BENDER WELLS CLARK DESIGN
Changes true to spirit of River Walk's creator
By Mike Greenberg
Express-News Senior Critic
Web Posted:
Ever since its completion in 1940, architect Robert Hugman's River Walk landscaping presented a beautiful, romantic face to the world.
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Under the skin, however, all was not well.
The federal Works Progress Administration, the Depression-era employment program that built the River Walk landscape, had neglected to provide proper footings for stone walls or prevent seepage of water to the soil behind and below them. (Midway through the project, the agency's name was changed to the Work Projects Administration.)
Along the main channel, subject to flooding, the banks failed with such
frequency in the 1990s that the River Walk could have been mistaken for
downtown
The city has just completed the first phase — from Convent Street to Lexington Avenue — of a project to stabilize what remained of the original work, to reconstruct walls and walkways that had collapsed and to add amenities and aesthetic enhancements along the way.
Completion of the second phase, between Convent and
The hand of Bender Wells Clark Design, the landscape architecture firm, is
most visible in the project's focal point, a new minipark with stairs and ramp
linking the River Walk to
Concrete artist Carlos Cortés, tile artist Oscar Alvarado and punched-metal light-fixture designer Judith Maxwell also made prominent contributions.
The bulk of the work, however, was addressed to invisibly correcting structural problems and repairing the damage already done.
Concrete piers were poured behind retaining walls to protect them from outward pressure.
The pilot channel, which confines the river during normal flow, was given concrete footings, and collapsed sections were rebuilt with new stonework exactly matching the scale and pattern of the original.
The old
(The stonemasons of Krisch Construction deserve praise for first-class work throughout this project.)
The riverbed was deepened in places so pools would remain in dry periods to provide refuges for fish, and the whole bed was paved with cobbles to maintain an attractive appearance during dry times.
Visible additions were designed to fit the Hugman aesthetic, for the most part, without directly imitating Hugman's designs.
On one bank, the original walkway ended at St. Mary's Street. Beyond that
point, the architects wove a new one into the steep slope and under the
The architects created four decorative patterns, in the same stylistic territory as Hugman's originals, to be etched into the concrete surfaces of new and rebuilt walkways.
In the new park, a classic Hugman gesture was ingeniously adapted to modern needs: Situated at one switchback of the wheelchair ramp, a bench of sensuously sculpted concrete has a wide notch in the middle so that a person in a wheelchair can sit next to his or her companions.
Cortés, who has revived the concrete sculpting technique perfected early in the 20th century by Dionisio Rodriguez, created a wonderful trellis of four "trees" with interweaving branches that spread across the walkway to touch the stone retaining wall behind Municipal Auditorium.
The trellis is actually a functional buttress. Inside are steel beams that push in against the wall, to counter outward pressure from heavy semi trailer trucks at the auditorium's loading dock.
Cortés also is creating two benches in the same trademark style, a unique
feature of
Alvarado is working on a dozen tile murals, all but one designed by
Maxwell's studio provided three punched-metal sconces and four tall copper-clad lamps with delicate pinhole patterns for the new park.
Formerly a small parking lot at the corner of
Multiple stairways connect the River Walk to both streets. The wheelchair ramp, weaving between high stone-walled planters and intersecting the stairway path at several levels, is seamlessly integrated into the whole structure. Seating terraces facing the river are pleasant spots for brown-bag lunches.
The designers may have erred, however, in trying to cram too much stuff, too much complexity and too much concrete and stone surface into so small a space. More shade would be nice — the trees are palms.
The (literally) glaring problem with the park and the riverside walkways can't be blamed on the landscape architects, however.
After sunset, the eye can find no escape from the glare of metal-halide light sources, some in fixtures mounted high on retaining walls, some in waist-high bollards along the walkways.
Perforated shields are to be installed in the bollard lights to reduce the glare, though the one shield already in place doesn't help enough.
The city insisted on the high illumination level for reasons of safety and security. The tradeoffs were visual discomfort and aesthetic degradation, a visual flattening of the space.
What's really required for a stage-set landscape such as the River Walk is a stage-set lighting design, with every instrument located and aimed in a site-specific way to sculpt the light while hiding the sources from direct view.
But that degree of care is properly the province of lighting design specialists, and it doesn't come cheap.
The extra cost would have been a wise investment, especially in view of the
role this stretch of river will eventually play as linchpin of a continuous
linear park from
In daylight, at least, this project does a remarkably good job of preserving and extending the Hugman legacy.
At night, you can always wear sunglasses.
mgreenberg@express-news.net