Before the Leaves Grow…
Miro… if you’re reading… I pretty much just have one request. Right about now with the leaves off the trees you can get a fairly clear view from the base of Pearl Street where the fountain is, straight down to the waterfront. There’s even something of a path on the hill there etched by folks seeking a short cut.
Take a walk down there sometime before the bloom and try to envision what it would be like to transplant the Spanish steps of Rome to that spot. That’s a grand vision, but even a wooden staircase and/or ramp system would tremendously enhance the synergy between the Battery Park and the Waterfront by proving a direct pedestrian link between them.
If you do build a permanent stair and ramp structure in that spot, with benches, landscaping, fountains and amenities, it would be an instant tourist attraction. A vantage for sunset watchers, and a treasure that would last centuries, not decades.
In a hundred years nobody will remember if you fixed Burlington Telecom or fired Larry Kupferman, but if you give the city a grand public work made of stone and iron, then you do have a shot at immortality. As a developer, perhaps you can figure out how to do this project. I hope you can see it. I hope you can do it.
7 comments
You know, that idea continues to seem like a MUCH better use of space than what is still being planned for the Moran Plant.
Thanks Jonas. The Moran Plant needs to become a year-round botanical gardens and solarium. There’s no question in my mind.
No no, Haik. Clearly, you’re mistaken. One of the coldest states in the country needs to take that great, abundant natural resource–ice–and move it INSIDE. That way, we can be cold inside and outside, year round. How are you not seeing this??
Jonas, are you sure you were here in Burlington this past winter? I wasn’t seeing a whole lot of snow and ice! :-)
A valid point, Alex. Then again, I don’t recall a significant public outcry regarding the lack of ice for climbing.
Joking aside, and not to disparage the sport of ice climbing, the plan just seems…ill conceived. In terms of usage, I’m hard-pressed to believe that such a facility really serves the public as well as other potential uses. If it were in Williston, this wouldn’t be an issue. Build 100 ice walls there! But the Waterfront is Burlington’s money maker. And the city needs all the cash it can generate these days. I kinda doubt our Canadian friends–upon whom the city relies for $$–will come over the border to climb an ice wall. The facility seems…incongruous.
Hey, I’d love to be wrong and be able to pat our industrious Scottish friends on the back and say “thanks for bringing this goldmine to town!” Really, I would. I just don’t see that happening.
I think they should build another floating bar. Burlington needs another bar.
Haik:
Let’s hear your take on the Rome-report controversy. This effort to silence him sounds INSANE.
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