Additional information, email: Gregory Delaney
The “Big Projects Studio” is a sponsored studio developed in partnership with Gensler and CannonDesign, working together to deepen our collective understanding of the social, economic, aesthetic, environmental, and other impacts of “big projects.” The partnership leverages collaborative relationships to create new knowledge, and offers students the opportunity to learn and gain experiences from Studio partners. The focus of the studio will be the development of a large-scale master plan for Buffalo, re-envisioning the city’s first “big project”—Frederick Law Olmsted and Calvert Vaux’s Parks and Parkways System (the first of its kind in the nation). Just as the original parks and parkways network not only offered a vision for a “city in a park” through the thoughtful design and configuration of its landscapes, but extended its reach to propose new urban developments for adjacent tracts—our collective vision for the 21st century will see urban design opportunities in post-industrial sites along the corridor, and in the “new land” generated by the (proposed) removal of the NY 198 (Scajaquada Expressway) and NY 33 (Kensington Expressway). Working comprehensively, the studio will conceptualize what it might look like to 1) reinterpret the parks and parkways system to best serve its present and future constituents, 2) reconnect urban neighborhoods negatively affected by 20th-century highway planning, large-scale disinvestment, and discriminatory urban policies, 3) create new urban centers and opportunities for economic development and enhancement, and 4) to restore strained ecologies, like that of the Scajaquada Creek corridor—all toward envisioning a more positive, healthy, sustainable, and vibrant urban future for Buffalo. The studio will engage community organizations, while also learning from the portfolio of large-scale work and design expertise of professionals from Gensler and CannonDesign. Further, partially-funded travel will offer students the chance to participate in site-based learning from real-world case studies.