The Reconstruction of West Street and Battery Place
On top of not running during my off-work hours, which is a drastic enough change by itself, life has also recently markedly changed during my work hours. Both of these changes have turned me into more of a hermit than usual, and made me feel a bit like I've dropped off the face of the earth.
Most people think that as a landscape architect, I have this great outdoor job that involves moving around greenery into position to create attractive, appealing environments. Unfortunately, the truth is that normally I sit in an office all year staring at a computer, save for the odd monthly visit to a project sites for a field meeting. Lately, however, I've been given the role of a site inspector, overseeing the construction of the landscape design of West Street (known as State Route 9A) and the new urban plaza across from Battery Park, at 17 Battery Place. Suddenly, I fit the landscape architect stereotype!
First of all, I didn't design any of it - so if you don't like the new configuration of streets, public walkways, and the new bikeway - I don't want to hear it. My job is to make sure that they're putting the soft landscape materials (trees, shrubs, perennials) in the correct placement, according to the plans and specifications, i.e. making sure the plant goes in the right spot, green-side-up. There are other inspectors on site in charge of the hard landscape materials (Paving, lighting, retaining walls, crosswalks, etc.).
Early on, this change in routine was pretty stressful, as my time was split between this new role and the office, as I had to juggle the demands of a many different projects. This is not unusual, but doing it between two geographic locations is. However, in the last few weeks, though, due to on-site staffing, I've been solely dedicated to the West Street project. This is good and bad. The bad is the 60-hour week that starts at 6 AM, which means I have to pry myself off my mattress shortly after 4:30 AM. It's been very exhausting, just because I haven't kept up with my sleep needs. Twelve hour days four times a week, and two days of eight hours. No wonder this blog's been so inactive.
On the other hand, being outside has been a welcome change from my cube and its flourescent lighting. Overseeing construction is not extremely demanding, but you do have to be on the ball to catch anything that's not happening according to the drawings and specifications, and it's such a large project that can at time feel like you need to be in many different locations at once, and then at other times, you're just standing around waiting for the workers to finish planting a certain area just so that you can inspect it and check it off your list.
It also brings some of my personal experiences full circle. Putting myself through university, I did a lot of landscape construction, and being back on a worksite watching others work is a strange turn of the tide. I'm a physical, hands-on kind of guy, and sometimes I'd rather just be doing the construction.
Obviously, I'm not at liberty to go into the decisions made about the design or construction of the project. I can tell you, though, that there are 22,937 trees, shrubs, perennials, and annuals on the site, and that I've had to account for each and every one of them. I also foresee some good running in the future, as the bikeway/promenade is further constructed during the next phase, north from West Thames Street along 9A. And in the meantime, I'm just happy to be working outside in such beautiful weather.
The official ribbon-cutting is on July 5th. Hope you can get down there to enjoy it.
Most people think that as a landscape architect, I have this great outdoor job that involves moving around greenery into position to create attractive, appealing environments. Unfortunately, the truth is that normally I sit in an office all year staring at a computer, save for the odd monthly visit to a project sites for a field meeting. Lately, however, I've been given the role of a site inspector, overseeing the construction of the landscape design of West Street (known as State Route 9A) and the new urban plaza across from Battery Park, at 17 Battery Place. Suddenly, I fit the landscape architect stereotype!
First of all, I didn't design any of it - so if you don't like the new configuration of streets, public walkways, and the new bikeway - I don't want to hear it. My job is to make sure that they're putting the soft landscape materials (trees, shrubs, perennials) in the correct placement, according to the plans and specifications, i.e. making sure the plant goes in the right spot, green-side-up. There are other inspectors on site in charge of the hard landscape materials (Paving, lighting, retaining walls, crosswalks, etc.).
Early on, this change in routine was pretty stressful, as my time was split between this new role and the office, as I had to juggle the demands of a many different projects. This is not unusual, but doing it between two geographic locations is. However, in the last few weeks, though, due to on-site staffing, I've been solely dedicated to the West Street project. This is good and bad. The bad is the 60-hour week that starts at 6 AM, which means I have to pry myself off my mattress shortly after 4:30 AM. It's been very exhausting, just because I haven't kept up with my sleep needs. Twelve hour days four times a week, and two days of eight hours. No wonder this blog's been so inactive.
On the other hand, being outside has been a welcome change from my cube and its flourescent lighting. Overseeing construction is not extremely demanding, but you do have to be on the ball to catch anything that's not happening according to the drawings and specifications, and it's such a large project that can at time feel like you need to be in many different locations at once, and then at other times, you're just standing around waiting for the workers to finish planting a certain area just so that you can inspect it and check it off your list.
It also brings some of my personal experiences full circle. Putting myself through university, I did a lot of landscape construction, and being back on a worksite watching others work is a strange turn of the tide. I'm a physical, hands-on kind of guy, and sometimes I'd rather just be doing the construction.
Obviously, I'm not at liberty to go into the decisions made about the design or construction of the project. I can tell you, though, that there are 22,937 trees, shrubs, perennials, and annuals on the site, and that I've had to account for each and every one of them. I also foresee some good running in the future, as the bikeway/promenade is further constructed during the next phase, north from West Thames Street along 9A. And in the meantime, I'm just happy to be working outside in such beautiful weather.
The official ribbon-cutting is on July 5th. Hope you can get down there to enjoy it.
Labels: landscape architecture, work
posted by Skylight at 5:29 PM
1 Comments:
I'll definitely make it down there at some point!
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