Video: The History of Cadman Plaza
Check out this fascinating video about the history of Cadman that Karl Junkersfeld put together for the Brooklyn Heights Blog. Great stuff!
Check out this fascinating video about the history of Cadman that Karl Junkersfeld put together for the Brooklyn Heights Blog. Great stuff!
Minard- he did the reliefs on the Brooklyn Heights Library and the Main library at Grand Army Plaza.
bkn4life- well, you know I agree with you. But I’m not against change per se- you probably aren’t either I guess, because nothing grows or evolves without it. My beef is change for the sake of change, and not caring about the consequences. Cities live for hundreds and every change or decision lasts over generations. When we forget that, we wind up with tossing good public transportation for a park.
I agree with my sibling, be. There is very little around this area for park-like respite. It makes a nice parallel to the Promenade.
actually bxgirl,
i was complaing about the change.
beautiful buildings aside, the great movers of people made the boro of brooklyn special. every removal(and this was a whopper) diminishes us on the whole.
whether (in brooklyn) its third avenue, lexington ave, fifth avenue, fulton street or myrtle ave… all of these were torn down in a fashion that, with some hindsight, was premature. and each removal probably facilitated the demise of the neighborhoods served. transit is the artery of a city. removing arteries is not a good idea.
parks made by removing infrastructure were a bad idea. and costly.
when we realized cites were not going to die we try to replace what we tore town. at monumental cost. just look at 2nd ave subway in manhattan. untold billions to undo the tearing down of the second avenue el.
were there problems? maintenance, noise, etc. sure. but those were managable with a better long term view. too bad the boro didn’t have that view. i would have like to go from bushwick to downtown brooklyn in 10 minutes or so.
or over the brooklyn bridge. or by greenwood cemetery.
just dont get me started on trollies instead of buses 😉
bxgirl, what a great name, Clemente Spampinato.
I have no idea who created the bas reliefs, sounds like you are the expert in that field. It is interesting to me that as late as 1957 architects were still including beautiful representational bas reliefs in their buildings. Something that became totally outre in the late fifties and that is still an aesthetic no-no for most contemporary architects.
Minard- was the artist Clemente Spampinato?
be rude- just because some of us have different priorities than yous is no reason for you to live up to your user name.And for the record- we aren’t complaining about change , we’re complaining about the loss of several architectural gems and the loss of much more important public transportation. The park is a localized benefit for BH. Public transportation was a loss for Brooklyn. That’s hardly “progress.”
Are you folks who gripe about Cadman Plaza serious?? Do you have nothing better to do than complain about _any_ change, even one that occurred well before your lifetime??
Minard already said it best, you “are either depressed or have not been there very often.” This “patch of grass” breaks up the concrete jungle nicely, and is indeed much needed in the area. Yes, a few nice buildings (and many more ugly ones) were lost, but such is the price of progress, and on balance I’m with MM, Minard and others who think a large park is better than the totality of what was there before.
Sooty elevated rails and dense blocks of marginal buildings with a few gems are better than this? Seriously?
bxgrl, it was the same architectural firm. Shreve Lamb & Harmon. No doubt about it.
Next time you’re there (jury duty?) check out the bas reliefs flanking the main door. I think it is Moses on one side (the real Moses not Robert Moses) with the ten commandments and a goddess represtning justice on the other side. I think it has some charm.
Minard- you could say that it is utterly charmless, forbidding and prison-like. From inside and out. It may have been the same firm but whomever the actual architects were I’d be shocked to hear they worked on the Empire State Building – which is still- in my opinion- the most amazing architectural story of NYC.
I’m with bkn4life- the park is pretty but sterile- except for the monument, which is very powerful. But the loss of cross borough transit? the park is not worth that.