson Eyre, and more than 11 times that of the £15,125 offer by Marks Barfield. [...] cost of the project could fund 30 new London parks or 30 times the amount of open space the bridge would provide.

Previously

Nijmegen's new approach to flood control — and urban design

2015-05-18T16:35:00-04:00

The people of Nijmegen aren’t taking their good luck for granted. With climate change expected to bring more intense storms like the one in 1995 (and a previous one in 1993), the city is embarking on a massive flood-control project. That may be expected in the Netherlands, a low-lying country where most homes are built behind protective dikes [...]. But even here, the approach underway in Nijmegen is unusual, and filled with ideas that river cities anywhere can learn from.

Will Los Angeles be seeing more housing development along its LA River?

2015-04-27T14:49:00-04:00

If Los Angeles aims to add more housing, it should look at the neighborhoods lining its long-maligned river to do it. [...] The city could make a big dent in Mayor Eric Garcetti's goal of adding 100,000 housing units by 2021 if it streamlines permitting and creates incentive zones in places along the river [...]. The report comes in the wake of a billion-dollar plan by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to revamp 11 miles of the L.A. River north of downtown [...].

Further legal setbacks for London Garden Bridge

2015-04-22T17:37:00-04:00

Campaigners opposed to the planned Garden Bridge over the River Thames in London have won the right to challenge a council's approval for it. The judicial review of Lambeth Council's decision to give planning permission for the £175m bridge will be heard in June. Questions were raised about bridge's funding and its impact on views across the river of St Paul's Cathedral.

Previously: Let the fighting begin: London Garden Bridge faces legal challenge

Let the fighting begin: London Garden Bridge faces legal challenge

2015-02-17T13:57:00-05:00

A legal challenge is being launched in the High Court against plans to build a garden bridge over the River Thames in central London. A south London resident claims Lambeth Council unlawfully granted planning permission for the £175m bridge. Michael Ball, from Tulse Hill in Lambeth, fears its impact will be "devastating". Lambeth Council said the bridge would potentially benefit "both the local and wider London economy".

Previously

London's Garden Bridge: not so public after all

2014-11-19T14:30:00-05:00

[...] the bridge will be closed at night, won't allow entry to cyclists or groups of 8 or more without prior booking, and will ocassionally be closed off for fundraising events. Right. So less a public bridge than a privately-managed tourist attraction, then. [...] The east of London, on the other hand, could actually use another crossing, with or without limits to access

Previously: London's Garden bridge: 'It feels like we're trying to pull off a crime'

Feds Okay $1-Billion Los Angeles River Project

2014-05-29T12:46:00-04:00

The jury is in and the Los Angeles River's future seems to be bright. After more than six months of intense lobbying by the city, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Army Corps) has announced that it will be recommending a more ambitious $1-billion plan to restore an 11-mile stretch of the Los Angeles River from downtown through Elysian Park.

Minneapolis’ Water Works Competition Shortlists West 8, SCAPE, Gustafson Guthrie Nicol

2013-06-13T18:03:00-04:00

The Minneapolis Parks Foundation has announced a shortlist of three award-winning design teams for the schematic design project Water Works: A Next Generation Park on Minneapolis’ Central Riverfront. The teams are Gustafson Guthrie Nicol with VJAA and Interboro (Seattle/Minneapolis/New York); SCAPE with Rogers Marvel (New York); and Team West 8 (Rotterdam/New York).

Warming Huts v.2013 - Five Winners Selected

2012-12-04T13:52:00-05:00

Warming Huts: An Art + Architecture Competition on Ice has unveiled the five winning projects of its 2013 edition. Like in previous winters, the selected huts will be built in early January on site and placed on the Assiniboine Credit Union River Trail in Winnipeg, Canada - the longest naturally frozen skating trail in the world.

Winner of Austin’s Waller Creek Design Competition

2012-11-30T18:39:00-05:00

The multidisciplinary design team led by Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates and Thomas Phifer & Associates was recently named winner of Design Waller Creek: A Competition. Organized by the Austin, TX-based Waller Creek Conservancy, this international design competition called for ideas to revitalize a 7-mile stretch of Waller Creek, a neglected Austin urban ecosystem, and thus turning a "currently fragmented and undervalued section of the city into a vibrant, livable, and workable district."

Yangtze River Turns Red and Turns Up a Mystery

2012-09-07T18:32:00-04:00

The red began appearing in the Yangtze, the longest and largest river in China and the third longest river in the world, yesterday near the city of Chongquing, where the Yangtze connects to the Jialin River... and officials have no idea why.

Amsterdam Iconic Pedestrian Bridge Entry by Yaohua Wang Architecture

2012-04-03T12:59:00-04:00

In our last post, we published the winning designs of the [AC-CA]-hosted Amsterdam Iconic Pedestrian Bridge competition. Here's another proposal that didn't quite make the cut with the jurors, but we are happy to publish it. The author is Yaohua Wang, who – in past articles – managed to polarize the opinions like nobody else.

Let us know what you think in the comment section below!

Winners of the Amsterdam Iconic Pedestrian Bridge Competition

2012-04-03T12:55:00-04:00

Three outstanding bridge designs have recently been selected as winners in the Amsterdam Iconic Pedestrian Bridge competition. Hosted by [AC-CA], this open international competition called for proposals that would reflect contemporary design tendencies and also take into consideration the "urban insertion and impact geared towards creating a new architectural symbol for an European capital city."

THE BLUE LINE - Winner of Kiev Islands Master Plan Competition

2012-02-21T14:16:00-05:00

A few days ago, we published BudCud's finalist entry to the Kiev Islands Master Plan Competition. Here is now also the winner of the First Prize, the concept THE BLUE LINE by Romanian team Wolf House Productions and Gabriel Pascariu.

Kiev Islands Master Plan by BudCud

2012-02-17T15:11:00-05:00

Krakow-based architects BudCud have shared with us their finalist entry for the international Kiev Islands Master Plan Competition. The proposal suggests the development of a network of existing islands and artificial mirco islands along the Dnieper river, right outside of Kiev, Ukraine, for recreation and nature exploration.