After over a decade of reports, designs, and public outreach, the United Nations Plaza in San Francisco was dedicated in 1976. Using historical documents such as government reports, design guidelines, letters, meeting minutes, and newspaper articles from archives, I argue that while the construction of the UN Plaza has failed to completely transform the social and economic life of the area, it succeeds in creating a genuinely public space. The history of the UN Plaza can serve both as a cautionary tale for those interested in changing property values purely through changing design, and as a standard of success in making a space used by a true cross-section of urban society.
History
Publication title
Archnet-IJAR: International Journal of Architectural Research
Volume
11
Pagination
123-136
ISSN
1938-7806
Department/School
School of Architecture and Design
Publisher
ArchNet
Place of publication
USA
Rights statement
Copyright 2017 Archnet-IJAR, International Journal of Architectural Research Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Repository Status
Open
Socio-economic Objectives
Expanding knowledge in built environment and design