Raise the Hammer

Where Does Bad Design Come From?

Bad design continues to haunt Hamilton. Only a few years ago, a similar opportunity to redefine the lower city via the much tauted "brand-spanking new Centre Mall" was lost forever in a sea of scattered stucco boxes.

The true impact of bad design can be seen daily in the vacuous expanse surrounding these boxes.

What could have been the most innovative transit centric, pedestrian oriented and bustling, sustainable/green mixed-used development -- at the hands of inept and greedy buffoons, very quickly morphed into one the most disastrous urban retail developments in North America.

Good design was available for the asking, locally, provincially or nationally - but instead, poor design was selected by the 'MBA centric suit' mindset, with little real-world experience of "civic duty" -- the stuff from which good design springs.

Our politicians at every level will refuse to learn from this debacle - because, they continue to look at such large developments as a convenient vehicle for re-election.

Boosterism, buzz, and lies is what drives such mega projects. Our politician are least interested in the reality of the outcomes - which is too distant in time for it to be of any strategic political value. It is in the 'now-ness' of the hype that they thrive on.

For them to become curious about good design, or invest time to investigate its lasting positive impact on the culture and economics of the city would require a sensibility that simply does not exist among the present breed of politicians and designers of such projects.

The Discovery Centre on the waterfront was one such hyped up project designed for political capital, and having achieved its intent within five years, was unceremoniously hacked into a commercial enterprise.

If Centre Mall was underwhelming, wait till you see what will be sprouting soon on Main and Bay.

For the proposed IWS, many community consultations were held by an American architect, only a few months ago. This got many in Ward 3 communities energized. The visioning process of the neighbourhood that was undertaken at these meetings was stellar, and the hopes generated, very high.

One thing visibly missing from these community consultations was the Stadium design. And rightfully so!!

God forbid, had this pathetic caricature of a stadium design been presented to the community at these meetings - all hell would have surely broken loose two months ago.

What the community was told at these meetings was that the social, cultural and economic impact of this $150 Million investment would be felt for many blocks surrounding the stadium in Ward 3.

The unveiled arcade of exposed steel columns on either side of the stadium silently begs to differ.

The community in good faith accepted the logic presented at the consultations. And it is possible that most went back from these meetings with mental images of a grand development befitting their neighbourhood.

So, what went wrong?

In fact, nothing. On the contrary, things went extremely well - as planned!

"Bait and switch" is the operative word in Ontario in our times, and Hamilton is no exception. It is the only way left, after a decade of plundering the treasury at every level.

The protocol is simple. Overwhelm the senses with grand talks, buzz words and patently false/misleading renderings - and call it the "vision"; then micro-manage the community input process. And then, fatigue the community with banalities of the restored grandeur, and quietly slam them with a hyper-controlled leak of an underwhelming - affordable design with a - this is what you get for the budget you have.

Such a protocol virtually assures that fifty percent of the population will continue to believe in the false buzz created by words and renderings, while the other thirty percent will turn around and justify that "bad is better than none". The remaining twenty percent may cringe, scream, and kvetch but eventually, will go silent.

Politicians continue to reward and dance around the virtues of sole-sourcing designs/projects of such types that devastate the identity of the community and the psychology of its people. It works for them politically and helps maintain the balance of power - and that is all that matters to them.

So where does bad design come from in Hamilton/Ontario? It comes from greed, ignorance, arrogance and conceit - the stuff from which "civic duty" most surely cannot grow.

The proposed IWS stadium design needs a 'street wall' on its periphery. Without a scaled down street wall, it is nothing but an ugly exposed skeleton of a simplistic steel-frame structure, just waiting to deteriorate in 20 years.

Fortunately theExaminer.com has stated that: "The stadium is expected to be completed for July 2014, one year ahead of the 2015 Pan Am Games."

This would imply that "One Year" is still available to redesign this colossal misstep.

The city mandated 'site plan approval process' also controls the city directed 'architectural & design guidelines".

This is the only point in the process where the architects could be sent back to the drawing board legally.

So, it is imperative that the city planning staff shows foresight in correcting the wrong path presently taken by the IWS design. It is also critical that community groups and individuals inform the city planning staff that the IWS in its present form defies universal design guidelines which could directly revitalize the local community.

A twenty to thirty feet mixed-use wrap of three/four floors, on the rear side of both the "glorified bleachers" would not only give the required street scaling and street wall with a street life -- but could also, if smartly done, provide a regular flow of much needed revenues to the city.

The vacuous front plaza also needs to be set amidst a grand entrance that defines the stadium precinct. This is the place where Hamilton's sports legacy for the coming generations can be defined - or as in the current design scheme, destroyed for ever.

It is a myth that "good design" requires tons of money, and that you get what you pay for.

Design Like you Give a Damn by Architecture for Humanity shows us very clearly that it does not take pots of money to create legacies through good design.

Do we have a culture that gives a damn? let alone design like it gives a damn?

Mahesh P. Butani

• Public Interest Design

Comment edited by Mahesh_P_Butani on 2012-10-15 14:33:27