Archinect - News

Michael Kimmelman looks for signs of hope in Penn Station’s proposed renewal

2023-07-07T13:17:00-04:00

The only thing everyone seems to know for certain is that nothing meaningful ever really happens to improve North America’s busiest and most miserable train hub, despite decades of demands and promises. Hope has long gone to die on the 6:50 to Secaucus. But now may actually be different.

Kimmelman complimented the new PAU/HOK/ASTM North America P3 plan as “the disruption needed to get Albany moving", and one that “lets daylight, dignity and circulatory logic replace the rat’s maze beneath Madison Square Garden.”

“ASTM’s architecture at this early stage is a little stiff and self-serious but it clearly conveys the all-important point that a gateway worthy of New York, and of the millions of working people who rely on it, needs to offer more than high ceilings, clear signage and hot bagels. It needs to be a source of public pride," he added.

Juxtaposed to this is the more bland but Albany-backed MTA plan (with drawings from FXCollaborative) whose full details won’t be unveiled until next year. The West Side native says the scheme presents a vexing problem over the involvement of Madison Square Garden, which he predicts would lead to crippling lawsuits if the MTA's adversarial position remains unchanged.

Italian firm proposes glass-wrapped alternative to Penn Station redevelopment

2023-04-05T13:10:00-04:00

The race to author an alternative solution to the recently-halted redevelopment of Penn Station may now have a top contender after the Italian firm ASTM Group released its plans for a proposal that would radically alter New York City’s iconic Madison Square Garden.

Last week, the New York Times reported on the newly-proposed alternative, which calls for the storied sporting “Mecca” to be wrapped in an aluminum-and-steel curtain while replacing the existing station with a two-hall glass-enclosed structure at its podium. The plan is said to be less expensive than the state’s Vornado-backed original proposal, and, if approved, would be completed no later than the year 2030.

According to the Times, several officials have already voiced their support for the alternative, making it into a “frontrunner” among those in power.

Last month, Vornado called off the already-maligned redevelopment scheme, citing economic conditions as a decisive factor in their postponing of the plan that would h...

The future of London's MSG Sphere may be getting clearer despite concerns

2023-01-24T17:42:00-05:00

[The] MSG Sphere, a new concert hall planned for Stratford in east London – which would be as wide as the London Eye and as tall as Big Ben – could soon move a step closer to reality. On Tuesday evening, the planning committee of the London Legacy Development Corporation (LLDC) will meet to consider its developer’s plans for managing the advertising display and its impact.

Efforts to halt the development of the Populous-designed entertainment venue date back to late 2020, when the public consultation phase for the project was extended for a third time over concerns about light pollution. Plans were approved by the LLDC in March of last year contingent on an agreement for a five-year review of the giant billboard’s 25-year advertising consent, which was accepted at Tuesday’s meeting. The project will now go before London Mayor Sadiq Khan for final approval.

Madison Square Garden (MSG)'s revised plan reportedly calls for a “suite of mitigation measures” to combat the effects of what would be the world's largest LED display. The intense visual impact of its Las Vegas counterpart is already being seen as a hazard.

A statement from the opposition group Stop MSG Sphere can be viewed below.

We gave it our best shot (the statement we gave at the meeting tonight is below). We're deeply disappointed no one voted against the paltry 5yr review on the 25YR adver...

Oliver Wainwright on the MSG Sphere's political tangle

2021-08-03T17:06:00-04:00

He [Kahn] was enthusiastic about welcoming “another world-class venue to the capital, to confirm London’s position as a music powerhouse” when the sphere was announced in 2018; yet the following year, his planning officers’ first report concluded that it did not comply with his own London Plan. He is in a bind. Will he side with the Labour borough and listen to the locals, or back his development corporation in the hope of using this brash bauble to buff the capital’s post-Brexit brand?

The Guardian critic Oliver Wainwright explores the sordid dealings behind the gigantic $1.8 billion orb he describes as "the apogee of 360-degree advertising, the ultimate building-as-sign […] the stuff of Robert Venturi and Denise Scott Brown’s neon-soaked dreams."

The MSG Sphere fate is still very much up in the air ahead of a scheduled September planning council meeting. Residents in London's Stratford and nearby Hackney neighborhoods have lodged complaints pertaining to the light and noise pollution caused by the 4.7-acre LED-clad structure.

Future of MSG Sphere London still undecided

2020-11-23T15:46:00-05:00

It has been a long time coming but a decision on whether east London will get a slice of Las Vegas in the form of a state-of-the art entertainment venue almost as tall as St Paul’s may be nigh. [...] But the project, the brainchild of MSG’s chief executive, James Dolan [...] is proving divisive.

The Guardian reports that the public consultation period for the enormous Madison Square Garden Sphere entertainment venue — officially filed for planning application in March 2019 — had to be extended for a third time until the beginning of December due to locals' concern over light pollution and traffic impact.

Gov. Cuomo's renovation plan for NYC’S Penn Station takes shape

2020-01-09T09:00:00-05:00

Empire Station

New York State officials led by Governor Andrew Cuomo unveiled a plan this week to expand rail capacity at Penn Station in New York City by as much as 40% through the addition of a new bay of passenger rail concourses just south of the existing station.

More specifically, the so-called Empire Station Complex plan would bring four new train concourses (and eight lengths of track) to an adjacent site currently packed with existing buildings, lending the chronically under-sized Penn Station complex an opportunity to grow and absorb an anticipated jump in rail traffic set to take shape over the next few decades. The plan would take over the entirely of the block situated between 30th and 31st streets and between 7th and 8th avenues immediately south of the station, enabling capacity at the station to grow by an estimated 175,000 passengers per day when fully completed. The station currently funnels over 650,000 commuters through its low-ceilinged and circuitous passages ...

Michael Kimmelman reflects on NYC's old Penn Station: 'The gateway it deserved'

2019-04-29T14:49:00-04:00

Conceived to handle fewer than 200,000 passengers, the replacement Penn Station is today the busiest transit hub in the Western Hemisphere, through which more than 600,000 commuters pass each day — an experience as humiliating and bewildering as Grand Central remains inspiring and exalted.

NYT architecture critic Michael Kimmelman takes a look back at the triumphal arrival of the former Pennsylvania Station by McKim, Mead & White in 1910, its steady decline in the following decades, the consequential replacement with the current solution—a disappointing product of mid-century modernist pragmatism—followed by a call for a better gateway.

Aerial view of the former Pennsylvania Station shortly after it opened in 1910.

"When Penn Station became during the mid-1960s a subterranean rat’s maze, the city seemed to be heading very definitely south," Kimmelman writes. "The historic preservation movement, which rose from the vandalized station’s ashes, was born of a new pessimism."

MSG Sphere London proposal is taking shape; to feature world's 'largest and highest resolution LED screen'

2019-03-27T13:44:00-04:00

Details and designs have been revealed for the MSG Sphere London, a planned venue that would hold up to 21,500 people. [...] The Madison Square Garden Company (MSG), which is behind the New York concert and sports venue of the same name, have bought a 1.9-hectare (4.7-acre) site in Stratford, adjacent to the Olympic Park and Westfield shopping centre, that was used as a coach park during the 2012 London Olympics.

Image: Madison Square Garden Company

Initially rumored in January 2018, London's sphere-shaped music venue proposal, designed by Populous, has substantially taken shape, and the Madison Square Garden Company (MSG) behind the project has reportedly now filed planning documents. The plans have been received favorably by London mayor Sadiq Khan.

Image: Madison Square Garden Company

"According to the planning document, the sphere will be covered in LED panels that can display high-definition concert footage or advertising images – the designs suggest that the imagery will be clearly visible 150 metres away," reports The Guardian.

The project's website even touts the display wall as "the largest and highest resolution LED screen in the world."

Image: Madison Square Garden Company

Critics of the proposal have launched a petition against it, citing light pollution, increased traffic, failure to build housing at the site instead, and also the close connection of MSG executive chair, James Dola...

Going from bad to worse: Penn Station's massive tunnel system is aging rapidly

2018-01-11T17:35:00-05:00

I’d been assigned to write a story about Pennsylvania Station, but I wanted to get a caboose-eye view of the decaying tunnels leading up to it, because the only imaginable way the station could be any worse is if it were underwater. Penn, the Western Hemisphere’s busiest train station, serves 430,000 travelers every weekday—more than LaGuardia, JFK, and Newark airports combined.

"As the gateway to America’s largest city," Devin Leonard writes in his piece for Bloomberg Businessweek, "Penn Station should inspire awe, as train stations do in London, Paris, Tokyo, and other competently managed metropolises. Instead, it embodies a particular kind of American failure—the inability to maintain roads, rails, ports, and other necessary conduits."

An ambitious plan to overhaul Penn Station, by moving Madison Square Garden

2016-09-30T13:21:00-04:00

Penn Station is much more than a transportation center. As the heart of the Northeast Corridor rail system, it has the potential to link downtown to downtown along the Eastern Seaboard in a way far more economical, expedient and environmentally sustainable than air travel. But while the governor’s recently announced plan is a step toward this goal, more must be done. What we propose in addition is a completely new commuter station on the site of Madison Square Garden

The proposed plan for Penn Station's redesign comes by way of Vishaan Chakrabarti, founder of the Practice for Architecture and Urbanism. Previously, Chakrabarti was the director of Manhattan's Department of City Planning under former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, where he also oversaw prior refurbishment plans for the station.

Previously, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo had released a plan to bring Penn Station up to speed (it was designed for a third of its current 650,000 daily commuters). But while the Governor's plan, headed by SOM, is focused mostly on utility, Chakrabarti's plan (as he writes for The Times) aims to provide the city with a grand public space—by physically relocating Madison Square Garden (an idea that has been floated before) to honor the original station's legacy where travelers "entered the city like a god".

Related on Archinect:

Governor Cuomo Announces New Penn Station Private-Public Partnership RFP

2016-01-06T17:34:00-05:00

Governor Cuomo unveiled the sixth signature proposal of his 2016 agenda: transform Penn Station and the historic James A. Farley Post Office into a world-class transportation hub. The project, known as the Empire Station Complex.... is anticipated to cost $3 billion – will be expedited by a public-private partnership in order to break ground this year and complete substantial construction within the next three years.

Governor Andrew Cuomo announced another piece of his proposal to revitalize New York's transportation infrastructure at Madison Square Garden this afternoon. Looking towards a private-public enterprise to develop the site, the proposal is budgeted at $3 billion and take three years to build.

While the details are unclear, the proposal calls for utilizing the Farley Post Office site in concert with the current Penn Station and Madison Square Garden site. The two blocks will be connected below 8th Avenue via a subterranean connection. Expanding north, the plan will shut down 33rd street adjacent to Penn Station/MSG and create a pedestrian focused entry along 33rd as well as 7th and 8th Avenues.

An ode to the old Penn Station, where travelers "entered the city like a god"

2015-01-06T13:40:00-05:00

“Penn Station did not make you feel comfortable; it made you feel important.” [...] Unlike McKim’s monument, today’s Penn Station — where many visitors, both domestic and international, encounter New York City for the first time — certainly does not make you feel important. Comparing the vanished terminal with this tawdry replacement, the Yale architectural historian Vincent Scully once wrote, “One entered the city like a god; one scuttles in now like a rat.”

Previously

Editor's Picks #391

2014-10-30T23:30:00-04:00

In Screen/Print #26: an interview with Jessica Walsh, currently half of design firm Sagmeister & Walsh , was excerpted, from the 2nd issue of Intern Magazine (devoted to "intern culture" in the creative industries).

Darkman was confused "Strange choice to interview the most hated designer in the world for Intern magazine...She almost brags about not paying interns...Reads like PR I've already read". Similarly Mr_Wiggin wrote "seems, to me, diametric to the message Intern Magazine should be publishing".

Malaysia-born Melbourne-based sculptor Daniel Dorall spoke with Archinect for the latest installment of Working out of the Box. He finished up his Bachelor of Architecture at the University of Melbourne in 2005, as he explains that now

"In a nutshell, I make miniature objects out of cardboard – it usually takes the form of the maze...creating walk through maze-installations". midlander felt the work was "Fantastic! Witty and meticulous".

News
Anthony Morey attended Acadia Conference of 20...

Law breakers, prize winners, bird flippers: Weekly News Round-Up for October 20, 2014

2014-10-27T17:53:00-04:00

Friday, October 24:

Architecture in Flux: Reporting from ACADIA Conference, Day 1: The Association for Computer-Aided Design in Architecture has changed a lot since its inception in the early 1980s; the conference takes a look at the present moment of "digital design" practice, while that term still exists.

Thursday, October 23:

Frank Gehry gives the crowd a piece of his mind (and his middle finger): At a press conference in Oviedo, Spain, in response to a reporter's insinuation that his architecture was "showy". Frank Gehry is 85 years old.
Keep Portland Architecture Weird!: Episode 3 of Archinect Sessions out now: Feat. special guest Brian Libby, we discuss the trials and tribulations of Michael Graves' Portland Building, and The Guardian's speculations on Obama's presidential library.
Denver's Union Station is lacking diversity and local critic places the blame on the architecture: The Denver Post's fine arts critic sees a lack of diversity at Union Station's multi-use redesign, and...

Urban Planners Propose Moving Madison Square Garden to Nearby Post Office

2014-10-23T12:22:00-04:00

If there’s one thing that all New Yorkers can agree on it’s that Penn Station is pretty awful. And if we’re ever going to get a new home for NJ Transit, Amtrak, and the LIRR, Madison Square Garden will have to move (just don’t tell any die-hard Rangers fans that).

The Alliance for a New Penn Station is proposing in a new report that the world-famous venue Madison Square Garden be relocated to the nearby Morgan Post Office and Annex, which occupies the block bound by 9th and 10th avenues and 28th and 30th streets. They say the mail sorting facility site is large enough to accommodate a new state-of-the-art arena and it's just a quick walk to Penn Station.

Penn Station was designed for 200,000 passengers a day and now sees 600,000, making a redesign necessary.

NYC Council votes to limit Madison Square Garden's permit to just 10 more years

2013-07-26T19:57:00-04:00

Yesterday, led by Speaker Christine Quinn, the New York City Council voted to limit Madison Square Garden’s permit to operate on top of Penn Station to just 10 more years. Building a new Penn Station and the next Madison Square Garden will not only improve the lives of the hundreds of thousands of people who use the station every day – it will revitalize the surrounding area and bring tremendous long-term economic value to the region.

Andrew Rice shines a spotlight on Michael Kimmelman's war on Madison Square Garden

2013-06-10T15:43:00-04:00

It might seem like a mismatch: the Dolans, veterans of many public brawls, against Kimmelman, an urbane trained pianist who previously wrote primarily about art. But such is the power of the Times when it’s given to a crusading voice.

Thinking Big - Four Visions of a New Penn Station

2013-05-29T15:00:00-04:00

The Municipal Art Society asked four design firms to draw big: Reimagine the ideal Pennsylvania Station and Madison Square Garden. The proposals — by Diller Scofidio & Renfro, SHoP Architects, Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and H3 Hardy Collaboration Architecture — will be introduced on Wednesday at the TimesCenter. All plans expect the new station to include high-speed rail.

SHoP ARCHITECTS Expands the existing site with a lightweight concrete structure that is meant to evoke the old Penn Station and seeks to make the station a social meeting spot. “When’s the last time you heard someone say, ‘Let’s meet for a drink at Penn Station?'” asked Vishaan Chakrabarti, a principal. “People say that about Grand Central all the time.”

SKIDMORE, OWINGS & MERRILL Moves Madison Square Garden off site and expands the station to four city blocks from two. Above ground: green space four times the size of Bryant Park; housing twice the size of Tudor City; more offices than Rockefeller Center; and more cultural spaces than Lincoln Center. “We saw Madison Square Garden as a sideshow,” said Roger Duffy, a design partner. “The primary purpose of the site is for the public and transportation.”

DILLER SCOFIDIO & RENFRO Moves Madison Square Garden across Eighth Avenue next to the James A. Farley Post Office building; Penn Station becomes a multilevel publi...

To Resurrect Penn Station, NYC Urges MSG to Move

2013-05-07T12:29:00-04:00

"While Madison Square Garden maintains that the arena special permit should continue in perpetuity, we believe the term is warranted due to the uniqueness of the site and the importance of Penn Station to the city," said Amanda Burden, the head of City Planning Department who also chairs the City Planning Commission.

The New York City Planning Commission has laid out a case for restricting a special permit to 15 years that allows Madison Square Garden to operate in the heart of Midtown. The move would hopefully restart negotiations to get "the world's most famous arena" to relocate, freeing up space to rebuild Penn Station and undo half a century of dismal train travel into New York. Jane Jacobs would be proud.

Previously:

New York's Penn Station Makeover Faces Arena-Sized Obstacle

2013-04-10T13:06:00-04:00

Every day, more than 600,000 thousand rail commuters navigate the crowded maze of tunnels and tracks that is Penn Station. Mass transit advocates would like to replace the aging station with a world-class transportation hub. But there's a big obstacle: Madison Square Garden, the arena that sits directly on top of Penn Station. And the Garden's owners show no signs of moving.

Previously: Municipal Art Society Challenges Architects for New Penn Station Vision

A Proposal for Penn Station and Madison Square Garden

2012-02-08T13:55:00-05:00

Some 600,000 commuters, riding Amtrak, Long Island Rail Road and New Jersey Transit, now suffer Penn Station every day. That makes it probably the busiest transit hub in the Western world, busier than Heathrow Airport in London, busier than Newark, La Guardia and Kennedy airports combined. To pass through Grand Central Terminal, one of New York’s exalted public spaces, is an ennobling experience, a gift. To commute via the bowels of Penn Station, just a few blocks away, is a humiliation.