Out-of-the Box Ideas

At a July meeting with the Cultural Alliance of Greater Birmingham, members of various arts groups looked at the plan. They said the proposed arts building could create interactive ways for people to “get hooked” on the arts, creating awareness and demand for their various programs.

“People will go out and find things that give them that same experience (in the park). They will be willing to go to the Alys Stephens Center or Sloss Furnaces,” said Rosemary Johnson, of the Alabama Dance Council.

Olivia Eaton of the Academy of Fine Arts Inc, who spent her formative years in arts-rich Chicago, said the arts building, whatever form it finally takes, must set innovative standards well beyond what Birmingham people are used to seeing.

“I am happy, overjoyed to see this,” she said. “But I want us to think outside the box, to see past four walls. We could have a structure with moving walls, experience the changing seasons . . . something that gives us maximum use of the arts we have, as well as the arts of the future.”

Kemp-Rotan – an international architect by training whose wide-ranging, 30-year professional background includes managing the creation of Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Park in the mid ‘90s and other multi-million dollar projects – brings a world view to Birmingham’s park planning process.

She muses:

Maybe the park could have features like Rotterdam’s (The Netherlands) Theater Square, where putting a quarter in a large motion-sensitive light boom causes a spotlight to follow you where ever you move.

Or it could have public displays similar to those of architect Christopher Janney, where a passing train or a child stepping on certain stones or steps in the park triggers exciting displays of steam, lights, sounds and music.

Or giant talking lips – like those designed by the husband-and-wife architectural team of Diller + Scofidio – can be projected onto walls, screens or a bay of televisions to direct park visitors to other cultural attractions, events and restaurants in the City Center and the region.

Besides just building the park, Kemp-Rotan says the community must answer a host of questions about what should happen inside the park:

What art performances and outreach programs will take place; what histories (railroad, industrial, labor, civil rights, culture, etc.) will be told and how; what features will exhibition buildings and other structures have; how will other cultural institutions incorporate their presence into park activities; how should the park be lighted to provide for security; how will signs, light posts, benches be designed (and many other considerations)?

Future Funding

Giles Perkins, FoRRd’s current president, says his group couldn’t be happier with the process and the progress being made on a plan that for many years was just an idea. But the Railroad Reservation Park plan will need millions of dollars to move it to reality.

“It will be a challenge to raise the money. However, the community’s involvement in our process makes me optimistic that we will be able to do this,” he says. “I am highly confident we’ll see regional support.”

Kemp-Rotan says she is managing and documenting the entire park planning process in an effort to meet federal guidelines for community involvement and secure future funding. “The only way to get money from the feds is to prove public participation. So I made sure that this is not only well-documented, but well-branded as we go.”

Mayor Bernard Kincaid has appointed an 11-member steering committee (which includes key FoRRd members) to find strategic ways to breathe life into the park plan. The hope is to have something people can see coming out of the ground in two to five years.

“I am, as Renee would say, ‘gassed’ about our planning for the Railroad Reservation Park,” Kincaid says. He appointed her to drive the park project as the first key initiative recommended in the City Center’s recently-developed 10-year master plan.

He believes the innovative park will be as synonymous with Birmingham as Central Park is with New York City and Inner Harbor is with Baltimore. “We’re just so pleased about what this means to us, the planning that has gone into it, and more than that, the alliance that’s been formed between the City and the Friends of the Railroad District.”

He says citizens, once they hear about the plan and see it taking shape, will take pride in the park. He sees it as a bridge that unites various people and parts of Birmingham in a central location.

“This Park master plan will serve as a new destination for tourists and as a new spark plug for economic development,” Kincaid says. “This park will create a new and even greater day for the City of Birmingham. . . We want everyone to come to City Council September 13 to see the final plan presented to the City.”