All Over Albany

Here's the proposed design for the Albany Skyway

Over the years thousands of people have driven along the off-ramp leading to Clinton Ave in downtown Albany that's in line to become the Albany Skyway elevated park. But walked the almost half-mile curve? That's probably just a handful.

"It was an amazing surprise to be walking on the Skyway," said Capitalize Albany president Sarah Reginelli, one of the few people to trace the route on foot. "Even with none of the amenities in place, it was still this really enchanting walk because you get all of these vistas and vantage points you wouldn't otherwise."

Last week at The Palace, Capitalize Albany -- the city of Albany's economic development arm -- presented the work of the team that's been designing the Albany Skyway.

Here are a handful of renderings, bits about the design plan and cost, along with a few questions and thoughts.

(there's more)

Gawking at another city's elevated linear park

For Albany Skyway inspiration / comparison / gawking: That video embedded above is a short aerial clip of the new Rail Park in Philadelphia, a former elevated rail line that's been turned into a quarter-mile linear park. It's part of an overall plan to create a 3-mile park along the rail line with sections at various elevations.

From an article about the park at Architects Newspaper:

The first section of the linear park, located on the northern edge of Center City and designed by landscape architects Studio Bryan Hanes, reflects the neighborhood's industrial past. Native plants and trees were planted on top of the viaduct's steel arches, and remnants of the embedded rail track are woven throughout the zigzagging walkway. Riveted I-beams have been turned into seating, and structural steel beams are used to support the hanging benches. A timeline of the neighborhood and a historical list of the city's industrial manufacturers have been cut into a weathered Cor-ten steel "history wall" that visitors can walk beside.

Unlike New York's High Line, the Rail Park is wide enough to include both dedicated bike trails and footpaths for pedestrians, creating new links to traditionally underserved neighborhoods when the three-mile-long park is complete.

This first section cost a little less than $11 million to construct. (It sounds like Friends of the Rail Park is trying to cobble together money for all sorts of sources. ) There are more photos at the Rail Park Instagram.

And over at Plan Philly there's a long look at how the park came to be and the some of the tensions that were part of its creation.

Earlier: Working out the design of the Albany Skyway

Working out the design of the Albany Skyway

One of the renderings shown at the meeting giving a sense of what might be possible. It does not represent a final design. (There's larger version inside.)

The Albany Skyway project is continuing to move forward, and this week the engineering team heading up the design work presented a few potential concepts for how to use the space on the new linear park/riverfront connector in downtown Albany.

So let's have a look at those ideas, and also talk about some of the key choices that have to be made...

(there's more)

There's another chance coming up to offer input on the Albany Skyway

A slide from the March meeting showing a rough idea of what the Albany Skyway could look like.

There's a public meeting May 22 at The Palace to talk about designs for the Albany Skyway project.

Blurbage: "Capitalize Albany Corporation is hosting a second public community event in order to generate ideas that will support the project's design and engineering. Initial Skyway design concepts will be previewed at this meeting. ... Learn more about the future potential of the Skyway and share your priorities and design ideas."

The Albany Skyway is a project to convert a relatively lightly-used off-ramp from I-787 to Clinton Ave in Albany into a pedestrian-bike connector/linear park between Broadway and the riverfront. The project got a big boost earlier this year when the Cuomo admin committed $3.1 million to it. Back in March there was a packed public meeting at which officials and the design firm Stantec outlined the project and gathered some initial input about what people would like to see happen with the project. This month the project team walked the ramp and surveyed views from it.

This next public meeting is Tuesday, May 22 from 5-7 pm at The Palace. Capitalize Albany is asking that people pre-register (see the first link above).

And Stantec, the engineering/design firm working on the project, is still gathering public input via an online survey.

Earlier:
+ Ideas for the Albany Skyway
+ 787 is sticking around for a long time, but if you want to change it the time to start is now

Ideas for the Albany Skyway

One rendering of one possible version of the project.

Three million dollars has a way of changing people's perspective of what's possible.

The idea behind the Albany Skyway -- to convert a lightly-used off-ramp from I-787 to Clinton Ave in Albany into a connection between Broadway and the riverfront -- first popped up in plans for the Corning Preserve and downtown four years ago. It was, as mayor Kathy Sheehan said at a public planning meeting Thursday evening, a "sort of pie in the sky, almost dream" idea.

The almost dream is now almost reality thanks in large part to $3.1 million in funding the Cuomo administration announced for the project this week, a surprise boost that now has the planning moving forward.

"We're in a unique position of starting off on a planning exercise that ... doesn't have have us going out at the end of the day and hoping to make this project a reality," Sarah Reginelli told the crowd. She's the president of Capitalize Albany, which has been heading up the planning. "This project will be a realty."

So that's what members of the public, along with all sorts of officials, got together to talk about.

Here are a bunch of bits about what people said they'd like to see happen, along with a few thoughts about this project.

(there's more)