"For the People" - What People?

(Wow!)

Recent visits to Government offices have left me pondering the overall experience - from arrival to departure. Am I the only one to leave frustrated and unsatisfied? Perhaps even a little beleaguered? If at all confused as to the address or location of your next visit to a Government Agency, simply look for a brutal structure that resembles little more than a concrete home depot store (given Home Depot's recent and successful attempts at establishing an increased urban presence and the shopping experience of its customers this may be a poor comparison). A foreshadowing of things to come on the inside, there is little left to look forward to.

(Sidewalk Security - Hudson Street)

(Sidewalk Security - Varick Street)

(Sidewalk Security - Madison Ave)

By no means are Government Agencies the only suspects in their manslaughter of public space, they may be found guilty more often than not as evidenced by the large (empty) weathered concrete planters carelessly scattered out front. Not only do they lack any sense of their primary function as planters, they possess a wielding and flagrant dismissal of our very arrival. Once inside it is not only the lack of greeting and direction - textured vertical or horizontal planes, coloured accents and/or wayfinding cues, or personal welcome - but a sense that, yes, we are simply an entity (as evidenced by the anonymous, generally white or green, queues) called to attention by a flashing digital number. Where are we? What have we done to have deserved such an impersonal experience? To me, there is little about this experience that is any different from entering a system of incarceration (not that I would know from firsthand experience). What happened to government being "for the people"?

While there remains a great deal of weathering infrastructure with an embodied energy mass that begets immediate renovation, there are signs of hope, I think. It can be said that private industry and businesses would not last treating its customers to an experience such as that described above. As Government evolves to meet the demands of its consumers as well as its workers, they are beginning to take heed of such lessons, ultimately trying to restore accessibility to the people. Unfortunately, the existing institutions bare the cost of these changes in the form of 'security' setbacks, often involving less-than-creative solutions. Recent movements to build new agencies outside the City may create others problems, however, while solving those currently being addressed.

Creative solutions to providing public space while providing workplace security have been evidenced here and elsewhere. The spatial layout of the front entry plaza to the Phillip Burton Federal Building in San Francisco, as well as innovation in streetscape security architecture that also serves as site-relevant public art can be seen throughout Lower Manhattan - more specifically through the streets adjacent the NYSE. Such levels of thoughtfulness to the importance of the functioning of public space as a precursor to experience, as well as an inexperience in its own right, are on the rise. Nearing, or at least aspiring to the level of quality evidenced by the rest of the built environment, Government architecture and experience will, with any luck, surpass the banal thinking of the past and respond to the citizenry it serves.

(Nogos)

(Turntable)

For a City that has so enthusiastically embraced PLANYC - yes, even our block b/w Lexington and 3rd Avenue has benefited from the recent addition of 5 new 'American Linden trees - I am left feeling confused as to the empty promises offered by such Governmental establishments. Actions speak louder than words and in this case, at the very least, would result in some additional colour.