A proposal to dramatically change the Providence skyline (crime, subsidized)
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if Providence doesn't want it sent those developers to CT
that seems the way to go as Bridgeport, Hartford, New Haven and Stamford fill their high rises readily. But those are not necessarily condos or luxury condos. The market in CT. seems geared to the apt dweller, which is really is a new concept in Rhode Island in buildings taller than 5-8 stories tall. That is about to change with 169 Canal Street and the new apts on Point Street.
that seems the way to go as Bridgeport, Hartford, New Haven and Stamford fill their high rises readily. But those are not necessarily condos or luxury condos. The market in CT. seems geared to the apt dweller, which is really is a new concept in Rhode Island in buildings taller than 5-8 stories tall. That is about to change with 169 Canal Street and the new apts on Point Street.
169 Canal St (Edge College Hill) and the Point Street project (River House) are not apartments in the traditional sense. They are housing specifically catered to students. Edge College Hill is marketed to Brown and RISD students and River House to Brown Med/URI & RIC Nursing students that attend school in the neighboring buildings. These complexes will see huge resident turnover from year to year with much of it occurring all at once (semester end/begin).
The thoughts of this monstrosity going up really scares me. What are people thinking?? This building looks like a conventional building that suffered catastrophic damage after a major earth quake. Does anyone know if this design is still on the table? Maybe, in Miami, or Las Vegas? But, in Providence...? This is awful.
The thoughts of this monstrosity going up really scares me. What are people thinking?? This building looks like a conventional building that suffered catastrophic damage after a major earth quake. Does anyone know if this design is still on the table? Maybe, in Miami, or Las Vegas? But, in Providence...? This is awful.
I would respectfully disagree. As would Freidrich St. Florian, perhaps Rhode Island's premier architect. The Hope Tower design is iconic and would mark Providence, not as the architectural backwater it is, but a city ready to embrace the 21st century. Such a prospect is indeed scarry to many.
I would respectfully disagree. As would Freidrich St. Florian, perhaps Rhode Island's premier architect. The Hope Tower design is iconic and would mark Providence, not as the architectural backwater it is, but a city ready to embrace the 21st century. Such a prospect is indeed scarry to many.
And it certainly won't be the worst architectural "sin" Providence has committed over the years.
And it certainly won't be the worst architectural "sin" Providence has committed over the years.
So true. So many mediocre & worse buildings have recently been approved & built in the city with little or no significant opposition. Enter something big & bold that speaks to a 21st century city with vision & all hell breaks loose from the provincial establishment status quo. That Providence's scale & magnificent collection of historic architecture are in any way threatened by this tower's construction is nonsense. The tower's lot is set well enough away from downtown to be a solo performer, singing its own unique, if bombastic tune.
No so much a sin as parochial architectural timidity. And, to call St. Florian, designer of the National World War II Memorial "just another bauhaus copyist" is to not understand the diversity of his enormous talent.
There's a LOT of bad architecture in Providence and some horrific planning disasters. Thankfully it has a solid enough core and great historic bones in nearby neighborhoods to make up for it, but PVD has some pretty bad buildings (just like many other cities). They've also leveled some good ones.
For examples of bad architecture in Providence see:
Garrahy Judicial Complex - a massive, anti-urban brick fortress/box just 2 blocks off of Providence best pedestrian scaled street (Westminster).
The Regency Plaza which takes 4 blocks of the city center and turns it into parking lots with 3 ugly, anti-urban towers.
Then there's this monster with zero street-level/pedestrian activation which is attached to a gorgeous gem of a building.
This building (that's mercifully hidden by trees), with a nice fence all the way around it - because nothing says "Welcome" like a big iron fence. And this streetview shot is the "nice" side - the back is parking lots and loading docks.
And that's just some of the architecture - it doesn't speak to the bad planning . This is also a city that leveled part of a dense downtown core to build an elevated highway (which it then leveled half a century later and is now trying to rebuild). Moreover, it's demolished a big chunk of the downtown core to make room for parking. The result is stuff like this. Even the first Fane proposal - that horrific brick thing - was better than the above. At least that was a small footprint with ground-level retail that would have put pedestrians on the street. Lots of what's been built since the end of WWII is far, far worse. than anything Fane has proposed.
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