Urban design students offer their visions for Ithaca's downtown

By Adrial Lobelo '02

The city of Ithaca recently has been dealing with a mix of developers, nonprofit organizations, businesses and other institutions on a variety of redevelopment proposals for the downtown area. While several of the stakeholders are formalizing their individual proposals, a comprehensive development vision for the area has been a major focus of many groups, including city officials.

"Nature, history, commerce" was the downtown "east-gateway" design theme presentation by Christine McMillan '01, in partnership with Erin Wilson '01, before Ithaca city officials, May 9, in Ithaca City Hall. Charles Harrington/ University Photography

One group that has stepped forward to help the city refine its vision -- and also provide an educational experience -- is a class of undergraduate and graduate students from Cornell. Roger Trancik, Cornell professor of city and regional planning and landscape architecture, assigned a seven-week-long project to his Urban Design in Virtual Space studio course (Landscape Architecture 302 and City and Regional Planning 402) to work with the city on providing visual assessments of the possibilities surrounding several proposed downtown projects.

On May 9, the students in Trancik's class presented their project visions to an audience of city officials, leading players in development and historic preservation in the city and other members of the public in Common Council Chambers of Ithaca City Hall. The presentations were the final projects for the semester-long class.

"This is the first for this kind of a relationship, where a whole class is actually put into the kind of role of consultant to the city and where a fairly large number of staff members in the city are involved," Trancik said.

To facilitate their study, the students were required to learn formZ, a software program that allows urban designers to create virtual 3D computer models of development proposals. The students were able to, virtually, insert, design and manipulate aspects of the projects to assess their impacts on the planning process. The students used the software and worked closely -- beginning with a meeting March 28 -- with various administrators and staff members in the city's Planning, Economic Development and Historic Preservation departments on several downtown projects, including: the proposed Hilton Hotel near the Ithaca Commons, Cornell's office building proposal for an area near the intersection of Seneca and Tioga streets, the Cayuga Green retail/parking/residential development along Six Mile Creek, the redesign of public space on the Commons and proposals for the "east gateway"-Wilcox Press site east of the Commons.

The formZ program helped the students analyze various aspects of the projects, for instance, the potential shadow effects cast by proposed large building masses in the essentially low-rise downtown area. Students working on proposals for the Commons were mindful of minimizing the impact of large shadows, since they can compromise safety in any downtown district. For example, pedestrians may feel uneasy walking across dark, shadowy streets. The students also grappled with challenging traffic issues and the need for creating new downtown parking facilities while providing adequate replacement parking for the existing infrastructure.

"In this country, what drives a lot of urbanism is the automobile, unfortunately," said Trancik. "Dealing with the system of one-way streets in Ithaca was also very difficult to work with," he added.

Some students saw value in creating linkages between the Commons pedestrian mall and the area around the former Woolworth site, adjacent to Six Mile Creek. Providing a connection between those sites would enhance circulation while involving Ithaca's natural beauty, they suggested.

Halle Watson and her project partner, Charlotte Brombach, both in city and regional planning, focused on proposals at the Seneca and Tioga street intersection during their presentation. They emphasized the need to increase the nodes of activity at the intersection, which is expected to become the new center in the downtown district.

"We really wanted to bring life back to downtown," said Watson of their plans. "We felt that adding a new apartment building, a grocery store and a new hotel would bring more life to the area -- and alleviate higher rents in Collegetown. Adding mass and density to areas that are now just parking lots or drive-in banks can accomplish that."

Trancik agreed with the importance of adding new housing density in the downtown area. "To get people living 24 hours downtown, I think, is really important to make [Ithaca] a living city, rather than just a place where people shop and work," he said.

For the "east gateway" area, landscape architecture students Erin Bullock and Teresa Damaske also proposed adding a new housing development, at the former Wilcox Press site, behind the Tompkins County Museum on East State Street. Housing at the former Wilcox Press site would be ideal, they said, since it is situated in a relatively protected area and it faces south -- an important factor, since it offers direct sunlight. The proposed housing also would face the Six-Mile Creek gorge, which would offer residents spectacular views and access to the area's natural beauty.

Focusing on the former Woolworth's site, now home to the Tompkins County Library, Stephanie Cheng, city and regional planning, suggested constructing what she called an "urban wrapper" -- a glass-enclosed public space that would resolve the disparity caused by having two parking lots adjacent to the library. Stressing the creation of an additional visual link between the Commons, the library and the proposed Cayuga Green development, Justin Winters, a graduate student in landscape architecture, discussed a proposal to build a glass-enclosed corridor within the Center Ithaca and Green Street parking garage area leading to the former Woolworth site.

Gary Ferguson, executive director of the Ithaca Downtown Partnership, was one of the people attending the students' presentations. "I thought it was a wonderful assignment because it gave students real-life venues to work on," he said. "We could look at their results and compare them to what's actually being discussed."