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Park Slope Entrance Might Look Like This One Day
By
Zoe Schlanger
Published Dec 3, 2010
Modified Dec 3, 2010
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By
Zoe Schlanger
Published Dec 3, 2010
Modified Dec 3, 2010
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The Third St. entrance to Prospect Park could be the site of a pretty neat piece of interactive urban design in the near future. The entrance was closed to cars in 2009 and has been sorely lacking permanent vehicle barricades ever since. “All we have there now are sad, pathetic police barriers,” Gilly Youner, a trustee of the Park Slope Civic Coucil, told the Brooklyn Paper. The council held a design competition in hopes of rectifying it, and last night "The Stone Garden" was announced as the winner of the $2,000 prize!
The design takes its inspiration from "sailing stones," the creepy phenomena where stones move slowly across a desert, leaving a trail in the sand. The "lithic sculptural elements" of the piece,12 granite stones, are set on bronze roller bearings. These are positioned in bronze tracks, allowing the rocks to slide out of the way for emergency vehicles. Architects Jordan Yamada and Peter Zaharatos see that as part of the fun, too: "It is our anticipation that the stone follies will welcome the interaction of bypassers who may wish to push and reconfigure the position of the sliding stones within their prescribed tracks." Man, this is so much better than the Astor Cube.
There's just one catch: the project needs approval by city officials to actually be implemented. So far, the architects say they haven't met with them regarding the project, which the civic council hopes to fund it through private donations.
Tagged
Astor cube
Jordan Yamada
park slope
Peter Zaharatos
prospect park
Urban design
Zoe Schlanger
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