Norman Alston Architects

Old Dallas High School is in the News

Steve Brown reports on Old Dallas High School and how design on the renovation of the historic building is underway, as it is for the new apartments that are planned all around it.

 

Pianos and Architecture

Piano music interacts with architecture like that of no other instrument. The sound seems to resonate from the very structure.

Today I was examining a chapel building. While I was in the loft at the back, I saw a young lady walking down the aisle. She glanced up and we shared a "good morning". She continued uninterrupted, purposefully to the baby grand at the other end. She sat down and instantly, without preparation, filled the entire space with sound. I'm sure it was only a warmup exercise of some kind, but my day was changed from that time on.

New Historic Rehabilitation Tax Credit helping to heat up construction jobs | MinnPost

A group of historic preservation advocates huddled in the former North Branch Library, a bare, unheated old red brick castle on Emerson Avenue in North Minneapolis earlier this week, as the first real taste of winter came to the Twin Cities.

via www.minnpost.com

Another demonstration of the value of continuing to use our historic buildings.

Preservation Texas Welcomes New Executive Director - Anna Glover Hudson

The announcement today, coming from THC's website, can be viewed here:

Preservation Texas Welcomes New Executive Director.

Best of luck to Anna. We look forward to working with her.

Settles Hotel Opens

Closed for more than 30 years, the Settles Hotel in Big Spring has emerged from a 5 year restoration effort. Last weekend saw the re-illumination of the iconic rooftop sign and provided  an opportunity for past and current Big Spring residents to get a glimpse of the hotel, including carefully restored public areas and the Lobby.

Before and after photos can be viewed at the Hotel Settles Opening Weekend photo album, shown at the left.

Guidance - The Transportation Alternatives Program (TAP) | Federal Highway Administration

The Transportation Alternatives Program (TAP) authorized under Section 1122 of MAP-21 (23 U.S.C. 213(b), 101(a)(29)) provides funding for programs and projects defined as transportation alternatives, including on- and off-road pedestrian and bicycle facilities, infrastructure projects for improving non-driver access to public transportation and enhanced mobility, community improvement activities, and environmental mitigation; recreational trail program projects; safe routes to school projects; and projects for the planning, design or construction of boulevards and other roadways largely in the right-of-way of former Interstate System routes or other divided highways.

Section 1122 of the Moving Ahead for Progress in the 21st Century Act (MAP-21) established TAP in 23 U.S.C. 213. Section 1105 of MAP-21 provides for the apportionment of funds in 23 U.S.C. 104(b), from which TAP funding is set aside.

The following sections of title 23 are applicable to TAP:

via www.fhwa.dot.gov

For many years since the Interstate Highway System was effectively built out, historic preservation efforts have been encouraged through the allocation of transportation funds to the preservation of transportation-related historic sites and buildings. Known previously as ISTEA and TEA21 and MAP, now comes the latest version, TAP. Only this time, historic preservation projects are not eligible. Thanks to PlaceEconomics for this heads up.

Phone trouble continues.

Seems that Clear Communications, my telephone provider, has chosen to change some lower-level carrier and is "switching me over". Until this is complete, and there is no timetable, my phone service will remain unreliable and calls to my main number will not be forwarded. So I must say to you as they say to me, "Sorry for the inconvenience."

Dallas' Praetorian Building Doomed.

The Dallas City Council has apparently removed the last roadblock to the demolition of the historic Praetorian Building in Downtown. For several months it has been known that the planned expansion of the Joule Hotel would remove Dallas' oldest skyscraper. Additional information on the building's history can be found at this Dallas Public Library site.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you were wondering why it doesn't look familar to you, this is what it looks like today thanks to an "updating" it received in the 1960's. It has long been understood that the update did an unusual amount of damage to the building, including the complete removal of the massive terra cotta cornice at the top.

 

Too bad.

US Post Office and Courthouse Building Restoration receives Preservation Achievement Award

Last Friday, the jury for Preservation Dallas' 2012 Preservation Achievement Awards selected the restoration of the historic US Post Office and Courthouse Building as an award winner. The presentation of the award will be made at the Majestic Theater, around the corner in Downtown Dallas, on Wednesday, May 16, 2012.You can see additional information about this project from my post last December as well as last September .

Congratulations to developer Shawn Todd and the rest of the project team!

 

Ludwig Mies Van der Rohe: Google Doodle

via www.youtube.com

It's Mies van der Rohe's birthday. Thanks Dallas Center for Architecture for bringing this to my attention.