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Ida Basic

Ida Basic

New York, NY, US

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Levittown - A Suburban Retrofitting Case

We had to take a typical American suburb, discover its weakness and try to retrofit it. In Levittown, NY we found a dying big mall with plenty of empty parking spaces in front of it. We tried to reorganize it by adding a community center, sports center, small businesses and multifamily homes instead of this old mall. The idea of connecting the streets where the big parking lots were came naturally and we reduced the main street width to make the neighborhood pedestrian friendly and more interesting for small businesses. The introduction of the streetcar which should be used to get to the 1.8 miles far train station was made in a second step. The spread of the public transportation networks is the future for the suburbs in order to get away from the cars and reduce our carbon footprint.

 
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Status: School Project
Location: Levittown, NY, US
My Role: Designer/ Urban Planner
Additional Credits: Lori Beppu