Comments on: NIMV

By: Young Urban Amateur

Young Urban Amateur — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 18:20:57 +0000

All I know is, I’m going to start refering to South U. in Ann Arbor as “an elevated plaza of light and air”.

By: g

Fri, 20 Jun 2008 17:36:52 +0000

Don’t forget “Manhattanization.” As if a tall building here or there are going to magically turn everyone in the neighborhood into investment banking a-holes.

By: Young Urban Amateur

Young Urban Amateur — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:52:14 +0000

Re: a). Point being that Hitchens totally fails to defend the architecture of the residential buildings on W. 11th and 12th to be torn down.

By: Young Urban Amateur

Young Urban Amateur — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:49:35 +0000

I’m sorry, I do need to rant about this some more. Hitchens is getting up-in-arms about the increased height on two lots…but *ignoring* the fact that the plan also calls for the *tearing-down* of several multi-story buildings to be replaced by small 3-4 story townhouses??? So, is small beautiful, or not?

a) if he’s a preservationist, he has his priorities totally screwed-up, since the architecture of the buildings to be torn down is well-worth preserving
b) if he’s anti-height, then he’s also totally screwed up, since this plan would actually create *more* unimpeded views and unblocked light
c) the plan for the O’Toole site itself is actually the least objectionable aspect, since it would create a tower that is significantly set back from the street, save only at the two points on the semi-ellipse.

Or maybe all the sick people in the Village can just to to Midtown for treatment. Or Wall Street.

But there I go ranting about someplace I don’t even live. What do I know.

By: Young Urban Amateur

Young Urban Amateur — Fri, 20 Jun 2008 15:13:01 +0000

I’m not sure I have a dog in this fight, but I felt like pointing out that while Hitchens describes the current building as “a raw box in the Brutalist style” and says that “the intersection of Greenwich and Seventh and 11th to 13th Streets has been slightly scarred by an inconsiderately ugly, if unobtrusive, division of St. Vincent’s Hospital”, the preservationist website gushes the following about the building:

“As the Landmarks Commissioners have already stated, the O’Toole Building is a striking example of modernistic architecture within the Greenwich Village Historic District and is an important landmark in its own right. In addition, in its low-rise configuration, it is an integral part of the fabric of the Historic District, providing a transition from the taller structures to the north and an elevated plaza of light and air between 12th and 13th Streets. If the O’Toole Building were demolished, these critical features would be lost to the Historic District and future generations. The Commission must do everything within its power to preserve the O’Toole Building.”

Wow! Let’s hear it for Brutalist architecture, I guess. (Actually, IMO, while the O’Toole building is indeed ugly, it is not Brutalist.)