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MAY 2006 - Artemio Paz, AIA
Chapter activities over the past six weeks have had Board members active in the community as well as at the national level. In keeping with a primary goal of the Board, the chapter has continued its outreach to improve and give value to members and our community in their perception and experience of design and architecture. Chapter efforts were focused on the Springfield Charrette, held on April 7th and 8th, and the AIA150 Initiative proposal submitted on April 1st to AIA national for the 150th anniversary celebration in 2007.
On the local level, the Springfield's Downtown Planning Charrette was a grand success. Fifty-four participants showed up for the Friday tours and the description of the three downtown district 'neighborhoods'. Forty-eight showed up for the 'design studio' discussions and graphic exploration on Saturday. Saturday's Charrette session went on from 8:30am to 4:30pm. The energy level and the resulting plans and display were quite impressive. The text and graphics will certainly help to define the City's future downtown.
Thoughtful questions and resulting group discussions were infectious and sustained an active review of urban design issues throughout the 2-day event.
The Charrette participants represented a broad cross-section of stakeholders invested economically and emotionally in the improvement of the historic Springfield Downtown. The participants were led through the two day Charrette process by Mark Metzger, Springfield City Planner, representing city interest and coordinator for project information and Artemio Paz as the moderator and representative of the AIASWO's interest in urban change discussions leading to safe, sustainable, and more livable environments in our metropolitan communities. Others that participated in the Charrette were a host of Springfield City staff (Planning staff, Police Chief, Director of economic development, Councilor Anne Bellew, Dave Puent the City's Building Official), community advocates, business people, small developers, UO urban design studio accompanied by Mark Gillem (California Architect/professor in the School of Architecture), landscape architects, two high school students and a dozen or more architects on each day. Thanks to the University studio and Mark Gillem, the Charrette's broad base collaboration led to discussions that were opened and engaging with illustrative graphics and text narrative.
Our concerns for maximizing insightful discussions of relevant urban issues, while maintaining personal interest for the participants, structured the Springfield charrette into three distinct sub-districts of the downtown. Then, the charrette teams were given a matrix of common urban issues and asked for resulting goals for short term (1-4 years) and long term (5 -8 years) urban policies and recommendations for guiding planning and design of future downtown urban growth. The planning areas are adjacent and co-mingled but were also discrete geographical areas in the overall experience of what it was to be in 'downtown' Springfield: first, the Booth Kelly/Mill pond, second, the Main Street - Cultural Center and the third was the Justice Center area to Island Park. After being provided with general background information and the 3-guided focus for the self-elected planning groups. I was the Charrette moderator with information related to the process, general scope of work, and a list of common urban issues applicable to all three planning areas. Each planning group presented their findings in the morning, once before lunch, and a second time at 3:45 in their final summary statements ending at 4:30. Summary comments used text and narratives statements, overlaid maps and diagrams, street sections, building and street elevations and some courageous design team members explored perspective and scaled physical models. Many exciting visuals were produced.
The final charrette wrap-up will have the City and myself reviewing plans and corresponding group planning narratives for an eventual hardcopy report and City Hall display. The city will provide the chapter 10 copies in a final report form, with a summary of goals and support narrative and all illustrative graphic information generated for the 3 sub-district planning areas. The City Hall display will likely occur in 2-3 weeks. Thank you to all Charrette participants especially the UO students!
It was a great success by all measures. The City and our chapter collaborated over a seven-month period to make the Charrette a success.
More on the results of the charrette will be posted on the City's website, and in the near future, display of the work for the public will be in the lobby of City Hall.
On the national scene, the Board supported the submission of the Franklin Urban Corridor study as the Chapter's AIA 150 project. Three weeks before the submission was due, National issued an extensive criteria list. By my view as the chapter AIA150 Champion and some board members, AIA National had spent too much time announcing the AIA 150 event and too little time sharing their ultimate criteria list to determine funding and support of the chapter initiative proposals. Letters of support and desires to collaborate were expressed by the Cities of Eugene and Springfield, University of Oregon and Lane Transit District. Local funding requests have been initiated and will be formalized soon. Also, there will be a committee to carry the AIA 150 efforts forward through the year 2007. Contact me or Eric Gunderson and/ or the AIA SWO office to discuss how you can help the chapter AIA 150 efforts.
Finally, the board supported a letter nominating Michael Mazczuk for the
2006 Eugene Arts and Letters Award for his distinguished architectural work in Eugene. The letter was submitted to the Oregon community foundation on March 23rd.
See you at our next regular meeting, may 17th, celebrating Charlie Brown's FAIA status and his many years of contribution to the understanding of natural energy use and sustainable design.
Muchos Gracias,
Artemio Paz, AIA
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