nadsat » Downtown

The High Line: the new urban park model

Zachary — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 20:36:53 +0000

I always enjoy visiting New York City. The simple act of walking around the city makes me happy. I was in town to catch a Yankees game in mid-July and I got a chance to check out a new feature to the city, The High Line. From W ikipedia:

The High Line is a 1.45-mile (2.33 km) section of the former elevated freight railroad of the West Side Line, along the lower west side of Manhattan, which has been redesigned and planted as a greenway.

I had a chance to walk on the High Line and came away very impressed. It is an old, elevated railroad line that runs along 10th avenue between Chelsea and the Meat Packing District. The line has been converted into an above street urban park/walk way. What impressed me the most was rather than escape from the city like a traditional urban park (Central Park or Goodale Park locally), the High Line celebrates and embraces its urban setting.There are still green spaces but there is also a hotel as well as an apartment/condo building integrated right into the park. A further celebration of the city, 10th Avenue Square is a sitting area where park goers can simply sit and enjoy a view of the street. The street is behind a glass wall like it was an exhibit at an aquarium.

I believe this is the future of urban parks. The park is not an escape from the city, but rather a hybrid of green space and urban architecture. It was built with a mixture of public and private funding. It offers integrated living and uses existing architecture and infrastructure. In the end the idea is really simple. On the surface it is just a walk way above ground, but a closer look reveals it is so much more.

If you’re interested in learning more, I recommend checking out the High Line page and blog.

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Busy Weekend in the C-Bus

Zachary — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 21:07:39 +0000

It has been about three weeks since I made the move from Dublin to the Short North and ~1100 sq ft to ~650 sq ft. There have been some set backs in the unpacking as some things fit and others didn’t. Some furniture choices were good and others were not so good. Overall though the move has been very positive. I’ll write more about the ongoing trials and tribulations of moving later. For now I wanted to provide a few highlights on the transition:

my commute is definitely longer, but traffic isn’t bad as I’m going against the grain
my monthly expenses have increased mostly due to parking fees but also because of my ever expanding appetite for new restaurants (I used to think I really enjoyed cooking and I still do, but I’ve since discovered I enjoy eating way more)
the noise can be bothersome especially when trying to sleep on a weekend night
Goodale Park is fantastic
Gallery Hop is so much more fun when you don’t have to worry about finding a parking spot
random things like the Zombie Walk can be enjoyed without much effort (I didn’t participate but did enjoy watching).

So is a longer commute, higher monthly expenses, and the added noise worth it? At this point my life, those are indescribably minor compared with everything else downtown living offers. I see myself being down here for some time to come especially if the rest of the summer continues like this.

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Giving Columbus a shot

Zachary — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 01:22:27 +0000

When Sandy and I first moved to Columbus last May we chose to live in Dublin due to its convience to our respective places of work, nice setting, affordable living, and general “niceness.” We toyed with the idea of living downtown. It appealed to both us but we did not think it made sense at the time.

Dublin is textbook suburbia but it was the logical choice and it was “nice.” Sometimes there is more to it than just logic though and so, against the advice of many, we’ll make the leap inside 270 this spring and truly experience life in Columbus…

It’s not that Dublin is bad. It’s actually a really nice place to live. But that’s just it, it’s nice… and that’s about it. My first taste of urban life came while in college in Atlanta and since then I’ve gravitated towards more urban style living (I even tried to do it in Augusta). The more we thought about it and the more we talked about our options for the future, the more it seemed like we should actually experience life in the heart of Columbus and not just nag about it from the sidelines.

Downtown living is not without its sacrifices. The two biggest ones will be a significant increase in my commute to work and a significant decrease in our living space unless we want to increase out budget for rent (we don’t). For us though, the benefits outweigh the negatives. Besides, why not take the risk? We’re both young, in a new city, this might be the best time in our lives to take that risk.

Downtown Columbus is a little bit of a misnomer. When I say downtown, I’m actually refering to downtown and the surrounding neighborhoods/districts. Think Urban has a great section about all the various downtown areas. Our search consisted primarily of the Shorth North, GermanVillage/Brewery District, and Downtown.

We liked all these areas with German Village offering a little more residential feeling, Downtown offering the truist urban experience, and the Shorth North being an art/cultural center with a vibrant nightlife. We looked at a lot of places over a relatively short period of time and found places in each neighborhood that we liked.

This past weekend we agreed to a place in the Short North. It is actually the smallest of all the places we’ve looked at but the location is fantastic and it met the rest of our criteria. I’ll be focusing a lot on our living situation over the next few months as we plan, move, and adjust to our new location. It will certainly be a challenge, but I think it will be a fun challenge.

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