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Today's News - August 8, 2006

A new Utah University performance hall bridges the town/gown divide. -- New Urbanists and pro-property rights advocates have become masters of storytelling to get their messages across. -- America knows how to build successful mixed-use communities, but is there the political will? -- Ouroussoff takes on new planning strategy in New Orleans: it's now up to the residents to master plan their future - despite lack of comprehensive guidelines. -- Chicago's mayor is getting public housing right. -- To get things right in Mumbai, Correa says people should elect mayor and use planners and architects as experts, not just executioners. -- Toronto's Yonge-Dundas Square finally hip. -- Three visions for L.A.'s cornfield park. -- Phoenix gets ready to open its new stadium (or is it a "giant silver-frosted cupcake" or a "coiled rattlesnake" or a barrel cactus?). -- The National Park Seminary outside of Washington, DC, is ready for its fantasy makeover. -- L.A. preservationists rescue a Lautner. -- Malaysian architecture without the kitsch. -- Surveillance technology leaves Big Brother behind. -- Shortlist for U.K.'s 2006 Better Public Building Awards. -- In a new book about Sydney Opera House, Utzon thanks his successor (without naming names). -- Erickson exhibition doesn't do Canada's "most distinguished architect" (and what has "kept him from achieving the greatness of which he's capable?"). -- An Osaka exhibition looks at an "alternative modernism."

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Fine Tuning: Utah State University Performance Hall: Inspired by the surrounding mountains, a new building establishes a campus arts precinct that bridges the town/gown divide. -- Sasaki Associates [images]- ArchNewsNow

Op-Ed: Urban Fables: The Role Of Storytelling And Imagery In Successful Planning Movements: New Urbanists and pro-property rights advocates have made good use of both allegory and myth to capture the attention of planners and the public. By Leonardo Vazquez, AICP/PP- PLANetizen

Concentrated Poverty in New Orleans and Other American Cities: The challenges...are complicated by the sluggish nature of the rebuilding effort...America knows how to promote housing choice and build mixed-income communities that work economically and socially. The only question is whether we have the political will... By Bruce Katz [from The Chronicle of Higher Education]- Brookings Institute

In New Orleans, Each Resident Is Master of Plan to Rebuild: Rebuilding a city, it seems, is too important a task to be left to professional planners...one of the most daunting urban reconstruction projects in American history in the hands of local residents. By Nicolai Ouroussoff -- Wayne Troyer; Robert Tannen; Andrés Duany; Frederic Schwartz; Reed Kroloff; Ray Manning [slide show]- New York Times

Housing That Means Freedom: ...mixed-income townhouse and apartment developments...have replaced those 16-story monuments to drugs, despair and degradation that were the landmarks of Chicago's public housing for 50 years.- Washington Post

Charles Correa: Mayor should be elected by people rather than state: ...To save Mumbai city from the brink of disaster vis-a-vis crumbling infrastructure...lack of planners and the role of architects as experts, rather than executioners in policy and decision making also undermines the proper maintaining and development of a city...- Express Newsline (India)

Yonge-Dundas Square finally hip: We have stopped worrying about what it isn't — a park — and learned to appreciate it for what it is — an urban square. By Christopher Hume -- Brown + Storey Architects- Toronto Star

Trying to Build the Perfect Park: Finalists Ready Plans for the Future of the Cornfield Site: ...each boast a prominent local architect...finalists discussed their visions... -- Field Operations/Thom Mayne; Hargreaves and Associates/Michael Maltzan; Mia and Michael Lehrer- LA Downtown News

Cardinals Stadium: There is a giant silver-frosted cupcake that dominates the horizon in Glendale...twin parentage is apparent...The outside belongs to Eisenman, the inside to HOK, and the two components couldn't be more different. [video link]- Arizona Republic

Preserving History and a "Fantasy Feeling": A long-neglected sanctuary outside Washington with 12 architecturally distinct building is undergoing a renovation estimated at $111,000,000. -- Alexander Company [images]- New York Times

Preservationists Score a Coup in Rescuing L.A. Office Designed by John Lautner: ...design will be reinstalled — in form and function — at LACMA West....the only such space ever designed by the architect...- Los Angeles Times

Uniquely Malaysian, but not kitsch: In their quest to create buildings with a Malaysian identity, some architects just stick a traditional roof atop a concrete box...one architect with a more holistic approach. -- Chris Wong/C'arch Architecture + Design- The Star (Malaysia)

Did you ever feel you were being watched? With surveillance technology so quietly pervasive, Electroland looks to pull back the curtain in its public art. -- Diller Scofidio + Renfro; Johnson Fain [images]- Los Angeles Times

2006 Prime Minister’s Better Public Building Award Finalists -- Hopkins Architects; John McAslan and Partners; Richard Rogers Partnership; Studio E; Wilson Mason & Partners; Snell Associates; DSDHA; David Morley Architects; etc. [images]- CABE (Commission for Architecture and the Built Environment, UK)

Thanks for finishing the job: Opera House creator salutes successors: "Building a masterpiece: the Sydney Opera House" -- Joern Utzon; Peter Hall- Sydney Morning Herald

Greatness eludes Canada's top designer: Show reduces Arthur Erickson to 12 buildings: ...[he] remains strangely disengaged from architecture as anything more than an exercise in aesthetics...Of course Erickson deserves a show, but this isn't it. By Christopher Hume- Toronto Star

Exhibition review: Shuhei Endo and Sou Fujimoto: "New Geometry Architecture: Toward an Alternative Modernism"...the use of unadorned shapes made from a single material has distilled the show into a lucid and interesting spatial experience...at Kirin Plaza Osaka through September 3. By Thomas Daniell [images]- Artscape (Japan)

Northwest Expansion: Portland Art Museum: Sensitive historic restoration combined with contemporary design expands a museum into a dynamic new art center. -- Ann Beha Architects; SERA Architects [images]- ArchNewsNow

-- Inauguration: SANAA/Kazuyo Sejima + Ryue Nishizawa: Zollverein School, Essen, Germany
-- Under construction: Rem Koolhaas/OMA: Coal Washing Plant, Zollverein Mining Complex, Essen, Germany
-- Master Plan: Rem Koolhaas/OMA: Zollverein Mining Complex, Essen, Germany

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