The Forum draws connections between Omnibus content and current events at the intersection of design and the built environment of New York, plus other stuff worth knowing about: news, opinions, feature follow-ups, and reports from the field.
THE TAXI OF TOMORROW
The “Taxi of Tomorrow”, the Nissan NV200, the first taxi specifically designed and engineered for driving in New York City, has been unveiled. While the new cab will feature some major safety innovations, including airbags for passengers and lighter sliding doors, they are neither ADA compliant nor are they hybrids. These are two big criticisms. Nonetheless, the new features emerge…
With the news that the pair of exhibitions celebrating and speculating on the Manhattan street grid has been extended until July 15th comes the announcement of a new series of live programs at the exhibitions’ venue, the Museum of the …
March was Women’s History Month: 31 days honoring women’s contributions, historic and contemporary, to society. As could be expected, the month was observed in part with a spate of dialogues, panel discussions, and symposia assessing gender equality and female achievement …
HOLLY WHYTE WAY
Since the 1980s, Midtowners in the know have avoided crowds and expedited trips between 57th and 51st Streets thanks to a string of privately-owned public spaces (POPS) partway between 6th and 7th Avenues. Now, the Department of …
How do we measure and communicate the value of urban agriculture? That was the underlying question throughout “Gardener on the Roof: Examining Urban Farming” last Saturday at Union Docs in Williamsburg. The panel presentation and discussion, moderated by Nicola Twilley of Edible Geography, brought together individuals with varied backgrounds (two farmers, two city planners, and an artist)…
BMW GUGGENHEIM LAB TRIP TO WITHDRAW FROM PLANNED BERLIN SITE
If the BMW Guggenheim Lab is an experimental exploration of the multiple meanings and possibilities of public space worldwide, one of the experiment’s perceived follow-on effects has come to eclipse all others: gentrification. The experiment’s control factor is a temporary venue designed by Atelier…
HIGH LINE PHASE THREE
Renderings of the initial designs for the third and final section of the High Line were released this week. The new leg of the park will include children’s play space (including “peel-up” see-saws and a climbing …
On the morning of February 23rd, Studio-X opened its doors to a full house of practicing and academic urban designers for a symposium entitled Megacities and Meta-Cities: Sustainable Models for Growing and Shrinking Territories | Global Urban Design Studies and …
Currently on display at the Museum of Modern Art is an exhibition entitled Foreclosed: Rehousing the American Dream that explores “new architectural possibilities for cities and suburbs in the aftermath of the recent foreclosure crisis.” Like Rising Currents before it (which proposed environmentally…
