The end state of this project will be seriously constrained by its failure to “capitalize” on the spatial possibilities opened up by its strong relationship to transportation and its rare anything-possible beginning state. And although all the actors involved diligently tithe the idea of a mixed-use, green, and design-intensive neighborhood, they all claim to be powerless to achieve anything beyond the alleged market constraints and planning default. Nevertheless, the D.C. planning department—which now has unusually enlightened leadership—continues to struggle to retrofit the unbuilt project with decent streetscapes and a set of secondary uses beyond mere retail. Stay tuned.
The irony of the accidental plaza suppressed in New York and the impossibility of producing any plaza, legible center, or sense of hierarchy and variety in Washington lies in the fact that while the founding physical conditions are opposites, the conceptual cage in which both sets of circumstances are locked is identical. Most of us can recognize decent urbanity when we see it, but we are constrained by the inefficiencies and limits of paradigms that are too narrow, too limited, too unimaginative.
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