Charles B. Aycock District

College Park district

Fisher Park district

David Wharton – Vice Chair of the Historic Preservation Commission

The City of Greensboro has a Historic Preservation Commission that oversees the historic district program and advises the City Council on historic preservation matters. David Wharton, Vice Chair of the HPC and I have been in contact over the last few days about what exactly it is they do for the city. He explained to me that the HPC oversees the three locally-designated historic districts in Greensboro – College Hill, Fisher Park, and Charles B. Aycock. They review, approve/deny applications when owners in these districts want to make changes or additions to their properties. Each change is governed by Greensboro’s historic Preservation Design Guidelines and Manual.
What’s so important about these structures is that each individual one has a story to tell, it’s a living record of the people who lived in and/or used it – the way they lived, their sense of style. Once these structures are lost, they are gone forever: unrecoverable. In this way, the buildings are a living and real connection to Greensboro’s past, and can tell present residents stories about where their city came from.
David Wharton’s job at the HPC impacts the city of Greensboro in many ways. Economical studies have shown that historic districts help neighborhoods retain and increase their property values, and can provide stability to neighborhoods in transition and decline. This is certainly true of all three Greensboro neighborhoods. They were either beginning to decline, or in deep decline when they were designated as historic districts and all have since become active, vital, and stable places to live. These districts are also available for the public at large, either by driving through them or taking the annual walking tours offered by a private group (Preservation Greensboro, Inc). They also provide Greensboro with a sense of place, that is, of being someplace rather than just anyplace. In that way, they help to give Greensboro its distinctive identity.
These districts not only have an impact within the city of Greensboro but also to the design world as a whole. The Greensboro historic districts have functioned as something of a Petri dish for innovative design ideas. Especially, the Charles B. Aycock district that pioneered preservation design by hiring a firm to come up with a neighborhood plan that included a proposal to renovate the 1926 World War Memorial Stadium and integrate its use with the surrounding neighborhood and nearby Farmers’ Curb Market. That plan was submitted in a design competition sponsored by the Congress for the New Urbanism (though it didn’t win). Unfortunately, the plan has never been implemented, but some of its proposals are included in the upcoming transportation bond package.

Shelter/Bus

Programatic diagram:
With my Programatic diagram I wanted to use shapes that I felt would go with my concept. So I chose puzzel peices, every peice fits with the next except for the two larger peices which represent the two races in my concept. The two large peices are so close to being able to become one there just missing one thing.
Longitudinal Section A
Longitudinal Section B
Cross Section C
Cross Section D Cross Section E
Cross Section F
Section key

Prejudice

Imagine trying to save someone on the verge of death, but they refuse your help. These individuals are neither depressed nor insane, their prejudice.
Natural disasters cause devastation all over the world, but in 2005, a hurricane that many of us will never forget hit the American coast and destroyed thousands of homes, businesses, and lives. All types of people came together after this horrific disaster to try and help the victims still trapped in Louisiana. As a nation we showed great compassion and care for the victims, but a small group of relief workers seemed to be ostracized during the mission.
A small documentary was made about Muslim victims and relief workers. Ruben Vaughan one of the Islamic relief workers said he experienced two different reactions from non-Muslims. In one instance some of the workers were helping carry supplies to affected areas when people would turn and ask them what they were doing saying, “We don’t need your help you can just take it back.” While others would load up their cars and help the workers on their way. Even such a small thing as wearing a hijab on their head would cause people to turn away from their help.
Prejudice is real and is still ever so present in our society, even in Greensboro. For instance when approaching the GTA bus ride feeling slightly prejudice against the individuals on the bus seemed to come naturally to most people. Scared, nervous, slightly germ phobic, and resentment for having to ride the bus with a bunch strangers seemed to be a common thread among my peers.
Prejudice can also be explained in terms of a force field that drives people apart, similar to two magnets when you have one negative and one positive charge. It seems that no matter how hard you try to just connect the two and create a whole, there’s always that force, that wall, that keeps the from one another.
A concept revolving around prejudice, interrupted into a bus for 4 relief workers, (two of which are of Islamic decent, and two of American decent) whom have two symmetrical sides on the bus. The symmetrical sides are a symbolic representation of the commonality of the four individuals. That although they may have different backgrounds they are all people just the same. The two communal areas for the four individuals are located in the center of the bus where a series of two pocket doors are located which gives the option to open it up as one major room where they can all become a whole. But like the magnetic force, there seems to be a something in the way that keeps the pocket doors seem from opening up completely. Only a small sliver of the adjacent communal area is able to be seen.
As individuals we need to understand that disasters know no prejudice it happens to everyone.

Bus / Shelter - landmark project

Mockery

When looking closely at Weatherspoon Art Museum I noticed that the entire building is made of nothing but horizontal and vertical lines. Ranging from the mortar lines in the brick walls, to the vertical columns located at the corner of Tate and Spring Garden, to the fence running along side the sculpture garden. Inspired by the simplicity of these two elements, I derived my idea.
Not wanting to contrast with the existing environment in which my bus shelter is to be placed, I choose to compliment it by using the same design elements displayed in the Weatherspoon Art Museum. The basics of my bus shelter consist of four verticals lines and two horizontal lines. The four vertical lines are made up of a simplified, elongated version of the existing columns located at the museum. To add interest to the structure the column heights vary. The two horizontal lines are made up of the roof structure and the seating. Coinciding with the mortar lines and the fencing the roof structure is a solid slab of horizontal wood. To answer functional needs, benches have been incorporated with the options of group seating, private seating or even the option of standing along the outskirts.
Inspired by elements displayed in the Weatherspoon Art Museum, I derived an idea of a coherent shelter by using simple lines to create a functional structure for the people of the Greensboro community.