The view of the downtown Durham skyline is changing
I was cruising down the Durham Freeway this morning when I spotted some sort of green mural on the side of the new parking deck that adjoins the Durham Performing Arts Center. At first I thought the Chapel Hill mural bug must have bit the Bull City, but I as I got closer, I saw that they were mesh panels hanging from the top of the deck.
I was so glad to see these panels camoflaging the concrete deck.
In July, I wrote a spokeswoman for the city of Durham and asked whether there were plans to conceal some of the concrete. Here’s what the parking deck looked like then:
She responded saying the banners were forthcoming. Eventually, there will be a building adjacent to this parking deck, which will block the deck’s view from the road. In the meantime, I applaud the city for taking steps to spruce up a generic parking deck. I hope the folks building the parking deck for the new Hue development in downtown Raleigh take a similar approach.
Don’t forget, tonight is the official ribbon-cutting for the Durham Performing Arts Center. The public event starts at 5:30 and includes the lighting of the light sculpture “Sleep No More,” by artist Jaume Plensa.
Wow, those look great! Thanks for pointing them out. I hope to catch the Lewis Black show on Wednesday there.
I hate the fact that parking garages are such eyesores – but unfortunately the most secure way to design them is to have large open views into the parking areas themselves. Natural surveillance increases safety by making people feel uncomfortable when they are up to no good.
Although this garage has the banners covering mostly plain concrete – I’ve seen others where the open space is covered up by artwork and although it’s aesthetically pleasing, it cuts down on the safety factor.
Wish there was a happy medium.
@Shawn I never thought about that, but I’d definitely leave it to you to be on top of security issues.