A Next Chance to Talk Possibilities

At the June 3 meeting of the West End Association, Public Art and Design Committee member Eric Elliott will present a brief 15-minute slideshow highlighting national "best-practices" in the use of bridge design and public art in the creation of transportation corridors. The meeting begins at 7pm and will be held in the community room of the Central Family YMCA, accessible through the entrance of the Y at Glade St and West End Boulevard. For more information on its meetings, visit the Association website at www.historicwestend.org

Bridge Architecture as Public Art

From Public Art Committeee member Keith Wilson, architect at Calloway Johnson Moore and West - I have included here a few images of Santiago Calatrava bridges that I like. I'm not suggesting that we try to have our bridges looks like any of these - it would be quite expensive to try to do something like that. This is merely to demonstrate how a bridge can become an icon image for an area or a city. These bridges generate revenue for their cities because people will visit just to see them. I include them merely to get people to start to see what a bridge can be.

Structurae is an excellent site with thousands of images of all styles of bridges. But I don't think we should get too caught up in what the bridge should look like. The important thing to focus our attention on is the desire to make these bridges into something more. Hopefully we will find a designer who can provide that vision for us, and the funding to make that happen.

At the Asheville Design Center website, there is also quite a bit of information on bridge projects and several examples even take you through the process.