Plain Dealer architecture critic Steve Litt recommends the following steps to assure that the new Cleveland Convention Center and Medical Mart will be integrated into the urban landscape in a well designed and sustainable manner:
1. Cuyahoga County and MMPI need to appoint a landscape architect and/or urban designer to the design team. Immediately. The landscape architect or urban designer should be a direct report to the county and MMPI, not a sub to architects for the individual buildings. If anything, the designer should be above the other architects, not below them, in the hierarchy. (that was the model at gateway).
2. Said professional would create urban design guidelines taking the form of performance specifications for the project. These guidelines will govern specs for other members of the design team, including architects for the medical mart, public auditorium and the convention center. The guidelines should be dimensionally precise realizations of simple, easy-to-understand performance standards (e.g. : There shall be a direct sightline from the front door of the Medical Mart to the front door of Public Auditorium. There shall be a direct sightline from the sidewalk at Lakeside Avenue to the horizon on Lake Erie. Variations in the ground plane of the Mall shall not exceed X feet going from north to south, and from east to west. No retaining walls shall be higher than X feet at St. Clair Avenue, X feet at Lakeside Avenue, etc.
3. Once the basic spatial armature of the Mall is set, a separate contract could be let with a star landscape architect to create a new design for the surface. The designer who works on the urban design guidelines could be a candidate, of course. I'm not going to name names, but the list should include the top practitioners in America.
