PROJECT BRIEF
Public
Plaza Network
According
to the New York City Department of Transportation, streets make up
approximately 25% of the city's land area, and yet, aside from parks, there are
few spaces to gather socially in the public space of the city. The DOT has begun a program to reclaim underutilized
public spaces to become redesigned as public spaces Communities are empowered
to nominate spaces to become these plazas, which are then outfitted by the DOT
with street furniture, planting, and paving changes. This studio will investigate the potential of
these sites to provide a physical locus for community gathering that can act as
a new type of infrastructural network in the city.
DOT
links:
SITE
Site option 1:
PearlStreet Plaza [intersection of Pearl and Water Streets]
Site option 2
Water-WhitehallPlaza [intersection of Water and Whitehall Streets]:
Map
Map
Program
Waterworks
Specifically,
the program is to be a contemporary take on a public bath house, which
could be understood alternatively a sort of urban "watering hole," as
a speculative infrastructural/social program that is a structure or structures
that will house bathing facilities, bathrooms, a public drinking water supply, and
other water features. Public bath houses have a rich and varied history
throughout urban life in many cultures, including Roman, Turkish, Japanese,
Scandinavian, and Jewish. In New York,
The Asser Levy Public Baths is a notable example of the important hygienic and
social role that baths played in the city in the first half of the 20th
century.
As part
of the infrastructural role that this program can play, sustainable aspects of
water including gray water treatment and runoff collection may be considered as
part of the program. The program can
also be understood as the design of gradient conditions of open to enclosed,
wet to dry, warm to cool, and public to private.
The
material studies from the first part of the semester will be introduced into
this project under the guidance of the studio instructors.
Arrival and circulation
Changing facilities (men/women)
Bathing facilities (steam, baths of various temperatures and sizes)
Rest area
Maintenance / supervision
Exterior/open or semi-open:
Bike parking
Water features (wading pool, fountain ...)
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