UO architecture students tackle Burnside Bridgehead (updated)

On Monday I had the pleasure of spending the afternoon with several graduate students from the University of Oregon's School of Architecture & Allied Arts, who presented ideas for the Burnside Bridgehead project as part of a class taught by architects from Mulvanny G2 (led by Suenn Ho), one of the firms that has been involved in the job.

Ironically, being with these grad students, professors and architects from UO cheered me up after I'd thrown a small temper tantrum earlier that morning about their school, when the nation's top-rated running back prospect, Bryce Brown, announced he was attending Tennessee over Oregon (the perceived front runner for his services.) A giant cross hanging from his neck, Brown had reportedly prayed and fasted in search of the right decision about where to matriculate, but then chose Tennessee because it was his fastest route to the NFL and millions of dollars. So it was great to spend time with Oregon students who saw their education as more than a personal means to an end disguised in flamboyant piety.

The format, as architecture school jury critiques seem to go, was to have each student present his or her idea to a handful of us jurors (non-grading, just opinion-giving) over about a half-hour. Unfortunately I didn't get to see all 11 grad student presentations, but the ones I did see were a treat. 

I've also attached at left an image from a presentation I didn't see by student Fai Chong, called "Learning Hub" for "using intentionally-designed landscaping in an urban area to evoke our imagination on how to use the land and what to build on it, informing the future programs of the site." At the bottom of this post is an image from Elisabeta Curea's project.

Masaye Harrison (pictured above) offered the most realistic plan for Burnside Bridgehead, which she branded the "B-side Blocks". She spoke about re-establishing the city grid here, and better connecting this large parcel with the surrounding urban fabric. Her plan an incubator for creative industries in the spirit of other nearby projects like the Olympic Mills Commerce Center, developed by Burnside Bridgehead developer-in-waiting Brad Malsin and his Beam Development company.

Harrison also had the simplest and perhaps most singularly effective design idea, not to mention the cheapest: The Eastbank Esplanade connects to the Burnside Bridge's edge with a stairway on the south side, she pointed out, but not the north side. Simply by putting in another stairway on the north side of the bridgehead, Masaye's plan established a better connection. No other student presentation I saw did anything like this exceptionally simple move to connect Burnside Bridgehead with the Burnside Bridge.

That said, two other students had the kind of bold ideas that we can only get from young, idealistic designers with open minds.

Kevin Ellingson imagined a relatively banal series of traditional buildings occupying the core of the Bridgehead site, but he also created a perimeter of very sculptural, curving architecture to ape the contour of the adjacent I-84/I-5 freeway interchange. Ellingson's design, which you can see a little bit in the photo above, looked like a long piece of origami, all folded triangles and angular facade. Were it to be built, the structure would become an instant icon for the city.

Then there was Kristopher Celtnieks, or "Special K," as I heard a fellow student call him. Celtnieks (pictured at left) proposed--are you ready for this?--a working dairy farm for Burnside Bridgehead, complete with cows grazing on the sloping green roofs of the buildings there. It wasn't something the designer pulled out of nowhere, though: He did all the research to prove that an urban dairy was not only possible for the site, but came up with a business plan that could turn a profit. 

Special K's plan also included a public market, which is actually a very viable idea for Burnside Bridgehead. Some of his buildings, curvy and classy with large overhangs, also recalled the landmark TWA terminal at New York's JFK airport by Eero Saarinen.

And if the dairy idea seems outrageous, I liked the fact that he was trying an idea so different. If you're not going to brainstorm wildly in a college setting free from the budget and client strictures of everyday practice, when will you?

Marc Holt had some of the best-looking displays for his project (a rendering is at right), which started with a more conservative, real-world idea: relocating Columbia Sportswear to the site. Within that simple plan, though, his designs offered some of the strongest ideas for how to energize the site with broad sweeping plans and integration with the surrounding streetscape. As it happened, one of the fellow jurors offering commentary alongside me during Holt's presentation on a Columbia headquarters was Eric Cugnart of Mulvanny G2, who served as a lead designer for another sports corporation headquarters in Portland, the Adidas Village, while working with BOORA Architects earlier this decade.

Cugnart, who happens to be French, also offered some of the most frank insights and commentaries to the students, which made good theater for the rest of us, being Americans more concerned with politeness. Cugnart wasn't afraid to say, "This doesn't work," when some of the rest of us weren't. I don't mean to imply he was nasty; Eric's a good guy without a doubt. But overall, I appreciated being part of a forum where my fellow jurors, people like architects David Horsely, John Duncan, and Kevin Valk (among several others) gently nudged students to both articulate their ideas and learn from opportunities not fully met.

Although this was clearly not an official brainstorming session for Burnside Bridgehead (I seriously doubt a dairy farm will go there, much as I enjoyed Special K's presentation), it was also good to see real decision makers there to participate, like the project's presumed actual developer, Brad Malsin, as well as Amy Ruiz from mayor Sam Adams's office.

In the future, Portland could very much use an integrated, collaborative approach to generating ideas for public-funded sites at key intersections such as this. Together the public and private sector should invite the academic portion of the design community to help generate ideas with as wide an initial net as possible. Kudos to UO and Mulvanny G2 Architecture for making this happen.

Oh, and Duck football fans: don't forget to root against Tennessee!

Update, 3/19: I've added some additional images from students below; the first four are of Kristopher Celtnieks' dairy project and the last two are from Jon DeLeonardo, a mixed-use public market project.

 

Also, I forgot to mention one other idea I had for Burnside Bridgehead. In Marc Holt's presentation, one of the jurors suggested his proposal might be better with a taller, more dramatic building at the point closest to the river. Hearing that, I thought: What if, were the Blazers and Portland Beavers intent on building a baseball stadium next to the Rose Garden--which I think is a terrible, disastrous idea--instead of letting Memorial Coliseum be demolished, what if it were to be disassembled and rebuilt at to the Burnside Bridgehead site? Obviously plenty of liberties would have to be taken with the design, but why not preserve the Coliseum at this prominent Burnside Bridgehead site as a concert hall, public market, or other space?

Comments

[billb]

Bri , forget that punk , we got Blount , who will now , miracles of miracles , come off mean ol suspension.... Masoli for the Heisman , Duckies win the Nat Title!

[Scott Mizée]

Great post. Thanks for writing about this. I have been watching this project for many years now and did not know UO was doing a studio on it right now.

[Tom Osdoba]

Goats would be far more viable, though smaller scale milk production (maybe very fine cheese). But it would also be able to draw revenues by renting the goats out to help deal with landscaping challenges, e.g., controlling ivy and other invasives, munching on public realm areas, etc. In Seattle, King County is bringing them in from farms for this purpose now; very successfully.

On a broader point, great to see this, and we should seek to really elevate our aspirations for this site. It has lots of challenges, which should inspire great designers. Done right, though, it can change the conversation about what happens throughout CEIN.

Finally, as a public market venue, interesting idea that will confront the lack of people living close by. It could easily orient to river, which would be great. More challenging to make easily accessible from east, though a great design opportunity to create ways to bring people down from higher grades. Also, should consider ability to have a rail spur for transporting WV produce in daily. Imagine the hive of activity that could create on site.

All this would take significant public investment for the infrastructure and public realm. However, the site could probably handle enough density to make it pencil.

[Frank Dufay]

As someone who's been serving on the Burnside Bridgehead Citizen's Advisory Committee for the last couple of years, I think the committe members would love to see this stuff. Is it still available for viewing?

I'm very disappointed we weren't told about this event. Was PDC involved with it?

Thanks for sharing it on your blog though.

[Brian Libby]

Excellent point, Frank. Suenn Ho at Mulvanny G2 should be able to help facilitate that, or email me at [email protected] if you need additional help.

Also, just generally to readers, I'm sorry for only posting twice this week, but I'm unusually swamped with some other writing deadlines and plan to return to a more frequent posting schedule next week.

[eric cantona]

"other writing"??? what the hell for? don't you make untold $$$$millions from this blog???

[writing a dissertation]

Blogs are good for every one where we get lots of information for any topics nice job keep it up !!!

[conspiracyzach]

Pictures inside the new UO athlete learning center are now posted online. To see them use the Google blog search with keywords "university of oregon alc".