Rose Kennedy Greenway

So would post-post-Modern urbanism be another example of reinventing the wheel? Pre-Modernism and the present are very different times with different urban needs. Scholars could still satisfy their egos by being cutting-edge in terms of a radical departure from Modernism and City Beautiful, because neither are really the best solution for contemporary cities.

I guess it probably won't happen with the current generation. With any luck, I'll get to be the one to change some of this. Don't worry, guys, I got your back. Just give it 10 to 15 years.
 
The problem with "academia" here isn't that it's too theory-obsessed. It's that its focus has been dramatically altered. The academy isn't producing Hausmanns anymore. It's producing architects who think of themselves as artists (over-ambitious) and urban planners who think of themselves as tinkering bureaucrats (under-ambitious): Koolhaas/Tschumi/Hadid on the one hand, the BRA on the other. There needs to be some unity of these disciplines if there's ever going to be hope of "reinventing cities" in a way that isn't either preposterous or underwhelming.
 
This has nothing to do with academics, it's strictly a financial issue. If the YMCA had the money to build on that parcel, they'd build.
 
Right, because that ugly YMCA half-covering the highway ramps that make even more laughable the abortion of a "park" that is the Greenway would really make a difference here.

This thing has way more fundamental problems.
 
The only way to save the Greenway is to auction off the parcels to private developers. Let the developers build whatever they can afford with private funds and fund those parcels yearly.
Solutions
#1 Rid the taxpayers of the yearly maintenance burden
#2 Rid the taxpayers of the corrupt Greenway Conservancy salaries
#3 Rid the taxpayers from the Politicians greed trying to get something out of a public funded park.
The only way to save the Greenway is private enterprise.

This will be the end solution about year from now.
 
I'd like to walk the Greenway with Shen and ask him why he thinks it works in its present state. Second question: If it works, where are the people?

Embarrassing.
 
nm88: I think you should do it. No kidding, I would call up Shen, and tell him to put his money where his mouth is. Either he can prove to you (us?) that the Greenway works, or he should stop his gospel of lies. It might not be a bad idea to get in touch with the CommonBoston people to try and arrange it.
 
Anyone ever wonder what might happen if some folks from our little group asked for a meeting with Shen? What's the worst he's gonna say? No? Get fucked?
 
nm88 said:
I'd like to walk the Greenway with Shen and ask him why he thinks it works in its present state. Second question: If it works, where are the people?

Embarrassing.
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Shen is either incompetent to reality or a complete fraud and will say anything to save his own ass.
The Greenway is a BUST for the amount of money we have spent on it.

I actually like the Greenhouse Idea for one of the Parcels. I'm still wondering how the hell the city or state will be funding the Greenway yearly?
 
The BRA is full of careerist politicians and political activists. Whatever planning or architecture credentials these people have tend to be secondary to their real focus in life.

I'm sure any attempts to correspond or any actual meetings with most of the BRA's staff would be fraught with different forms of evasion or outright hostility. Remember the open hearings with Jay Rourke about SCL?

When people are playing politics to get promoted elsewhere, are unwilling, unable, or incompetent at their jobs, they always get upset when someone whom is actually interested and competent to do the job starts pointing out faults. I'm sure what few people at the BRA actually care about their work and the good of the city, work quietly as possible and walk on eggshells around the hacks.
 
Lurker said:
The BRA is full of careerist politicians and political activists. Whatever planning or architecture credentials these people have tend to be secondary to their real focus in life.

I'm sure any attempts to correspond or any actual meetings with most of the BRA's staff would be fraught with different forms of evasion or outright hostility. Remember the open hearings with Jay Rourke about SCL?

When people are playing politics to get promoted elsewhere, are unwilling, unable, or incompetent at their jobs, they always get upset when someone whom is actually interested and competent to do the job starts pointing out faults. I'm sure what few people at the BRA actually care about their work and the good of the city, work quietly as possible and walk on eggshells around the hacks.
Click to expand...

The BRA should actually be called Menino's breeding ground of the inept.

?Now that people can walk and experience the Greenway, I?m not sure that putting buildings there is necessarily the best thing to do,?? said Kairos Shen, chief planner for the Boston Redevelopment Authority. ?We have to ask what is the impact of having structures in these critical locations.??

Let's a keep the Aquarium & Congress St Garage's. They look great on the Greenway.

This guy is a true fool. Shen should just keep his mouth shut.
 
NO!!! This Cairomans is LOGIKAL. you EXPERIENCE grenway best by the walking and seeing the NOTHING THERE!!! at least THAT is wshat iam thinkin
 
This little poem by our former Poet Laureate could be about our sad, benighted Greenway:

Keeping Things Whole

by Mark Strand

In a field
I am the absence
of field.
This is
always the case.
Wherever I am
I am what is missing.

When I walk
I part the air
and always
the air moves in
to fill the spaces
where my body?s been.

We all have reasons
for moving.
I move
to keep things whole.​
 
Anytime. Strand's talents were humbling whenever I'd encounter his work in grad school. Reading his poems makes me wonder why I quit writing, and explains in bold relief why quitting was the only answer to my creative inadequacies.

In any case, I'm glad someone gets the connection...
 
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Beton Brut said:
Anytime. Strand's talents were humbling whenever I'd encounter his work in grad school. Reading his poems makes me wonder why I quit writing, and explains in bold relief why quitting was the only answer to my creative inadequacies.

In any case, I'm glad someone gets the connection...
Click to expand...

I'm with Ablarc. Very moving, very appropriate to the RKG experience. Thanks for posting, now I'll need to look up more of his work.
 
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