Tuesday, April 15, 2008

Shabby Work

Another death on a construction site yesterday. That brings the total to thirteen this year and we're only in April. Of course, half of those deaths were from the crain crash last March.

According to the Daily News, the site of this latest accident, another hideous high-rise, has 38 open Building Department violations. This seems to be standard operating procedure for construction in the city these days. Is it just me or don't all these new buildings look like one strong wind would knock them over?

And another thing, while huge high-rises are still as ugly as ever, when did midsized buildings become so hideous. All the new apartments and condos in Williamsburg/Greenpoint and Chelsea look like they belong in Tel Aviv. (I must give props to my peep Erin for coming up with that one, but it's true).

Used to be a time when architects actually tried to a)make buildings that fit the form and mood of the neighborhood and b)would look great one hundred years from now. Now the goal is to build it fast, cheap and, if possible, extremely ugly. If AMC, makers of the Pacer and the Gremlin, got into architecture, these are what their buildings would look like.

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