WEEK 7: Urban Public Space Study

This week in class, we watched a 00:58:00.00 minute video about a study conducted focusing on the public space of New York's Seagram Plaza. The study mainly looked at interactions, design, and use of the Seagram Plaza.

This article, http://greatergreaterwashington.org/post/3025/dcs-odd-shaped-public-spaces-neednt-be-awkward-or-neglected/, talks about the design and urban planning of Washington D.C. The article explains how L'enfant designed Washington D.C. and with diagonals and triangles. L'enfant basically designed the whole city, with urban/public spaces included. However this was in the colonial era; today the cities original design does not mesh with the traffic pattern and how the city has evolved. According to the article, the D.C.'s traffic pattern creates dead spaces, mainly because of the triangular intersections that L'enfant designed. Now, the city of D.C. claims that these triangular "dead spaces" are "public spaces" that can be used as "parks." According to the article this is clearly not the case because they weren't originally designed as public space and can't even be used for public space because of the surrounding city and traffic. The article calls for a restructuring of the urban/public space in the city.

This is L'enfants plan. You can clearly see how there are many triangular areas and how this pattern does not mesh with modern traffic patterns