FRACTURED MOSAIC: DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN
Group members:
Anat Banin
Emilio Chacon
Petra Kempf
Albert Marichal
Downtown Brooklyn is a mosaic of diverse fragments: these are its strengths but also its weakness. The challenge is to bring these pieces together in order to create a civic identity for Brooklyn. The Brooklyn and Manhattan bridges that run through the district have cracked the urban mosaic, creating huge gaps. While a few small fragments such as Montague Street have strengthened, larger pieces like Fulton Mall are crumbling. One symptom of fragmentation is the privatization of public space. At Metrotech, the most prominent example, walls raised next to gaps further isolate the city's different parts. The paradox is that at larger scales, the same bridges that 'crack' Brooklyn locally are important connections to the larger metropolitan area and the New York City region. For example, at a regional scale, the Brooklyn Bridge crack is a postitive urban icon. The challenges is not only to reassemble the pieces at a local scale into a community but to also to reinforce the larger connections.