Mid-Atlantic: New York City
Bringing Downtown to Life:
Citizens' Suggestions for Sustainability
1. Introduction
By Gail Karlsson
The rebuilding of lower Manhattan has presented New York with a unique opportunity to set new visionary standards for excellence in sustainable urban design and construction and provide new images of a city center grounded in respect for life and the future of our common world. A number of people have been working to promote various aspects of sustainability in New York. By compiling examples of projects, innovative proposals, policy recommendations, and profiles of people and organizations working on activities related to sustainability in New York, we can present ideas that will help planners, developers, government officials and interested citizens understand the benefits of sustainable development practices, and also create a vehicle for sharing information and potentially catalyzing more coordinated action to promote sustainable development.
2.
A planning framework to rebuild Downtown New York
This report describes findings and recommendations of the Civic Alliance to Rebuild Downtown New York convened in October 2001 by the Regional Plan Association in partnership with over 85 civic, business, academic, community and environmental organizations.
- Executive Summary [PDF]
- Excerpt: Social, Economic and Environmental Justice [PDF]
- Excerpt: Green Buildings and Sustainable Systems [PDF]
3. High performance goals & objectives for Lower Manhattan
A report from a 2 day workshop held at the Rockefeller Brother Fund’s Pocantico Conference Center and supported by the US Department of Energy. Participants were selected because of their familiarity with sustainability, high performance buildings and/or involvement in Lower Manhattan. (The report was written by the staff of Earth Day New York.)
- Preliminary report [PDF]
4. A vision of Green Ground Zero
Green Ground Zero (GGZ), a nonprofit group, launched an international competition soliciting green development schemes for downtown New York. The competition is intended to transform lower Manhattan into a showcase for cutting-edge technologies and a working model and prototype for future green cities worldwide.
Proposals for downtown may include energy-efficient buildings, transit centers, and parks and recreational facilities. Awards will be given in five categories: energy; light and air; construction; greenery, water, and waste; and ecology. Submissions that address the areas immediately adjacent to the World Trade Center are encouraged to focus on ways to green the existing redevelopment plan, rather than creating new schemes.
- Vision statement [PDF]
5.
The 2020 Tower
A proposal for an innovative building from Kiss+Cathcart, Architects that would generate it's own energy, recycle its own waste, and smoothly integrate with nearby city life.
- Four-page brochure
[PDF; 6.5MB]
Best printed with 'Fit to Page' option, original is a poster-size design;
This large file may take over 20 minutes to download over a modem.
6. Transitioning the Tri-state Region towards sustainability
Materials prepared by the Regional Plan Association for a conference held September 24, 2003 co-sponsored with the New School’s Milano Graduate School, US EPA Region 2, and New York City Department of Environmental Protection.
- Conference report [PDF]
7. Vision 42: Creating a pedestrian-focused positive urban alternative
An important key effort toward sustainable development should be to make our cities more attractive as positive alternatives to suburban sprawl. People who live more densely, within urban settings, impose a much smaller footprint on our planet, living (with smaller families) in apartments which share energy for heating and cooling, taking shorter trips, and using/supporting mass transit much more easily. Because automobiles impose enormous handicaps on cities in terms of the space they take up (even if and when they are made less pollutant), a key to making cities more livable is putting restraints on cars and putting in place in their stead high-quality public transit and street environments.
Roxanne Warren (architect and author on urban planning and design and George Haikalis (a civil engineer and transportation planner) are pursuing their inspiring proposal, vision42, to convert Manhattan's 42nd Street into a landscaped, auto-free light rail boulevard.
They believe this would prove so popular that it would only be the beiginning of a light rail network in NYC. vision42 is also considered a pilot project, which could serve as an example across the U.S. of how delightful and environmentally benign cities can actually be, and could thereby help to counter the anti-urban prejudices that are so prevelant in our country. Reception to the proposal has been overwhlemingly positive, and currently three well-regarded consultants are under contract analyzing the economic impacts, the diversion of traffic, and the costs of the project.
