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New York City’s High Line has been such a success – both as an urban renewal project and a money-making tourist attraction – that it’s spawned quite a number of Copy Cats around the world (we found 18 19, listed after the break, but no doubt there’s many more…). Many, however, are more yawn-inducing than awe-inspiring. The following four projects are notably awesome exceptions.
Find out which projects made the cut, after the break…
4. “LEGO Bridge” – Wuppertal, Germany
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The colorful LEGO-inspired bridge, painted last fall, is part of an Urban renewal project to redevelop the city of Wuppertal’s old Railway into a 10-mile cycle path. City officials hope it will “reinvigorate the city and increase residents’ quality of life.”
Unfortunately, no actual LEGOS were used in the making of this bridge; the illusion was designed by street artist Martin Heuwold of MEGX.
3. “Hofbogen” – Rotterdam, The Netherlands
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This plan of DOEPEL STRIJKERS to turn an old elevated train track in downtown Rotterdam into a commercial strip and elevated park, has an ingenious twist. The plan integrates city heating into the design: industrial waste heat will be used to warm the pre-war buildings along its trajectory, radically reducing their CO2 footprint.
2. “Transbay Transit Center” – San Francisco, California
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Once a bustling train station, the Transbay Transit Center has been in a slow demise since WW2. Even though it’s been reconstituted as a bus terminal, the facility no longer serves much purpose in the community.
The proposed idea will retrofit the old, outdated building and turn it into a new high-speed rail terminus – but above the terminal is the real show-stopper. The 5.4 acre elevated park, designed by Pelli Clark Pelli Architecture, will incorporate cafes, retail areas, playgrounds, public art exhibits, an amphitheater and display gardens with climate-appropriate plants. It should be stroll-ready by 2017.
1. “The Delancey Underground” – New York City, New York
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As the Highline has everyone looking up, James Ramsey and Dan Barasch are asking people to start looking down. Satellite engineer turned architect, James Ramsey has developed a fiber-optic technology that will naturally light and bring life to the abandoned Williamsburg Bridge Trolley Terminal below the streets of New York City. The renderings are positively sci-fi, but if this Kickstarter Project becomes a reality, the results could be truly fantastic.
More “High Line” Like Projects Around the World…
- Atlanta, GA, USA - The Beltline
- Chicago, IL, USA - The Bloomingdale Trail
- Detroit, MI, USA - The Dequindre Cut Greenway
- Helsinki, Finland – The Baana Bicycle Corridor
- Jersey City, NJ, USA - The Harsimus Stem Embankment
- Jerusalem, Israel – Railway Park
- Los Angeles, CA, USA – Park 101
- Mexico City, Mexico – Chapultepec Project
- New haven, CT, USA – Farmington Canal Greenway
- Philadelphia, PA, USA – The Reading Viaduct
- Santiago, Chile – Túnel de FFCC
- Singapore – The Green Corridor
- St. Louis, MO, USA – The Trestle
- Toronto, Canada – The Railpath
- Washington, DC, USA – Dupont Underground