November 1955, Bellevue, Washington. Addressing the Bellevue Municipal League, Urban Planning Professor M.R. Wolfe:
1. Notes the emergence of a “new urban form”, the “regional city”, and
2. Stresses that one “principal challenge of our culture” is, inter alia, the “handling of this phenomenon”
March 2010, Bellevue, Washington. Via his offspring:
What do these photographs show? Today, what role does the exurb or suburb play in a “regional city”? How are we “handling this phenomenon”?
The goal of “walk, bike ride”: take people from their cars to alternative forms of transportation. But even exemplary places can give new meaning to the adage “one step forward, two steps back”.
The moral, of course, is be careful what you wish for.
Crosscut recently adapted the original February 23 post, which contrasted “sustainable stairways” in three Italian venues, with a “greened-up” escalator in a suburban mall.
For those who need remedies for the tongue-in-cheek, magnificent stairways do exist in older Seattle neighborhoods, as documented in the Seattle Stairways Walks Blog, not to mention steep, green alleys nearby.
In the Madrona neighborhood, pictured below, the network of alleys and stairways interface with the spirit of the Olmsted Brothers’ early twentieth century Plan for Seattle Parks.
The English telephone booth, or “telephone box”, has a history all its own, including national competition to arrive at a uniform design. Browse the web and you can buy one for your basement.
Or, if you can, travel the world, and see the uses of an anachronism, ranging from an expatriate icon in a former colony to a thematic gateway to a Seattle restaurant. Cell phones have denied us one urban symbol of the British Empire.
As recently touted in local press, on the evening of March 4, the reclaimed, illuminated Nord Alley in Seattle’s Pioneer Square emanated urbanism. The much anticipated Green Alleys Competition, sponsored by the International Sustainability Institute, AIA Seattle, and other groups, awarded the Grand Prize to Seattle’s Weinstein A|U LLC.
As a placemaking prototype of the sort discussed in the two part myurbanist“Placemaking Comes Home” series earlier in the week, the evening experience amplified angle, color and texture consistent with the eighth of the twelve principles repeated below.
The photos which follow show the rich possibilities of reclaimed pedestrian spaces, without the need to travel thousands of miles to find them.
Here is a one-stop summary of the 12 myurbanist principles to foster placemaking in Seattle, consistent with the current multiple public dialogues about enhancement of alleys, public spaces, street appearance and safety:
1. Emphasize an alluring focal point.
2. Use hanging green.
3. Use simple, green plantings and encourage ornamental building features in the path of view.
4. Where possible, enhance multi-level exposure to vernacular buildings amid the urban fabric.
5. Provide varied forms of encounter with surrounding commercial uses.
6. Celebrate exotic signage.
7. Provide for a multi-color, mixed use environment.
8. Together amplify angle, color and texture to highlight organic street life.
9. Enhance structural features to frame places enroute.
10. Celebrate the marketplaces of vending and dining.
11. Make angles magical.
12. Highlight iconic buildings.
