Re-Imagining Penn Station

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/29/arts/design/thinking-big-four-visions-of-a-new-penn-station.html?ref=nyregion&_r=0

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Hello Everyone:

Events in Taksim Square have really picked speed.  The media is a blaze with reports of Turkish security forces have entered the square in full riot gear, armed with tear gas with full intention of clearing the square.  All this over saving Istanbul's one remaining green space?  Wow, preservation gone wild.  Saving the park has become a forum for airing grievances against the Tayyip Erdogran government.  I've heard of people chaining themselves to buildings and trees but a full-scale riot?  Wow.  Anyway, speaking of buildings and spaces sparking visceral reactions, Pennsylvania Station, Penn Station, in New York City is the topic of our post today.  Specifically, four architectural re-imaginings of the famed train station.

The original Penn Station was a vast Beaux-Arts style building designed by the firm McKim, Mead, and White, erected in 1910, and encompassed two whole city blocks.  The demolition of the original Penn Station was announced on July 25, 1961 in the New York Times in order to make room for Madison Square Gardens.  The sports arena currently sits on top of the venerable train station.  By the time of the announcement, the station had become a dilapidated shell of its former self, due to poor maintenance and alterations.  Despite a vigorous campaign to stop demolition, the process began on October 28, 1963.  As a side note, if any of you watched the first season of "Mad Men," there was an episode that made reference to this event.  Penn Station played an important part in shaping New York City's preservation history and its loss was keenly felt by all those involved in the campaign to save it.  Though the history of New York City's preservation activities began long before the demolition of the station.  Although New Yorkers were not aware of the significance of the loss, the demolition served as a cause celebre, spurring further action, the creation of the New York Landmarks Commission, and legislation.  (http://www.nypap.org/content/pennsylvania-station)  The current problem is the size of the station.  The number of people who move through the station has triples since the sixties.  Thus, it was time to re-imagine the station for the new millennium

The Municipal Arts Society (http://www.mas.org) has asked four design firms to re-imagine the ideal Penn Station and Madison Square Garde.  The firms: Diller Scorfidio & Renfro; SHoP Architects; Skidmore, Owings & Merrill, and H3 Hardy Collaboration Architects were introduced on Wednesday June 5, 2013 at the TimesCenter and tasked with the job of creating a station that meets the needs of New Yorkers and the region.  All the new plans are expected to include high-speed rail.  The Madison Square Garden Company, which owns the land, has asked the New York City Planning Commission to renew its permit for the site in perpetuity.  The commission voted in mid-May to renew it for fifteen years only.  The MAS has asked these firms to envision what the new station should look like.  Look being the operative word.  The emphasis of the four new proposals is on aesthetics rather than functionality.  Yes something can be both beautiful and functional.  The question is should aesthetics be the basis for solving a problem that involves engineering, transit, zoning, economic development?

The H3 Hardy Collaboration Architects effort moves the entire complex to the West Side waterfront at 34th Street, creating an elevated bicycle and pedestrian promenade and converts Pier 76 into a new 16-acre park.  Sounds lovely doesn't it.  According to Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan, this proposal lays out the problem in terms of actual transit users, which is a good thing. (http://www.gizmodo.com/four-glamorous-new-penn-station-design-that-we-should-510662698) According to founding partner Hugh Hardy, "It's an opportunity to do more than just fix things."  The H3 Collaboration contribution includes an eight-track high-speed rail expansion to the south accommodating the increased capacity, integrating the community around it, retail complex, and a two-acre roof garden.  This sounds fine but how does this integrate the surrounding community?

Diller Scofidio & Renfro offer a more formalist proposal described as a "city within a city."  This plan moves Madison Square Garden across Eighth Avenue next to the James A. Farley Post Office building; Penn Station becomes a multi-level public spaces with amenities such as a spa and a theater.  Now a trip to the spa after a long commute or hard day at the office sounds like a great idea and would certainly put me in a better mood.  According to firm principle Elizabeth Diller, the goal is to turn waiting into a positive thing, enticing users to come early and spend more time.  A spa might do it but really, the whole point of a train station or airport is to get where you're going as quickly as possible.  I seriously doubt that someone would want to spend time in a train station for no real purpose.

Skidmore, Owings & Merrill offer up the most ambitious looking proposal for the project.  When I say ambitious, I mean it resembles a giant futuristic amphitheater.  The proposal calls for moving Madison Square Garden off site and expands the station to four city blocks from the current two.  A central transparent Ticketing Hall is the center point of the sites with a dedicated vehicular drop-off and radial pedestrian connections to the city.  Vehicular drop-off point?  Surely, SOM was referring to taxis not automobiles, no one drives in New York City or Manhattan.  Roger Duffy, a design partner with the firm stated, "We saw Madison Square Garden as a sideshow."  The main purpose of the site is for public and transportation.  While the design will exhaust its potential air rights, it will preserve the full four block ground-plane for public use.  The ideal local for Madison Square Garden would be adjacent to a transit hub, not on top of it.

Finally, the SHoP Architects design expands the existing site with a lightweight concrete structure that makes a historical reference to the old Penn Station.  The firm imagines an expanded main hall as a bright, airy, easily navigable space that creates a center as a new destination, Gotham Gateway. Gotham Gateway, hmm images of Batman come to mind.  Anyone know how New York City got the name Gotham City?  The point is to make the re-imagined station a social destination point, akin to Grand Central Station.  Interesting, because Grand Central Station has become a very mixed-use space.  In addition to its primary purpose as a train station, it's also a commercial-retail space.  In addition to significantly improved rail and security capacity improvements, it address the major needs of the existing station.  The good, the main focus is connecting the High Line to the pedestrian areas, which would improve access.  The bad, the tower-in-the-park typology hasn't worked out too well in New York so far.  Public plazas in midtown tend to end up as ghost towns.

What all these proposals have in common is making Penn Station a destination spot.  A pretty place for people to come and spend time.  This concept is something that's common in cities in Asia and Europe where there is not real city center akin to Times Square.  The train stations take the place of public plazas.  However, would this work in New York City or for that matter in any American City where there is a defined center.  Los Angeles is trying create a center in Downtown but it remains to be seen.  Grand Central Station's retail-commercial space is more geared toward the passenger who's on his/her way to somewhere else.  The restaurants and shops are more geared towards quick and efficient service.  Some one needs to stop and pick up a bottle of wine for dinner on the way home.  That kind of in and out.  While a spa in a train station is a good idea, Diller Scofodio & Renfro should perhaps take note of the spa in airports that offer limited services catering to travelers that just want to freshen up on the way to or from someplace.  No one really wants to spend time in an airport or train station unless they have to.