East Chapel Hill St. Parking Deck - Where is NIS when you need 'em?
Word in the Herald-Sun and New and Observer earlier this week is that the Official Obfuscation policy all too prevalent in our city has lately attempted to keep mum that the East Chapel Hill St. parking deck has been quietly cracking away in a structurally, um, disadvantageous manner - evidently acknowledged only by some we-suggest-you-park-your-Hummer-elsewhere signs near the upper floors. Kevin posted about this earlier in the week over at Bull City Rising.
To my mind, this is the best news I've heard in Durham in awhile. Keep the place cordoned off so no one can park there or go near the thing. This has got to violate some code - I think it lacks the requisite number of feet of countertop or something - and then bring in the NIS bulldozers. It's a threat to public health, right? Structurally unsound, right? C'mon - I'm with ya on this one!
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15 comments:
It doesn't have enough bathrooms, so it should be torn down. :) Maybe someone could "accidentally" run into it a few times with a bulldozer, just to get things started? :)
The bad thing is that the old deck would probably be replaced with a new deck that looks even worse. :(
Go figure. Anything historic the city has seemingly little care about demolishing. But watch how they go out of their way to preserve this piece of architectural history.
Let's start a drive to name the parking deck after Mike Nifong.
Dear Gary:
Thanks for your recent inquiry to Durham Neighborhood Improvement Services. We appreciate your comments. Please be advised however that NIS only considers tearing down old, funny-looking buildings that keep Durham from looking modern and up-to-date. Our East Chapel Hill St. Parking Facility is a wonderful example of modern urban architecture that needs to be carefully preserved. Along with City Hall and the Durham County Jail, it concretely embodies the spirit of Durham government. Perhaps you also don't know that it was designed by the noted architect, Mies van der Deck.
There are no cracks or other problems in this magnificent structure. Those are simply false stories spread by Fox News, and are not to be taken seriously. However, we are considering putting vinyl siding on the facility as part of our effort at downtown beautification.
NIS
Hey NIS! Thanks for stopping by. I'm hoping that this can be the test case for "deconstruction" - carefully disassemble all of the reinforced concrete, and then dump it on the side of the road and call it art. (Anyone around who gets that reference?)
I disagree that this building isn't funny-looking! There is no vinyl, anywhere. That's gotta be worth some demo points. I'm wondering if you will encourage the owners to replace the current 'windows' (I think the windows must have been stolen - there are just some big holes) with rows of new plastic ones - some of them with the low-maintenance strips in-between the glass that make it look like a bunch o' panes instead of just one?
(Mies va der Deck - love it.)
GK
Nothing to see here! That's not a crack! It's an air vent! I had the city staff, um, add that to the deck for air circulation. See, it's an environmentally-friendly deck - that's why no SUVs above the, well, above the ground.
Dear Gary,
Our parking facility is NOT funny-looking. Have you no taste? Funny-looking is when the buildings are all different like Cleveland-Holloway instead of a proper Southpoint neighborhood where every house is identical including the garage sticking out front. Whatever you think, Durham is improving: it now has a downtown with all the garages sticking out front. Ride around the loop and look if you don't believe us.
You have an excellent suggestion to put plastic windows on the parking facility. However we're all out of plastic windows since we've provided them for the current remodeling of 520 Holloway. And have you given us any credit for THAT?
If you don't stop being so negative, we'll report you to Mike Woodard. And Diane Catotti doesn't like your tone.
NIS
NIS
You are right - I have tone problems. I know that people keep telling me that, as long as one adopts a positive tone, then everything actually is great. I must be tone-deaf. I keep telling folks in the neighborhoods that, should the city council dump on them (not that you ever would, my beloved NIS) they should "lie still and think of Durham's image." Asphalt plant in your front yard? Stress the positive! Jobs! Material to fill the potholes - er, I mean the Fortuitous Ground Exposures in the road.
Good job with the vinyl windows on 520 Holloway. I was happy to see that you have managed to get most of the original materials removed from that very funny-looking house.
And soon I will have more control over the big-money contracts as a reward for innovative thinking!
Forget naming it after Nifong, it should be the "Billy Bell Memorial Parking Garage"; a true tribute to his enduring legacy (and, they may both only last four more years).
>> they may both only last four more years).<<
We should be so lucky. :)
Seriously, why are Catwoman and Woody pushing for Baker to have authority to sign larger contracts without council oversight? Does this make sense to anyone?
I assume "Woody" is me. It's not just me and Diane Catotti. There is a majority of Council members who favor this idea. Can't wait to see the nicknames you have for them. ;-)
The Capital Projects Advisory Committee (CPAC) has made this recommendation in its last three quarterly reports. In its last report, the suggestion was worded very strongly. In conversations with CPAC members, they have shared that it is one of their primary concerns.
CPAC is the citizens' advisory group that oversees the implementation of the City's bond and capital projects. The group has noticed over the year of its work that one of the biggest factors in slowing down construction projects is that lower-dollar spending requests must come to the Council for approval. This adds another four to eight weeks to a project.
Given the current nature of the construction economy, these delays are adding a lot of additional cost to projects, not to mention the additional time.
The Manager's contracting authority was cut during Marcia Connor's last year as the previous manager. Managers in our peer cities have much higher authority to execute contracts. We need to raise the Manager's contracting authority, perhaps not to the level of other cities, as a way to move the City's work along.
The Council always has oversight. We receive reports on the execution of all contracts, and, of course, the Council has the ultimate authority of supervising (hiring, firing, disciplining) the Manager.
Also, most of the contracts are required by state law to be awarded to lowest bidder anyway.
Should the Council spend its time reviewing these contracts upfront, adding time and cost to projects? Or should it spend its time providing direction and guidance to the administration?
People often complain that government doesn't work fast enough in its day-to-day operations...and I generally agree with that assertion. Here is one way to correct that.
Mike Woodard
"I'm hoping that this can be the test case for "deconstruction" - carefully disassemble all of the reinforced concrete, and then dump it on the side of the road and call it art. (Anyone around who gets that reference?)"
Heh heh. As I recall it: at the corner of University Drive and Old Chapel Hill Rd., someone created a multi-arch art-piece (maybe 10 ft high and 30 ft. long?) that soon enough started falling apart. At some point, the piece was transmogrified into something that looked a bit more like Roman ruins-meets-abstract-art. Broken pieces of the original were re-arranged and re-connected in new ways, all closer to the ground. Then eventually it just went away.
I have no idea who the original artists were, or who changed it, or who took it away. But I do know that a prominent Hope Valley person told me that it was MEANT to be created as a ruins-like piece.
In any case -- while I didn't really like the original, I do wish we had more public art. Even if I don't like all of it.
As for the "signature" pedestrian bridge that's now being discussed for the American Tobacco Trail over I-40 -- I have no opinion. Of course it will be nice to have something attractive there. But for the marginal budget increase over a regular bridge, might it make as much sense to do a lot of smaller things all over town? Like I say, I dunno. The bridge over I-440 in Raleigh makes me think better of Raleigh, but so do the many downtown pieces in Asheville make me think better of that town (which wasn't nearly as cool when I was growing up there in the 70s).
The artwork you mention was placed by Alan Aldridge, then-owner of Allenton Realty. I think it was called "Laocoon and his Daughters". It looked pretty cool until a couple of drunk drivers plowed though it. That location was very vulnerable, and the roadway was being re-arranged, and it didn't seem that things would get better, so it did get hauled off.
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