Connective Corridor was prominently featured in a 12-page spread in the May 2014 issue of Landscape Architecture Magazine.

A widely read publication, Landscape Architecture Magazine (LAM) was founded in 1910 and is the monthly magazine of the American Society of Landscape Architects — reaching more than 60,000 readers who plan and design projects valued at more than $140 billion each year.  The prestigious publication is available in both print and digital formats by subscription and may also be found each month in more than 200 bookstores across the United States and Canada.

Read the full article here. (8MB file size)

Here are some excerpts from the article.

LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE MAGAZINE MAY 2014

ARTICLE BY ALEX ULAM, A CAMBRIDGE-BASED FREELANCE JOURNALIST WHO WRITES FREQUENTLY ON ARCHITECTURE AND DESIGN. HIS WORK HAS APPEARED IN THE NEW YORK TIMES, MACLEAN’S. ARCHAEOLOGY, ARCHITECTURAL RECORD, THE ARCHITECT ‘S NEWSPAPER, AND OTHER PUBLICATIONS.

“Now the largest public works project in Syracuse in more than 30 years, a $42.5 million streetscape initiative called the Connective Corridor, is seeking to help the city recover from the tabula rasa era of urban planning by building bridges to its past and to its future. The project is establishing a distinctive design identity and a green ethos along a two-mile route leading from the core of Syracuse University’s imposing 19th-century hilltop campus toward a downtown that is finally awakening after decades of decline.”

…

“The Connective Corridor already is receiving national attention. A 2012 U.S. Green Building Council Global Community Leadership Award recognized Syracuse’s leaders for their sustainable initiatives, singling out the work that is taking place along the Connective Corridor. The project includes a three­ for-one tree replacement program, bikeways and rehabilitated parks. Among its ambitious goals is a plan to harvest and manage 22 million gallons of stormwater a year through a network of green roofs, porous pavement, and bioswales.”

…

“Tillett’s work along the Connective Corridor also includes work on the OLIN Partnership redesign for Forman Park, originally built in 1839. Here Tillett installed tiny pulsating LED lights in the park’s new custom-designed  red­painted benches.  Tillett, a quietly exuberant woman dressed in black and grays, calls these lights fire­flies. And on a winter’s night with the park’s historic fountain silent and its many bushes and trees denuded of all greenery, the little specks of flashing light highlight the unusual red benches and create an enchanted environment throughout the space.”

…

“The use of avant-garde lighting schemes to revitalize worn-out buildings and public spaces is not new to Syracuse. In fact, the city has some of the most dramatically lit buildings in the country. One prominent example is the art deco National Grid building, once home to the nation’s largest electric utility company, which is bathed top to bottom in a bold colored lighting program created in 1999 by Howard Brandston, the designer  of the current lighting plan for the Statue of Liberty. “Because of these long, gray, snowy winters, lighting has been a focus for us,” says Linda Dickerson Hartsock, director of the Connective Corridor for the Syracuse University Office of Community Engagement and Economic Development, the entity charged with developing the two-mile route.”

…

“In addition to Tillett’s work, the lighting plan for the Connective Corridor includes a facade grant improvement program with requests and guidelines for owners to illuminate their buildings. Hartsock says the facade lighting project will build on Tillett’s scheme “so that moving out from the streetscape, we will be lighting up a series of beautiful iconic buildings that go back to the mid-18oos.”

…

“The Connective Corridor, which is a partnership between Syracuse University, the city of Syracuse, and Onondaga County, is already paying huge dividends.  It has been linked to $270 million in private sector development in the past three years, and it is credited with a 35 percent increase in people living downtown in the same period. Prominent architects such as Toshiko Mori and Richard Gluckman are designing new buildings and redesigning old ones alongside it. And the Connective Corridor’s environmental ethos has also inspired the construction of five new LEED Platinum buildings alongside or nearby it.”

…

“As the most identifiable marker along the Connective Corridor, Tillett’s lighting certainly is changing the city’s appearance and opening possibilities for the future.  If you think about great European cities, one of the things that I think truly makes them special is the way that they use lighting,” says Hartsock. “Syracuse has a lot of that style of architecture here, and there is so much more that we could do with lighting –looking at it both from a functional point of view and also as art to illuminate a public space.”

Connective Corridor Project Credits

·         DESIGN, ENGINEERING, LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE, AND CONSTRUCTION MANAGEMENT: BARTON &. LOGUDICE, D.P.C., SYRACUSE, NEW YORK

·         LANDSCAPE ARCHITECTURE CONSULTANT: OLIN,  PHILADELPHIA

·         LIGHTING  DESIGN CONSULTANT: TILLETT LIGHTING DESIGN, BROOKLY N, NEW YORK

·         IDENTITY AND INSTITUTIONAL PARTNERSHIP BRANDING CONSULTANT:  PENTAGRAM , LONDON/ NEW YORK

·         DESIGN VISION:  CLEAR, SYRACUSE,  NEW YORK, UPSTATE : A CENTER FOR DESIGN RESEARCH AND REAL ESTATE, THE SYRACUSE SCHOOL OF ARCHITECTURE, SYRACUSE, NEW YORK

·         CONSTRUCTION AND CONSTRUCTION INSPECTION: BARRETT, ROSELAND NEW JERSEY/SYRACUSE and C&.S COMPANIES,  SYRACUSE,  NEW YORK

·         LANDSCAPE INSTALLATION:  BALLARD, SYRACUSE, NEW YORK