Booth-Kelly Mixed-Use District

51 pagesGraduate and undergraduate architecture students in Professor Brook Muller’s terminal studio during winter and spring terms of 2012 examined potential redevelopment scenarios for the Booth-Kelly site, located in downtown Springfield. The city anticipated redevelopment concepts and guidelines developed as part of the studio could potentially be adopted into the Downtown Refinement Plan and implemented in the future. Students identified several programmatic schemes that describe how the site could become a destination location with a pedestrian-friendly appeal. Seen as a collision of industry and nature, sharing multiple habitats and crossing paths, the site’s industrial beauty and rich history are ideal for unique design solutions that exemplify these characteristics. An in-depth focus on its ecology led many students to incorporate much of the surrounding context in a systems thinking approach. Many of the designs seek to interconnect various processes, from both onsite and offsite byproducts and resources, and to bridge natural and urban resource flows. Common themes emerged with different programmatic emphases, including: adaptive reuse, agricultural production and distribution, community education, linking downtown to industry, and adaptable piecemeal development. While each project holds a different focus, the studio collectively promoted many of the same design values