The Highline Shell

Water + Architecture_

Sea level rise is an event which cannot be met symptomatically. In the past, engineers have built dikes and levees to hold back water from civilizations only to prolong the inevitable interaction between water and architecture. Hurricane Katrina is one of many instances that illustrate the dangerous consequences of controlling rather than cooperating with nature.
Architecture has not addressed water and so now it is being forced upon us. New Orleans, Bangladesh and the United Kingdom are only a few examples of the regions being inundated by the forces of water.

The systematic paradigm suggests that water in this context is not a misfortune, rather a means to enhance experience, redefine space and consider the inhabitation of the edge of our land bound world. More than seventy percent of the globe is covered with water yet it remains fundamentally ignored for its resources and remains almost completely barren of human inhabitation.

NYSea Site + Systems_

This is an architectural thesis and in order to avoid complicating issues, such as the political aftermath of a disaster, this project will propose its own hypothetical scenario in which sea levels have risen twenty three feet. The map illustrates, in dark blue, the areas which would be submerged by the waters. This level of coverage does not completely debilitate the city but does cut off its most important transportation systems, automobiles and the subway.

At the edge of the partially drowned megalopolis there exists a shell of a building in the northwest corner of the West Village. The remains of industry long since gone but not yet reclaimed by developers. Through the shell the highline erodes a massive void which now pumps life back into the structure. The highline was informally reinstated by the risen water level. The train no longer runs, but activity is forced onto its raised level, the familiar, somewhat solid ground connecting to higher, dryer parts of the Manhattan in the north. What once was the only empty building in the neighborhood now is now reanimated.

High fashion boutiques and night clubs are now flooded; only the higher residential levels remain inhabited. Fire exits turned into main entrances bring a mischievous experience to even mundane places. Roof tops are now a landscape, as separate as they might be, connecting people. The roof which used to be the most private space in the city now has become the most public, event formed transformation.

The bay, once far from mind, now seems such a viable option for conversation and relaxation. Soon those who stayed realized that a sail boat is a far more versatile tool than a car, it is a mobile place not simply a vehicle. Water familiarized interaction with the forgotten layers of the city and extended the borders of interaction well into the bay. Most of all the speed of the city was altered, and the journey became as significant as the destination.

[The shell in these images is the black square structure superimposed over the highline railway. It lies on 14th street a main east-west corridor. The historic Chelsea district lies to the north and the bay was once to the west. The shell is on the right in the bottom images]