Agri-tecture

The High Line is a one and a half mile long elevated rail line that runs down from the west side of Chelsea to the Meat Packing district of New York City. Built in the 1930s to allow trains to roll right through buildings to deliver milk, meat, produce, and raw and manufactured goods without causing any street-level traffic; the rise of interstate trucking in the 1950s led to a decline of rail traffic on the High Line with parts of the High Line being torn down until the final train ran in the 1980s.

A competition to redevelop the remaining rail track has been won by Field Operations and Diller Scofidio + Renfro with their strategy of agri-tecture. Agri-tecture “combines organic and building materials into a blend of changing proportions that ccommodates the wild, the cultivated, the intimate, and the hyper-social.” The design proposes a series of public gardens, an out door film theater, open air walkways, a swimming pool and beach, and food halls.

High Line Site
New York Times Article