Dean Sakamoto Architects
Not too long in the future, when cyclists or joggers head north toward Cheshire from downtown New Haven, they’ll stop in a tunnel under Whitney Avenue — and connect with history.
That’s the hope of architect Dean Sakamoto, who’s designing the last piece of New Haven’s stretch of the Farmington Canal Greenway, a former canal and rail line from the city to Northampton, Mass., that has gradually been reborn as a walkers’, joggers’, and cyclists’ mecca.
Three years from now, Sakamoto told a crowd Tuesday night, he wants New Haveners to say: “‘You have to get to the tunnel to see the exhumed rail lines. It could be a [new] public space on the order of the New Haven Green.’”
New York can boast of its “High Line.” New Haven, Sakamoto said, will draw people to its “Low Line.”
As part of his work, Sakamoto is designing the 300-foot tunnel section of the trail running underground from Temple to Orange and Grove streets.
Tapping into the existing structures of the almost two-centuries-old canal bed, rail lines, and supporting masonry walls, he envisions turning the space into a unique illuminated mecca for urban archeology, exhibition, and other activities that bring the city’s rich past alive.
Allan Appel Photo
Trail tunnel architect Dean Sakamoto.
Sakamoto conveyed his excitement about the project Tuesday night in front of 40 people as the City Plan Department and the engineers on the project from Milone & MacBroom made a presentation of designs for the final leg of the trail in the city.
City Plan Director Karyn Gilvarg hosted the periodic public meeting, a requirement of Connecticut’s Department of Transportation (the funder), on the occasion of the design being conceptually complete, but only 30 percent detailed.
The final or Phase IV of the project begins at Hillhouse Avenue, runs through the tunnel beginning at Temple, rises onto the surface at Orange and Grove and travels over city streets to its destination at the once and future boat house at Canal Dock Road near Long Wharf.
(Click here for Mary O’Leary’s Register detailing the route out from about Hillhouse Avenue, where it is open to the sky, into the tunnel, then up out via shared bike and car lanes to Long Wharf.)
Currently the 1.7 miles of the trail in New Haven are complete from Lock Street to the Hamden town line.
The final phase begins with the tunnel then surfaces at Sakamoto’s plaza-like eastern side entry at Orange and Grove up to Olive. It then jogs left on Water, then follows it to Brewery Street curving in front of the Ikea parking lot and dashing across Sargent and Long Wharf drives to the future boat house.
Click here for the Dean Sakamoto Architects site with details about the project. And here for an article on last spring’s public meeting on the project.
Sakamoto Tuesday night seemed most excited about converting the remnants of the canal and the railroad lines laid thereafter and their walls and supporting structures into the centerpiece of an urban archeology site
To that end, his plan calls for generous sections of non-slip structural glass to be laid over sections of to-be-excavated rails. Passing pedestrians and bicyclists will in effect be walking or stepping close to and over history.
Plans call for display signage with timelines, and facsimiles of historical photos, to be developed from a partnership with the New Haven Museum.
He likened the site’s possibilities to that of the High Line in Manhattan. That’s a conversion of an elevated railway line into a new urban structure that has become a destination for strollilng, art, and commerce.
This tunnel will be our Low Line, he said.
Dean Sakamoto Architects
Interpretive green panels on bifurcated path and rail remains on floor of tunnel beneath glass panes.
The Temple to Orange tunnel is wide enough to allow for what Sakamoto described as two five to six-foot bifurcated paths. So while bicyclists and pedestrians move through in either direction, those eager for more leisurely viewing can step into a dedicated lane where they walk by a five-inch band of interpretive text.
“They’ll be separate from bikes and joggers,” he said.
Sakamoto also said that the walls, which contain sections of historical masonry, along with rubble, and other archeological markers will also be dramatically uplit. “We want not to be heavy handed, but treat it with dignity.”
The tunnel is in effect new public space, part park and part indoor/outdoor museum. Plans call for it to be gated at both ends for security. Unlike public parks whose hours are from sunrise to sunset, more or less, the tunnel will be illuminated for security reasons 24/7 and may have longer hours than the parks.
City Plan’s Karyn Gilvarg said details remain to be worked out about security, use, and who, for example, will be opening and closing the gates.
Several attendees, who live near the tunnel, expressed anxiety regarding security in the tunnel. Gilvarg replied the best remedy is to provide amenities and sufficient appeal that the tunnel becomes a well used, and, therefore, safe destination.
Sakamoto agreed. He said the “Low Line” he’s creating could even be conceived of as having three distinct spaces: the historical, the section that runs beneath the Park for the Arts, that is the backyards of the Neighborhood Music School and Creative Arts Workshop, and the plaza.
“The plaza could be a place for a Saturday market. Three sub-spaces unified by one design,” he said.
The “palette” of materials throughout is also in keeping with the historical rail and canal setting: local stone, weathered iron or steel, concrete, and even heavy timbers, Sakamoto said.
The total budget for the project is $7.6 million. Of that, $6.1 million is federal and $1.5 is local, shared equally by Yale University and the city. Those monies on the city side have been previously bonded, according to Gilvarg.
If all goes well with permissions, easements for rights of way, approvals, and then bidding, construction could begin in the spring of 2013.
Milone & MacBroom’s Vincent McDermott said that there might be two construction seasons: one for the tunnel and one for the street improvements along the balance of the trail.
Sounds like a place for trouble to occur!