Mysterious ways

[muckefuck]

I can see the goal now, but still not the logic.

I've long since grown accustomed to the unpredictable start-stop nature of the project going on above my head, a plaza renovation that began over a year ago and is still not completed. (Latest development: Two weeks back, a crew showed up and made my life miserable for a day and a half drilling holes in the concrete directly above my office to erect less than 20 metres of perimeter fence; the stretch they were working on is now metal on one side, temporary wood on the other, with a flimsy array of "DO NOT CROSS" banners linking the two across a two-metre gap. No indications whether they are ever coming back.) But I'm still puzzling over the accompanying landscape changes.

Last fall, the ground crews painstakingly pruned the living hell out of the patches of honeysuckle, bridalwreath, and forsythia nearby. I was alternatively disappointed by their poor showing when it came time to bloom this spring and bemused by the rank growth of weeds sprouting up in what had previously been an impenetrable thicket. Who knew that when you take away heavy shade, lambsquarter and ragweed spring up? But that was nothing compared to the clear-cutting of a couple of weeks ago.

New crews came in and ripped out every inch of the recently-thinned honeysuckle patch. What was going in its place? For days, there was no sign of anything. Now this morning I see a lot of fresh cedar mulch and five bicycle racks. Huh? You've got a plaza built to Mayan proportions and, instead of dedicating a corner or even a side of it to bicycle parking, you mow down an area of green space? To make matters worse, it's a somewhat awkward corner, only about a third of which is really usable and less than half of which is actually supporting racks.

I guess somewhat didn't want the nice clean lines of the restored plaza muddled with messy ranks of parked bikes. That might also explain why they still haven't replaced any of the numerous benches or planters that made the space a pleasant one for a morning snack or afternoon nap rather than the blasted concrete waste it is now.

Comments

[bitterlawngnome.livejournal.com]

You misunderstand. If there were benches, poor people might congregate there.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

I think the poor people are stopped at the leafy green borders. The people I used to see congregating there were students, and no one who can afford to attend this institution is "poor" by any stretch of imagination.

[zompist.livejournal.com]

That plaza never made much sense to me. Architects seem to love plazas, and always sketch them with people evenly scattered across them. Perhaps they've seen pictures of Italian plazas and think that all that's needed to create them is a humongous bare space? There's nothing to stop for in the library plaza, as I remember it-- it's only a place to walk through to get somewhere else.

[muckefuck.livejournal.com]

There is so much about this building that makes no bloody sense to me. In reagrd to the plaza, Netzsch has gone on record saying he was inspired by ancient Mesoamerican architecture. Perhaps what we need to make it lively are simply a few human sacrifices atop the South Tower.

Seriously, you're right, it is a place of transit, but it's not like these can't be inviting. Lord knows I trip across cherubs in the hallways of this place enough. Put some comfy places to sit and cozy nooks along the corridor to Norris and people will stop. Like I said, I used to take my morning breakfast break on the plaza before I submitted to the stale air of a structure erected at the height of sick building syndrome.