Jeffrey LeFrancois, government director of the Meatpacking District Administration Affiliation, the neighborhood’s enterprise enchancment district, has a mantra about city life. “If town’s not altering, town’s not wholesome,” he says as he strolls down the 14th Avenue Promenade, the title for 2 pedestrianized blocks of the crosstown road that the BID inaugurated in June.
Taking the place of parked automobiles are 5 curbside decks, every measuring round 18 ft lengthy, furnished with public seating; tall timber in weathered metal planters that bookend loading zones; and granite boulders that pinch the roadway into two lanes. LeFrancois crosses the road from deck to deck as a way to present me the ideological shift that these interventions characterize: pedestrians rule the street.
Elsewhere within the Meatpacking District—roughly eight sq. blocks bounded by 14th road to the north, Gansevoort road to the south, Hudson road to the East, and Hudson River Park to the west—there’s ample proof of the ability shift that has been happening on the streets: a lot of seating streets with colourful murals on the pavement, and landscaping that provides a leafy buffer between busy thoroughfares and bustling plazas the place individuals are consuming espresso, taking cellphone calls, and assembly pals.
[Photo: BrakeThrough Media]
The neighborhood is unrecognizable from 30 years in the past, when supply vans for slaughterhouses rumbled down the street, carcasses hung from loading dock awnings, and it was the middle of queer nightlife.
Whereas its high-end retail, influencer-filled eating places, and luxurious condos are probably the most seen components of the Meatpacking District’s transformation right into a mixed-use purchasing and tradition vacation spot, its pedestrianized streets and public areas have steadily turn into probably the most highly effective. And probably the most bold.
The district payments itself as the primary pedestrian-priority neighborhood in New York Metropolis and has been among the many most bold in adopting experimental streetscape concepts. The neighborhood in the present day proves that prioritizing walkability and deemphasizing driving is a successful method for a balanced public realm and provides an instance of what might be achieved elsewhere within the metropolis when the suitable forces align.
[Photo: BrakeThrough Media]
Designing a ‘Pedestrian Precedence District’
The Meatpacking’s European-style pedestrian flip is a response to new growth in and across the space that has elevated the amount of foot site visitors tremendously. “To not match that on our streets is a missed alternative,” LeFrancois says.
The Whitney Museum opened in 2015 and now sees a million guests yearly, up from 300,000 to 350,000 friends per yr when it was on Madison Avenue. Little Island, which opened in 2021, attracts 1.5 million guests a yr. Then 2023 noticed the opening of Gansevoort Peninsula, a 5.5-acre growth to Hudson River Park, and Pier 57, a market corridor with a well-liked rooftop park. These locations joined the Excessive Line, which opened in 2009 and now receives eight million guests a yr.
Jeffrey LeFrancois, Govt Director of the Meatpacking District Administration Affiliation, welcomes attendees to the disclosing of Gansevoort Touchdown on Sept. 28, 2023. [Photo: BrakeThrough Media]
Not solely is the Meatpacking District a vacation spot in and of itself, it’s additionally an area folks stroll by means of on their method from the subway to those new public areas on the west aspect. And the BID needs to entice these walkers to linger—and spend a couple of bucks whereas they’re at it.
“It’s all about stream, porosity, and entry,” Le Francois says of the center of the technique. “We see that as a significant driver for why folks wish to be right here . . . It’s not only a one-off go to that we wish to have occur; we wish to ensure that individuals are serious about their return as properly.”
This philosophy has pushed incremental streetscape enhancements that started as non permanent tactical measures earlier than changing into everlasting fixtures. This included leveraging the Bloomberg-era plaza program to reclaim site visitors lanes alongside Ninth Avenue for public area, a course of that started with barricades earlier than resulting in a $28 million capital undertaking that was accomplished in 2019.
In collaboration with DOT and the panorama structure agency Ken Smith Workshop, the BID widened sidewalks, put in 40 movable planters that measured 10-by-5 ft every, furnished plazas with a whole lot of chairs and dozens of tables, and built-in clean granite slab bike paths down the middle of the cobblestone road.
[Photo: BrakeThrough Media]
Then, in late spring of 2020, after changing into one of many first neighborhoods to take part within the metropolis’s Open Streets program, the District started finding out the way it may turn into a real pedestrian-priority neighborhood.
LeFrancois and his workforce had already been serious about the best way to construct off of the profitable plaza program however the pandemic, and the sudden citywide curiosity in rethinking public area by means of applications like open streets and out of doors eating “supplied the flash level, the water within the scorching pan to permit it to occur,” he says.
All of this culminated within the 2022 Western Gateway Public Realm Motion Plan. Developed by the design agency WXY and TYLin, the plan recognized alternatives to rightsize the neighborhood’s infrastructure for the big selection makes use of it now sees: pedestrians, buses, cyclists, supply automobiles, taxis and ride-sharing, and private automobiles.
David Vega-Barachowitz, an affiliate principal at WXY, says that as New York Metropolis districts just like the Meatpacking transition from industrial use to a mix of makes use of, infrastructure plans have “privileged patterns of motion which are old-fashioned or misaligned with coverage priorities, but additionally ossified this very autocentric perspective on how we take into consideration streets.” Whereas land use and motion patterns have modified, streets haven’t saved tempo.
The Public Realm Motion Plan’s solutions included constructing a brand new crosswalk the place Gansevoort Avenue meets the West Facet Freeway; pedestrianizing east-west streets within the neighborhood; making tenth Avenue, which stays probably the most industrial of the neighborhood’s streets and serves as a back-of-house, extra nice to stroll down; and untangling the intersection between 14th road and tenth Avenue because it’s a significant crossing to Hudson River Park.
[Photo: Meatpacking BID/Cherry Orchard]
It’s “rethinking the suitable of method in a extra complete method,” says Lian Farhi, a senior affiliate and director of city planning and design at TYLin.
Many of those tasks have been accomplished or are underway. In late 2023, the brand new crossing throughout the West Facet Freeway at Gansevoort Avenue opened as did Gansevoort Touchdown, a pedestrianized portion of tenth avenue between the Whitney Museum and the brand new crossing.
“We name it a touchdown as a result of it’s on the sting of the West Facet freeway,” LeFrancois says. “It’s not probably the most interesting place to spend time and sit and have a cup of espresso, however while you depart the museum and also you see this good little respite with seating, perhaps you’re going to open your map for 5 minutes then determine the place to go. Folks will make the most of bizarre areas in the event you give them the possibility to take action.”
And this emphasis on a superb expertise works. Claire Weisz, a founding accomplice of WXY, steadily visits out of doors occasions within the neighborhood and notices comparable conversations taking place.
“I actually overhear folks saying, ‘I come right here now as a result of nothing like this within the metropolis,’” she says. “And really not often do they are saying, ‘as a result of there’s no automobiles,’ proper? However they’re implying it in the way in which they are saying it . . . Meatpacking is simply such an amazing poster for why it is best to take into account not letting automobiles simply do no matter they need in any district. It was actually courageous of them.”
[Photo: Meatpacking BID/BrakeThrough Media]
A Cohesive Neighborhood Imaginative and prescient
To revamp the neighborhood, the BID works step-by-step, tackling small tasks one after the other in order that the entire might be “radically transformative,” LeFrancois says. And now the district is at a degree the place pedestrians can expertise the outcome.
It’s an strategy that has concerned determining which metropolis insurance policies and applications it may possibly leverage, then working intently with the myriad stakeholders within the neighborhood—companies, cultural establishments, neighborhood boards, preservation teams, metropolis council workplaces, builders—and aligning them on a imaginative and prescient.
It helps that it’s a sexy one. In 2022, Avenue Plans and TYLin developed a tactical supplies catalog for streetscape enhancements. “The most important query for us was how will we create pedestrian areas that reply to town and to the fabric cloth of the neighborhood?” says Veronica Rivas Plaza, a senior undertaking designer at Avenue Plans.
[Photo: BrakeThrough Media]
These panorama components reference the neighborhood’s structure and historical past—suppose sturdy pure supplies with an industrial end like metal, wooden, and stone—and assist beautify and unify the interventions, from non permanent installations all the way in which to everlasting fixtures.
To wit: the blackened metal, wooden decks, and lounge chairs that comprise installations inside the 14th Avenue Promenade, customized constructed by the Nordic out of doors furnishings maker Vestre, nod to the Excessive Line’s language.
The BID appeared to 3 DOT applications to develop the promenade. The Curb Administration Motion Plan, a 2023 initiative to diversify how NYC allocates area on the curb, knowledgeable the redistribution of area. As a result of the BID wished to maintain the seating areas public, it labored with DOT to designate parts of the curb lanes on 14th road as plazas.
[Photo: Meatpacking BID/BrakeThrough Media]
This framework will permit them to do extra with the area, corresponding to programming concessions and enabling year-round out of doors seating. This coverage lever is a notable distinction between BID’s roadway set up and different road furnishings; Eating Out NYC and Avenue Seats are seasonal.
The workforce referenced out of doors eating pointers to find out just a few key options for the parklet design, together with aligning the deck flush with the curb for accessibility, leaving room beneath it for stormwater to stream unobstructed, and specifying detachable decking.
However there are just a few key departures, porous perimeters so pedestrians can entry them from the road aspect—a delicate element that encourages mid-block crossing—and seating choices that modify from parklet to parklet. “We comply with pointers, however we additionally break them somewhat,” Rivas Plaza says.
Guests to the 14th Avenue Promenade will discover that the expertise inside every parklet is totally different. Avenue Plans furnished an set up beneath a tree with lounge chairs considering that drained customers would possibly wish to kick their ft up within the shade, whereas one other parklet nearer to the steps resulting in the Excessive Line riffs on stools at a bar considering that folk who’re getting into or exiting simply want a fast touchdown spot whereas they determine their subsequent transfer.
[Photo: Meatpacking BID/BrakeThrough Media]
Different parklets have tiered benches interspersed with planters that supply privateness whereas one other includes a eating desk—an amazing spot to carry lunch from meals vans down the block. “We wished to see totally different sorts of seating as a result of inside New York Metropolis now we have a really strict palette,” Rivas Plaza says. “We’ve foldable tables and chairs, that are nice, however how will we make areas that permit us to do totally different actions?”
That mentioned, the overarching mantra of the streetscape is consolation. She’s seen folks sit on the granite boulders that separate the brand new pedestrian zone from site visitors, which indicators to her that the design is profitable since folks really feel protected and welcome to hang around.
[Photo: Meatpacking BID/BrakeThrough Media]
In comparison with the remainder of town, the Meatpacking District has fewer site visitors collisions, and these experience-driven components prolong an invite to really feel relaxed. “It’s like an out of doors residing area,” Rivas Plaza says.
Excessive-quality design has helped to persuade extra companies in Meatpacking to need these options on their blocks. Washington Avenue, for instance, was reluctant to obtain public realm enhancements. That modified after the BID quickly relocated the planters in ninth Avenue as a way to make room for the Nice Elephant Migration sculpture set up.
“We love being versatile, the concept to face one thing up, see if it really works, and if it doesn’t discover how we are able to change it,” LeFrancois says. Over the following few weeks and months, he’ll intently observe how guests to the District use the parklets and make modifications accordingly. Finally, he hopes to construct a beer backyard underneath the Excessive Line.
[Photo: Meatpacking BID/BrakeThrough Media]
Can This Work Increase Throughout the Metropolis?
The Meatpacking District is uncommon in that it has a strong, energetic, and well-funded BID that is ready to construct coalitions essential to advance streetscape enhancements—and has been doing so for greater than a decade. By high-quality design, intensive engagement with stakeholders, and an curiosity in experimenting and iterating, it exhibits what is feasible when there’s the uncommon alignment of progressive concepts, political will, and price range.
However this work is pricey. LeFrancois says that the BID’s FY ’26 working price range is about $4.4 million ($3.6 million of which comes from a particular evaluation levied on property house owners) and simply over one third of that goes to operations and the general public realm, which incorporates landscaping, pedestrian administration, and sanitation. Plaza activation and programming income additionally helps pay for public realm enhancements, which isn’t included in that determine.
[Photo: BrakeThrough Media]
The BID paid for the planning, design, and development of the promenade, which got here to just about $1 million—a sum that’s out of attain for many neighborhoods, even these with BIDs. Based on LeFrancois, the Meatpacking is taken into account “medium sized” in comparison with the 77 different BIDs in New York.
In the meantime, the geography of the neighborhood lends itself to pedestrianization work. It’s off to the aspect relative to the remainder of town and has busier streets, just like the West Facet Freeway and ninth Avenue, round its perimeter however none that slice by means of its middle—a bodily situation that makes plazas simpler to construct.
Moreover, its slender one-way streets don’t align with the grid and they’re typically paved in cobblestone, a bumpy materials that encourages slower driving and that pedestrians get pleasure from for its attraction. When it needs to completely pedestrianize the neighborhood for particular occasions, the BID solely has to shut 4 intersections to automobile site visitors.
Plus, the 14th Avenue Busway, which limits site visitors on the crosstown road between third and ninth Avenues, has additionally inspired extra pedestrianization. Final week, the company introduced a public-private partnership with the Meatpacking and Union Sq. BIDs to pedestrianize extra of 14th Avenue, bringing the philosophy of their neighborhood-focused work to a complete hall. And lately, it expanded the teams that may accomplice with them past BIDs by means of its Public House Fairness Program.
[Photo: Meatpacking BID/BrakeThrough Media]
The success of pedestrianization applications within the neighborhood has helped DOT perceive how collaboration with personal organizations can assist encourage extra public realm enhancements. Lately, it expanded the teams that may accomplice with them past BIDs by means of its Public House Fairness Program.
To Vega-Barachowitz, a vital ingredient of the general public realm work is reorienting the dialog about rebalancing streets from one about enterprise to 1 about expertise.
“It units a paradigm and offers a cue to different locations that that is extra than simply about creating area for eating places to have overflow,” he says. “It’s about creating extra space for pedestrians and for folks to solar themselves on a picket deck in probably the most lovely locations in New York Metropolis.”
The 14th Avenue Promenade arrives at an exhilarating second for town, as congestion pricing has led to a mass decline in site visitors. With fewer automobiles on the road, what comes subsequent? “The large messaging right here is you generally simply want some pilot applications going into impact and be taught from them,” Farhi says.
