From an aesthetic and design standpoint, it has always been our position to try to respect the innate character of the High Line itself: its singularity and linearity, its straight-forward pragmatism, its emergent properties with wild plant-life - meadows, thickets vines, mosses, Flowers, intermixed with ballast, steel tracks, railings, and concrete.

Our solution is primarily threefold: first the invention of a new paving system, built from linear concrete planks with open joints, specially tapered edges and seams  that permit the free flow of water (collected for irrigation) and the intermingling of organic plant-life with harder materials. Less a pathway and more a combed or furrowed landscape surface, this intermixing of plants with paving creates a rambling,texual effect of immersion, strolling "within " and "amongst" rather than feeling distanced from. The selection and arrangement of grasses and plants further helps to define a wild, dynamic character, distinct from a typical manicured landscape, and representative of the harsh, arid conditions of the shallow rooting depth. The second strategy is to slow things down, to promote a sense of duration and of being in another place, where time seems less pressing. Long stairways, meandering pathways, and hidden niches with seating encourage taking one's time. The third approach involved a careful sense of dimension and scale, minimizing the current tendency to make things bigger and obvious and seeking instead a more subtle gauge of the High Line's measure.

The result is an episodic and varied sequence of public spaces and landscape biotopes set along a simple and consistent line - a line that cuts across some of the most remarkable elevated vistas of Manhattan and the Hudson River, each view unfolding through an otherworldly synaesthesia of motion.

James Corner, Principal

Field Operations

quote from:Designing the High Line:Gansevoort Street to 30th Street