BURLINGTON, Vt. (AP) - Found: A dozen or so neglected corners of Burlington in need of loving attention.
Students in David Raphael’s design class at University of Vermont unveiled their suggestions for how to make Burlington’s so-called “lost spaces” more appealing.
During a final presentation of maps and models earlier this month, a panel of peers and professionals agreed that the city’s overlooked, under-used patches could be adopted, rehabilitated - and made more fun.
Motorists might easily overlook the absence of civic life at places like the worn green space at the Main Street entrance to Edmunds Elementary School, Raphael said.
Pedestrians, too, seem to have grown accustomed to that flawed landmark, and to the trampled, grass-less triangle at Front Street and North Avenue, across from the police station.
The young planners proposed fixes for those sites as well as inert sections of Pomeroy, Schmanka and Baird parks.
They tweaked the celebrated but joyless grid of locust trees beside the downtown Cathedral of Immaculate Conception, next to the new bus terminal on St. Paul Streets.
Raphael termed those challenged acres as “lands that are left over - overlooked, abandoned and without purpose or place.”
The class assignment: “Envision a use, a purpose, a design that will make the site a part of the townscape, neighborhood or locale.”
Edmunds Elementary proved a tough nut for the students to crack. Car traffic loops around the spare green space, compounding the safety risk posed by Main Street.
Kylie Hanley proposed a protected bike lane - an upgrade that might raise the ire of drivers, her critics warned, because it would reduce parking spots.
Hanley noted down the criticism and continued.
A more artful entrance, she said, might inspire motorists as well as walkers to slow down: colorful, painted crosswalks; benches backed with materials to resemble the spines of books; fence posts shaped like giant colored pencils.
Another student, Jake O’Connell, suggested slowing down stormwater with paving stones that allow rain to soak into soil, rather than further downstream.
That upgrade might not directly benefit kids, O’Connell said, but the added filtration “would reduce pollution that’s gnarling our lake.”
Noise pollution from Main Street’s traffic inspired a design by Gabrielle Rancoud-Guilon.
Her model featured a thick cedar hedge and a circular outdoor-classroom area where students might even be able to enjoy birdsong, for a change.
Andrew Kenney looked further afield, to Baird Park in Burlington’s South End.
The half-hidden quarter-acre behind that park’s basketball court, Kenney said, is typically littered with windblown trash.
“It’s dark, it feels crowded and dense,” he added, “It’s ominous.”
But, Kenney continued, there is ample opportunity to showcase a ledge of exposed rock, to plant a wider variety of native plant species that might attract birds, pollinators - and people.
“Just inviting people to step into the woods would be huge,” he said.
His classmate, Ali Wilder, took on a much more problematic stretch of turf: the historically polluted acres between the Burlington rail yard and the federally managed toxic waste site at the Barge Canal.
Her proposal included a pedestrian bridge across the rail tracks, native plantings, access to the water and climbing structures that would hearken to the waterfront’s industrial heritage.
The challenge of rescuing that stretch of Queen City shoreline has long been described as monumental, noted Jon Adams-Kollitz, a program coordinator who had been invited, along with other city planners, to critique student presentations.
Fresh thinking on that lost space, and others, is a welcome breath of fresh air, Adams-Kollitz added: “Young minds like these are going to solve this puzzle.”
Online: https://bit.ly/2xQh6HU
___
Information from: The Burlington Free Press, http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com
Please read our comment policy before commenting.