Today has been a meaningful day which is started at the Riverside Park South. Although the weather is a little colder, we were in a great passion to experience the landscape in New York City. From the trip today, we notice that human is one of the most important elements for a successful landscape. Whatever the landscape is designed for (only for watching, having a seat, walking and etc.  ), human’s feeling should be considered always.

         The Riverside Park South which is located at the west coastline of Manhattan is our first stay today. It is a long park which is by the river. This park has several interesting elements which makes it such a lovely park. All this elements are the result of considering human’s feeling. First, there are many old historic remains in this park. This conflict seems to be strange in this modern city in someone’s regular opinion. However, this old pieces just are the memory of human beings. It makes this landscape to fit the culture and history field, and culture and history are just what human being is. It is a great improvement. Second, we have noticed the path way is another important element for this project. The path way of the Riverside Park south is not only a narrow path for walking. Along the way, we have found some small spaces which are attached. At these small rest space, people will able to have a lunch or chat. It make this park more closed to human. We even find a little art park in it. Landscape and the activity of human are mixed in this river park, making this park greater than ever.

         Teardrop Park is the most impressive one today. Although it is a small park among the residence, but it is so useful and fit the environment well. In this park, the designer use elevation changing to separate the space and make the park more interesting and private. The people who live beside love to go there is most point. Second is the material it had chosen. It seems be rough, however the “rough” makes the park to be one part of the environment and close to the human at the same time. We really have a happy time there, playing the slide, chatting on the wooden stairs and watching the child playing in the sand poor. All these are fresh evidence for this park which consider human’s feeling so much.

         Last, we found that we can see the skyscrapers from all the parks exactly. In our opinion, this is an evidence that the parks are all belong to the city, and the city is the “bowl” for humans. Considering human always will be a good method to create a “real” city landscape. 

I found today’s technique of the day very entertaining.  A visual time line tells a story not only about how the user experiences the space, but also about the size and scope of the site and how much time it takes to navigate through it.  With the assignment in my mind all day, I chose variations of two different time intervals for the sites.  When we started out the day at Riverside Park, I took a picture every 45 seconds along the first 15 minutes.  When I got to the Esplanade, I switched to every minute and a half.  Throughout the rest of the day I managed either 45 or 90 second shots.  I especially tried to pick places with landform to navigate, or tunnels to traverse.  The Esplanade made a great transect because of the World Trade Center Tower as a constant point of reference.

My impressions of Riverside Park were mixed, I enjoyed the grassy landform to the east that buffered noise from the city, but the nodes in this park were fragmented and unrelated to each other.  However, tangible connection between the park and the water is always powerful, and most of the sites we saw today achieved that goal.

I chose to transect the ferry ride because it was one of the few times we were going faster than a walk.  Although it took time to board, get settled and finally set sail, the actual trip was not long at all.

One site I found odd but utterly quaint and charming was the Irish Hunger Memorial.  It was a powerful blend of urban structure and rolling European landscape, one part architecture and one part a rolling green roof.    The toppled gravestones rolled down the hill send a chilling, almost overlooked gesture of these forgotten people.  It is not coincidence that the only discernable remains of the house are the hearth and fireplace in the still standing rock wall.  I broke this transect up into segments of mini-transects, some shots taken more often than others.  It still tells the story quite well.

Chelsea Cove was my favorite spot of the day, as you can see!  Although I took over 75 shots walking around the wonderful landforms, retaining walls, piers and attractions, this carefully contoured great lawn is the perfect place to enjoy the waterfront, and I felt a transect of this “action” was just as relevant.  The earthen berm behind me blocked the sounds from the street, the open expanse in front gave a breathtaking view of the water and the activities on the lower lawn, and the trees gave a shady break from the sun.  The slope of the landform at my back was just right for reclining in the grass.

The most difficult site of the day was Peter Walker’s 911 Memorial, as I am sure it is for so many.  I was saddened to see so much construction and chain link interfering with what the designer intended, but on an even more personal note, I think it is a very disturbing gesture of water.  Unlike the Paley Park waterfall that acts as pleasing white noise to filter out the sounds of the city, this waterfall is eerily similar in action to the actual collapse of the building.  The cascading outer walls look much like the crumbling walls of the towers as they fell in on themselves.  If you look closely at the water exiting down the center hole, you see the occasional surge or gulp if you will that bursts away from the cascade and jumps to the depths below, much as the people did that horrible day.  It was hard to be there and think about and remember every awful moment of that day.  I believe Peter Walker is a genius but I question if there may have been a softer way to memorialize 911, just an observation.

It has been a productive day to explore the landscape projects in Manhattan today, even compared to what I had gained yesterday. While yesterday what I had was the perceive and analysis on the colors essence on landscape, I realized landscape has its inborn capability of spacial connection and transaction narrative during the walking on Day 2.

Teardrop Park would be very good evidence to vividly prove this point. Initially high rises around it had been the restrain in its design process. “ Zoned for an additional four residential units, it was a flat site dominated by sandy soil with limited sunlight. Re-zoing following the plan to create playing fields, opened up an opportunity for a new park for children and adults alike, but creating a design that would inspire a sense of exploration and hold visitors…” quote from the description from Michael Van Valkenburge Associates. The vision was to recall the memory of childhood and through the ice-water wall, along with rock formations really achieved the concept well. Even more, it has the communication of varying sceneries with changing view-points, through the transaction image collage I and II, which contains two meaning, space conversion and landscape transformation. With multiple facilities and installations, the perception of the concept has been enhanced. Walking to different levels of accessible observatory in between woods breaks the vertical boundary, while playing with the slides results in the consideration of morphology on the conversion of space other than vertical and horizontal level.

Moreover, Teardrop Garden has not been alone in this morphology application. Irish Hunger Memorial illustrates the same concept, to continue the conversation with ambient environment by establishing the particular pedestrian path and view point. In the aesthetic analysis and research in western academic, Acropolis of Athens probably stated as the first project to apply this concept, by enforcing people walking along the Athens, which forms the shared spacial perception and literally strengths the feeling step by step.

Then about 9/11 Memorial at World Trade Center, it can be seen as the reverse model of Kaaba with water feature dropping to the Ground Zero. On the account of icon recognition, it shares the same function and construction to memorize and recall. People comes here as a volunteering activity to cherish the history and look into the future. This large volumetric figure presents as the negative of what it was and meticulously convey the sympathy to ones come here.


It has been said in the beginning, today was a really a productive day on the scale of distance, acknowledge and others. Now we have drawn the boundary of Manhattan Island, and I really intrigue about the following trip to Brooklyn and elsewhere. 

    Today is the second day in our trip in NYC. It is nice weather same as yesterday. After the experience of the first day, I am well prepared to walk already when I left for subway in the morning.
    

Today we began with a little cold weather of the spring morning in Manhattan. We met at 72nd street and then went forwards to the Riverside Park South which is a kind of spot park in the west coastline of Manhattan. There are several interesting landscape elements in this park which includes many industrial historic remains like old train and pier structures. In the background of modern city and natural environment, the view in the park seems like really conflict and contradict that attract me a lot.

Then we walked along the coastline and got to the Chelsea Cove Waterside Park which located between 22nd and 25th Street beside Hudson River. I have been there twice and what impressed me most is the beautiful lawn beside the river. In the meadow there is always some children and people playing and relaxing under sunlight. In addition, other than the plants and lawn, the unique thing of the park is that it’s not a simple plan in a same level. The lawn and plants are designed on a kind of earth slope and hill surface which is pragmatic and effective to resist the deluge from Hudson River and protect the bridge and buildings along the river.

In the afternoon, the Governor Island was really a wonderful landscape project for us to have a special view to the NYC. Actually it’s a ongoing project on the island which is not completed. So when we got in it we had to take on a helmet and yellow shirt that was first time to be looked like a engineer. The plan of the whole island seems like a ice cream and the concept of the landscape planning tried to continue that shape. The old buildings and beautiful meadows form different districts on the island. Before the visitors coming to the island, hundreds seabird have been occupied the baseball fields and lawn. Through these scenes we could get fantastic views to the Status of Liberty, NJ and Lower Manhattan that is unique from this island. I have to say I really expect to go there again after the whole project completed in the future.

Then, the last spot of Tuesday is the 911 Memorial at World Trade Center in One Liberty Plaza  that I have been really looking for. I knew the one of the designer is Peter Walker who is my favorite landscape designer in United States. For 13 years ago, a serious disaster in human history happened in lower Manhattan. Thousands of people lost their lives and a lot of them scarifies themselves to save others’ lives. It’s a huge lost for human being, because a lot of them were elite of us. When I stood beside the huge hole on the ground and stared on the names on the edge, it seems like all of them were flowing into the middle hole with the falling water. A sorrowful feeling emerged in my heard which was really sad for me. Even though the project was not complete, I can figure out it’s a excellent landscape design and I ‘ll go back when it finished.

A common theme that was seen in many of the parks yesterday was water, either in the form of a designed feature or the park was situated next to a body of water. Today, however, the main focus was the waterfront parks of Manhattan. The city is surrounded by water on three sides, so it is no surprise that this element plays such an integral role in many of the parks. 

From what we have seen so far, it seems that a decent amount of the waterfront space has been developed for public use. In contrast to the East River Esplanade that we visited yesterday, the parks on the west side that we visited today were connected by the water, but quite fragmented in their designs. Although some concepts may have been carried on, it was apparent when you reached the boundary between different sections or parks. A good example of this was at Riverside Park South. The concept of the smaller scale overlooks mimicking the shape and orientation of the old piers was repeated along the length of the park system, but each section designed by a different person created a series of separate spaces. Each area provided a new experience, whether it was the circulation patterns, seating options, or art pieces. Also, as we walked along the shoreline, through Chelsea Piers down to Battery Park, there was almost a continuous line of parks, but each one was unique.

In the transect that I studied for today, I tried to emphasize the interaction with the water. Chelsea Piers was one of the sites that we visited today. In order to get there, we got off a bus and had to walk down a few blocks westward to the shore. As we walked along this road, we experienced many different conditions: walking under a dense tree canopy, being surrounded on both sides by tall buildings, crossing a few streets, passing underneath the High Line, and finally crossing into the park. The photo transect shown illustrates the journey to the water starting at the entrance to the park. These photos, taken roughly 30 steps apart, follow the path from the park entrance down to the end of Pier 64 (from the last image moving up to the first). The pier was quite a long, linear path, with the water on one side and terrain on the other. It is not until you reach the end of the pier that you are visually surrounded by water on almost all sides. I thought it was interesting how the topography designed by Van Valkenburgh influenced this journey through the park and down the pier to the water. All of the parks that we visited today had a slightly different approach to the interaction with the water.

Pamella Selby.

In general, the sites we visited on today’s trip were made up of many different pieces and parts. The Esplanade and Chelsea Piers Park were odd composites of different styles, and in particular, both Teardrop Park and Governors Island were defined by different zones. The many different parts within each site fit together with varying amounts of success, and I was particularly struck by the experience of walking through the Irish Hunger Memorial in Battery Park City. Starting at the main entrance, the lines on the walls and the text lead you in and make an interesting contrast with the stone of the walls ahead of you. As you enter, you move from light to dark to light again, the dark serving to wipe the visual slate clean and transition you from the city into the memorial. From there, the path winds back and forth up the slope, imitating perhaps a natural landscape, but also serving to keep the eye moving within the site as opposed to outward. When you reach the top, the experience is made all the more interesting by the contrast between the memorial and the city around it. Walking up, you can see almost nothing rising above the slope because the waterfront is undeveloped there, but when you reach the top and turn around the experience is quite different, and you see both the site and its larger context. There were certain aspects about the memorial that I did not like, the fact that it was a tad too neat to be truly immersive and truly believable for one, but I was struck by the whole journey that you take through the memorial and how each part along the way was integrated well with the whole.

above: photo transect of journey aboard bus, then walking toward and inside of chelsea market.

we began the day walking along riverside park on the upper west side: a linear biking / running / walking path with wider areas for fields, and some pier elements that reference the industrial past of that area that has all but disappeared. saw some excellent examples of how not to do public art. we kept seeing these ghosts of piers, otherwise known as pile fields, throughout the morning as our excursions hugged the water, and one remnant gantry [industrial structure that lifted boats out of the water and tipped their contents out- i want to see one in action! will see many more of these tomorrow] wanting to see more industry- tomorrow's visits should be fun!

took the bus [photo transect no.1] to chelsea cove-
chelsea cove was beautifully designed, with a wide variety of ornamental plantings and nice use of topography to create subtle definition between outdoor rooms. the exercise class filled with lululemon-clad women tells all about the culture of that part of town.

from chelsea cove, walked to chelsea market [ see photo transect no.2 and 3] for a long relaxing lunch.
after lunch, we walked along riverside park some more, witnessing material changes and different treatments of points of access, etc., and a lot of joggers and bikers.

then, teardrop park. a gem- a compact park, packed with wonder. the entire thing references the catskills, and topography is varied, with rock paths leading up and down small and large hills, a big slide on one side of the biggest hill, integrated corten steel staircases, and the massive rock 'ice wall' that references a fault line and serves to roughly divide the site between playful, hilly area and the tipped lawn area.

then, the irish hunger memorial. there are a lot of important things that it does not say.

from there, we wandered down to battery park on the waterfront. some fragmentation between styles does occur, but overall a nice area and well-enjoyed by people. my favorite spot had lots of boulders for seating, a well-planted slope to separate waterfront from street, lots of trees, and open space. battery park has nicely integrated seat / retaining walls, a nice example of a smaller waterfront park.

then, we all boarded the ferry for a special tour of governor's island with dave zelniki of west 8, with the help of lexi from the trust for governor's island. toured the historic former military area, then through the lygatt building and into the newly redesigned park! paths weave in 'petal' forms among the many trees- they planted more than could ever grow to full size, as competition among young plants allows those that will survive to climatize, along with reducing costs of planting. i imagine the proposed 'hammock grove' in its mature form will be highly popular. then we reached the hills at the southern tip of the ice cream cone -shaped island, that will rise 20 to 80 feet above the rest of the island, creating a new, dramatic, naturalistic skyline to contrast the dramatic skyline of the site's amazing views of manhattan, ellis island, the statue of liberty, brooklyn, and new jersey. there are tons of fascinating details about this project, but overall it was so exciting to see the project underway, and i look forward to watching it develop!
realized as we got off the ferry that many of us had been sunburned during the day. oops.

we then made our way to the 9/11 memorial, designed by peter walker and partners. security was very tight. after being processed at many checkpoints, one is herded through the narrow, construction-zone walkways that are lined with light blue material. my whole body started to go cold- maybe it was just the sunburn, but it was like feeling many parts of myself go still. there are not often chances for introspection and reflection in the crowded, busy city. the monument is incredibly powerful, and the fountains much deeper than i had imagined, like an endless hole. the element of water is so peaceful and fluid, and its noise softens the feeling of trying to make sense of loss and absence. the group dispersed from there.

Of all the means of diagramming and studying space, the section is one of the most effective and yet underutilized methods. Creating a transect is an extremely powerful tool in that it contributes to the viewer a specific visual sequence, but with added qualities of depth and detail that a section does not contain.

                While keeping in mind that the method of study would be a transect, Vince and I decided that a study concerning topography and play would be interesting and relevant to the spaces we viewed today. Shown in the photos are one transect at the Chelsea Pier Skate Park, and one down the slide at Teardrop Park. Instead of using pictures to attain a video-like quality as in a typical transect, Vince and I used video to create the transect by taking still frames out of the video at 2 second intervals. This method of work allowed us to achieve a certain amount of flow in the footage that would not be achieved through photo taking.

                Today our group visited several interesting sites, including Riverside Park, the Irish Potato Famine Memorial, Teardrop Park, Chelsea Piers, the Esplanade, Governors Island, and the 9-11 Memorial. While these sites varied in scale, style, and language spoken to the user, the common thread of these spaces was the presence of water and proximity to the coast line. Aside from water and the coastal location, I would argue that the presence of emotion was particularly heavy in several of the parks visited today.

                The Chelsea Piers site, for example, clearly exemplified a balance between formality and whimsy (particularly present in the garden forms and rocks’ program of sitting versus climbing), as compared to Governors Island, which illustrates full blown daydream in the newly built sections that contain oversized cartoonish sculptures of a coat hanger, telephone, and star. On the other hand, the Irish potato Famine Memorial and the 9-11 Memorial each dealt the hardened reality of catastrophe and its brunt on humanity to the viewer. The 9-11 Memorial differentiates itself from the Irish Potato Famine project however, in that the latter strikes the visitor with a sense of awe, as compared to the former, which grants the user a sense of comfort amid sadness in its pastoral elements.