Page 20 - 2012 SDCA Project
P. 20
DISTRICT AND
SITE PROPOSAL
Context | Site Across the street is an old house that is falling down. Behind Reinforce and encourage the connectivity and synergies
the LWC building is the broken up paved lot. between uses
The Lithonia Woman’s Club (LWC) building is in a district, Over the years, a portion of the historic downtown has been
located at the edge of a residential area, that converges with demolished and replaced with strip retail and large expanses Reconnect the LWC to the main street retail corridor, the
the downtown main street and an adjacent light industrial of asphalt paved parking lots. One example is what locals PATH bike trails and the community at large.
area. call the “Blue Elephant,” a retail building with its large
blue roof that dominates the area when you drive into the Encourage adaptive re-use of existing abandoned buildings
There is an unsightly “found space” located between and Downtown from the expressway. and spaces
behind these three uses. It is comprised mostly of a large The Arabia Mountain Trail, a greenway mountain bike trail
broken up asphalt parking lot that has served the adjacent extends to Lithonia, and stops short of making it to the In one of our last meetings with the Mayor during our
retail & industrial businesses. The parking lot is in a flood Downtown Area. The Lithonia Woman’s club is situated Charette, the mayor noted that the found space between
plain and appears unused. between the end of this path and the downtown district. all these uses, the large asphalt area, was also used for
the occasional outdoor concert. In fact that day we were
In the vicinity are also the Southern Rail tracks and the Program – Proposed Design noticing a stage being set up and preparation for the concert
beginning of the PATH bike trails. that evening. This generated for us a real excitement over
Overall, the residential neighborhood is intact. However, “Always design a thing by considering its next larger the potential uses that could transform this area. Our team
there are several empty lots scattered about particularly at context- a chair in a room, a room in a house, a house in an expanded from trying to tie the Woman’s Club building to the
the periphery and between the LWC and the downtown. In environment, an environment in a city plan.” Erro Saarinen community, to now trying to tie all of these elements together
some cases, demolished homes have been replaced with with the LWC building at the center.
parking / paving. Thru the several meetings with stakeholders and from our
several Charettes we identified challenges that we have We now saw that Arabian Mountain, the PATH trail, the
Adjacent to the site of the LWC there is an abandoned addressed in our proposed design: railroad, the downtown areas, the sidewalks, the potential
Telecom Building. This building does not follow the typical parks & the music were elements that together could
setbacks of the neighborhood, and blocks the view to the Reinforce and restore current uses, identities’, and generate the entire project and could be expanded upon to
LWC. With no windows it could be considered an “eyesore.” boundaries. the full potential that this area holds. We are trying to push
20 RAGS 2012
