A Different Kind Of Acupuncture

Recently I touched on the concept of urban acupuncture as part of a larger article on Geographic Information Systems. Urban acupuncture attacks decay in tiny doses.  It’s one building, one reclaimed block, one community garden over time that creates a steady, sturdy patchwork of success in an area.

Because I believe nature achieves balance; winter with summer, light with dark, war with peace, and prosperity with need, urban acupuncture may well be a trend that takes hold for some time because it’s the opposite of the gargantuan projects of the past which haven’t all worked, and which we can no longer afford anyway.

Consider the sort of balance between two long ago infrastructure schemes for our area.  The Erie canal was the result of a giant man-made trough, east to west, across New York State, an umbilical cord of sorts for all our upstate cities; Albany, Amsterdam, Utica, Syracuse, Rochester and Buffalo, as mules pulled cargo and a new economy from the Atlantic Ocean to the Midwest.

Once trains took over for the mules, we were left with a river that looks like nature had put it there.  Today the Erie Canal is lovely.  Pleasure craft float by willow trees with branches that bend and touch the water.  In some places the old canal runs through charming pedestrian and boat-friendly villages like Seneca Falls which offer us an appealing European aesthetic.  The project was a success, but its death was a success too, which is rare.

There’s no such evocation of nature with Interstate-81  This is another trough, the one that goes from north to south.  Though the need for vehicular transport of people and goods past Syracuse is not obsolete, the monstrous hulk of concrete and asphalt that cuts our city in half is expensive to maintain and at the end of its lifespan.  It must be entirely rebuilt or eliminated, but unlike the picturesque Erie Canal, a decaying elevated highway is not something from which we can simply walk away.

I say knock it down.  No one who uses that highway ever gets off and explores our city with their tourist dollars.  Traffic should be diverted onto Interstate-481, our version of a beltway.  The remaining local traffic is something we can handle.

Removing the highway would open the expanse of real estate that stands between the part of town that is growing; the University hill, with the part of town that is not; everything west of it.  That so much is made about every detail of the build out for a single national retailer, Urban Outfitters in Armory Square, says something scary about where we are.

Because there is no more money for giant projects, we’ll have to approach the future differently.  That’s where the acupuncture comes in.  If we divert north/south traffic onto I-481, we can slowly reclaim small pieces of what is left behind.  It doesn’t all have to happen at once.

Until we decide what to build, plant vegetable gardens.  That’s acupuncture.  Think of how many Syracusans could find fresh produce within walking distance of their homes.   I’d love to see all the residential south side streets that dead end on both sides of the highway reconnected, one block at a time, more acupuncture.  I’d like to see energy efficient, affordable housing where the passing lane once lie so the people least able to afford to heat and repair crumbling, uninsulated homes have some money left over for other necessities.

With the south side portion of route-81 gone, my kooky dream is to open up the original main entrance under the grand redstone gates of Oakwood Cemetery.  Southsiders could once again access this beautiful and historic cemetery/ architectural gem/arboretum, and meet up with the rest of us who come in from Comstock Avenue to the west.  Right now a monstrous berm blocks the gates and trees grow from cracks in the masonry, but you have to know where to look to find it and looking is hazardous when you’re driving a few yards away at 60 mph.

Just as the most comfortable of homes are decorated over time; a family heirloom here, a new furniture purchase there, we can take baby steps at building a better city too.  Whether or not we get the land back from route 81, we can fix up pockets of the place one block, one project at a time; nothing too ambitious, just some acupuncture applied here and there for a steady and modest improvement of where we live.

Tagged as: Syracuse, urban acupuncture