| Harvard taps architect Gehry Design team will begin
planning Allston campus
By Chris Reidy, Globe Staff, 6/5/2004 Harvard University chose a team that includes Frank Gehry, the architect behind MIT's much-lauded Stata Center, to create a long-range planning framework for the development of a new 200-acre campus in Allston. Along with Gehry and landscape architect Laurie Olin, the New York urban design firm of Cooper, Robertston & Partners was selected to draw up broad guiding principles for developing the land over the next 50 years. Gehry is world-renowned for such projects as the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, and Disney Hall in Los Angeles. Last month, the $300 million Ray and Maria Stata Center debuted at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology; it will serve as MIT's home for computer, information, and intelligence sciences. Gehry, who spent two years studying at Harvard in the late 1950s, described the Harvard assignment as a lifelong dream. "I always wanted to be an urban planner, not someone who designed iconic buildings for rich people," said Gehry, 75. "Now that I'm in my old age, I'm finding these opportunities to do urban design and planning." With other members of the team, many of whom he has worked with before, Gehry said, he'll help to devise an urban design plan for Harvard's land. The team will look at such things as traffic, land use, and the site's relationship to the Charles River. His job, Gehry said, is "to add some design DNA to the overall project . . . but we're not going to design 80 Gehry buildings." Instead he and the Cooper, Robertson team will look to develop broad guidelines so "when individual architects come to do pieces of the project, they'll have a framework to guide them." The mission of the Cooper, Robertson team "is not about designing individual buildings, but about creating settings," added Alex Krieger, chairman of the Department of Urban Planning and Design for the Harvard Graduate School of Design. In recent months, Harvard officials have sketched out general concepts for the Allston property that include a life-science complex, professional schools, and graduate and undergraduate housing. The idea, Harvard president Lawrence H. Summers said last year, is to create "a robust critical mass of scientific activities in Allston." It's up to Cooper, Robertson to flesh out those concepts from a physical planning perspective. One goal is to ensure that both campuses, which are just over a mile apart, are integrated and that Allston does not become a satellite of Harvard's Cambridge campus. The 200 acres that Cooper, Robertson would be involved with are separate from the Harvard Business School campus in Allston. As they focus on the 200 undeveloped acres, Cooper, Robertson will consider potential building locations and the scale of those buildings as well as a conceptual vision for open space and street layouts. Devising this planning framework is expected to take 12 to 18 months. "Cooper, Robertson has an impressive track record, and they have assembled a team with a strong combination of local experience, world-class planning expertise, vision, and creative talent," Summers said in a statement. The team will explore whether more bridges over the Charles River and a tram system are needed to connect the Harvard Square campus with the new Allston campus. As chairman of the North Allston Strategic Planning Group, Ray Mellone has been meeting regularly with Harvard and city officials. Harvard's plans, he said, are still "mostly concept, and not a lot of black-and-white details." But the early signs are good, said Mellone, who sees Harvard as positive force that will improve a "blighted" part of Allston near Soldier's Field Road and the Massachusetts Turnpike. Besides Gehry, the Cooper, Robertson team includes Olin, who has developed open-space plans for several campuses, including MIT's and the University of Pennsylvania's. Cooper, Robertson, meanwhile, is well known to city officials. "Having worked with Cooper, Robertson on the Boston Seaport Master Plan, I know first-hand that they bring to this project a high level of expertise, professionalism, and a sensitivity to the fabric of urban life," Boston Mayor Thomas M. Menino said in a statement. This story ran on page D1 of the Boston Globe on 6/5/2004.
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