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Revisiting the High Line as sociopolitical project

Article  in  JoLA - Journal on Landscape Architecture · September 2019

DOI: 10.1080/18626033.2019.1705585

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 Journal of Landscape Architecture

ISSN: 1862-6033 (Print) 2164-604X (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rjla20

Revisiting the High Line as sociopolitical project

Greet De Block, Vera Vicenzotti & Lisa Diedrich

To cite this article: Greet De Block, Vera Vicenzotti & Lisa Diedrich (2019) Revisiting the
High Line as sociopolitical project, Journal of Landscape Architecture, 14:3, 72-73, DOI:
10.1080/18626033.2019.1705585

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/18626033.2019.1705585

Published online: 17 Jan 2020.

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U N D E R T H E S K Y I N TROD U C TIO N

Revisiting the High Line

as sociopolitical project

Greet De Block University of Antwerp, Belgium

Vera Vicenzotti, Lisa Diedrich
Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Sweden

P RO J E C T N A M E S U R FAC E A R E A The High Line is a 2.3-km-long public park built on an elevated derelict
The High Line; The High Line: 7 acres (2.1 ha) freight rail line that winds through the West Chelsea neighbourhood of
Friends of the High Line (FHL); in lower Manhattan; Manhattan. The site underwent two design competitions to define its
High Line Network (HLN) FHL: n/a; transformation into a park, a first public competition in 2003 and a sec-
HLN: projects vary by city ond limited one in 2004. The winning design team realized the park in
L O C A TIO N

The High Line: New York, NY; D E SI G N P E RIOD

the following years, with the first stretch opening in 2009, and the last
FHL: New York, NY; The High Line: 2004–present; in 2014. The park is owned by the City of New York but programmed,
HLN: 17 cities in the FHL: 1999–present; managed and operated in partnership with the local non-profit group
United States HLN: 2017–present Friends of the High Line (FHL), who have initiated and driven the trans-
(network projects are at various formation process and who now also raise the park’s annual operating
D E SI G N E RS
stages of design, implementa- budget. Because of its boosting effect on real estate and economic devel-
The High Line:
tion and operation) opment in the adjacent neighbourhoods, it has earned the City of New
James Corner Field
Operations, 
York a massive increase in tax revenue while at the same time causing
C O N STR U C TIO N P E RIOD
Diller, Scofidio + Renfro, considerable gentrification effects. Originally inspired by the Promenade
The High Line: 2009–present;
and Piet Oudolf; FHL: n/a;
Plantée, a similar linear park on a railway viaduct in Paris realized in the
FHL: Robert Hammond and HLN: Ongoing (network pro- early 1990s, the High Line has now propagated the idea of reusing disaf-
Joshua David; jects are at various stages of fected industrial infrastructures to cities worldwide.
HLN: various teams across design, implementation and
the United States operation)

CLIENT
The High Line: City of New
York Planning, Transportation,
and Parks Departments;
FHL: the residents of
West Chelsea;
HLN: clients vary by city

72 Journal of Landscape Architecture / 3-2019

 In contrast to many other scientific fields, in the design disciplines the claim of objective authority
is not a prerequisite epistemological drive_at least not by default. One could even state that, at the
core, design holds many truths as it translates a wide range of often contradicting societal needs,
aims and dreams into spatial projects. Moreover, intention and effect are not in the least clear-cut.
Projects differ by designer (according to their ideas, ideals and preferences), the perception and inter-
pretation of the given situation. Questioning and reframing what is considered a ‘good’ and ‘suc-
cessful’, or a ‘bad’ and ‘unsuccessful’ project_in other words, the work of project critique_thus
has a formative influence on both theory development and design practice. The critical reflection
on canonical projects has been, and still is, especially influential in formulating new questions, pri-
orities and pitfalls.1 As this issue has the explicit ambition of (re)inserting the ‘For whom?’ ques-
tion into the design discourse, the ‘Under the Sky’ section revisits one of the most canonical pro-
jects in current theory and design practice. The High Line has become a hallmark of the new ‘-isms’,
of which the critical reception is instrumental in formulating new agendas for theory and practice.
As such, a reflection about how sociopolitical concerns are included or excluded in the project is not
only timely, but indeed crucial in the development of the field towards a more socially inclusive
and environmentally just horizon.

JoLA has fostered landscape critique from the outset, in its ‘Under the Sky’ section. In the field of
landscape, the interest in critique has just recently generated two comprehensive theme issues on
the topic, one in JoLA itself (Landscape Criticism, 3-2018) and one in SPOOL, the open-access journal
for design in architecture and the built environment (Criticising Practice, Practising Criticism, 5/1 2018).
A ‘culture of considered critique’ seems to be evolving, as JoLA’s Landscape Criticism issue’s guest edi-
tor Julia Czerniak calls it. We think this proves especially urgent for the study of urban landscapes,
where environmental and societal concerns with associated knowledge practices easily conflate or
collide. Critical thinking offers a means of reflecting on the dynamic interplay of societal forces, pro-
fessional activities, academic education and research that structures how people view_and make_
the urbanizing world. Landscape, as an area of study, and landscapes, as experienced material con-
structs, do not lend themselves to narrowly siloed research or confined sectoral actions. Criticality
does not belong to any one discipline. Rather, it helps scholars observe how disciplines operate dif-
ferently_and to take a position on what they learn from these observations about disciplinary con-
straints and affordances.

This is why we decided, for this edition of ‘Under the Sky’, to give the floor to two author teams that
evaluate the same urban landscape, the High Line in New York, from two different disciplinary van-
tage points_while complementing the critical discourse on this canonical yet contested design pro-
ject by as yet underexplored aspects. The first author team, Diane Davis and Stephen Gray, focuses
on the High Line’s particular urban planning context of New York City at the turn of the century,
unfolding a nuanced view of the role activism played in the complex process, while opposing blunt
dismissal of the High Line as a gentrification machine. They shift the understanding of the High
Line as a ‘design project’ to appreciating it as a ‘planning network’_supporting those who want to
drive similar initiatives. The second author team, Natalie Gulsrud and Henriette Steiner, dive into
the design project as such and confront it with questions on environmental justice. They unpack
critical aspects of the High Line’s planting and counter the common appraisal of its formal design
and ecological performance critiquing the design profession's naive use of the concept of urban
greening, without considering the question of who will benefit from it. In juxtaposing the two posi-
tions, we intend to make our readers realize how controversially a project can be critiqued from dif-
ferent disciplinary angles, and how powerfully critique across the disciplines can foreground the
political implications of landscape design in support of advancing societally responsive practices
for urban landscapes.

N OT E

1 See, for example, the projects featuring in James Corner (ed.), Recovering Landscape:
Essays in Contemporary Landscape Theory (New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 1999);
Charles Waldheim, The Landscape Urbanism Reader (New York: Princeton Architectural
Press, 2006); Mohsen Mostafavi and Gareth Doherty (eds.), Ecological Urbanism
(Cambridge, MA/Baden, Switzerland: Harvard University Graduate School of Design/
Lars Müller, 2009); Jeannette Sordi, Beyond Urbanism (Trento: List Lab, 2015).

Journal of Landscape Architecture / 3-2019 73

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