At SHIFTBoston, we saw the top 20 ideas presented by the expert panel, but what about the other 122 proposals? At least one firm is very proud of its proposal, and believe it would make a great addition to the city’s infrastructure.
Boston is a walkable city. I can vouch for this reputation, having walked from North Station to Brookline Village, and from the Back Bay to Ashmont Hill, in the past. But what about East Boston? Eastie is separated, physically and mentally, by Boston Harbor. Jamaica Plain-based OZIIO has a solution for this.
The Harbor’s Public Space, known as the Harbor Walk, follows the edge of Greater Boston from the North End and as far south as the ICA. The project proposes a Harbor Walk bridge to link both sides of the harbor and ultimately encourage reactivation of East Boston’s harbor edge. Scaling back farther, an argument can be made to connect the linear ‘green’ corridors that exist on both sides of the river. To make this connection the bridge will be sited on disused urban fragments such as the abandoned East Boston ferry terminal that has a direct connection to Maverick Square. Sargent’s wharf in the North End is chosen to be the Boston terminus transforming its function as a large-scale parking lot by giving the site new urban dynamism.
By giving the bridge multiple, alternating layers and a corner midway across the harbor, the bridge provides more function than simply a connection from one neighborhood to another. “Through this urban deign concept, the unconventional bridge form evolves to be more than just a bridge but rather an urban landscape extending out over the water. By extruding the various organic and orthogonal lines emanating from the docks found on both sides of the harbor, the bridge begins to take on shape. Paths form where the lines intersect carving out surfaces of decking, concrete pavers, and green space.”
The bridge’s atmosphere offers both space for peaceful reflection and speedy transit. The bridge provides unobstructed views of Boston’s skyline as well as leisure space surrounded by indigenous trees and plant life. The injection of new functions such as urban market space and dedicated bike commuting paths provide a pathway that can be traversed in 2 to 15 minutes with activities to do in-between. Restructuring the space over the water as a new public forum allows the harbor bridge to play the roll of destination and not just means to get from A to B. By bridging the waterfronts we help further move the urban infrastructure of Boston away from car-centric travel and toward a true walking city.
OZIIO’s Justin Viglianti believes their proposal wasn’t selected as a finalist “because there were so many projects that took into consideration the water around the city and on a much grander scale. Yet our modesty might say something about how personally intimate we feel about such issues as connecting waterfronts and providing an infrastructure for the underprivileged.”
What do you think? Could you see a link between East Boston and downtown becoming reality? How could connecting the neighborhood with the city change either, or both?
