Spanning three city blocks and linking two vibrant city attractions, the Grounds Connector is an integral but unfinished component of Eero Saarinen’s vision for the St. Louis Arch. This missing link can be partially blamed for the disconnect between a stressed downtown and a popular monument that draws four million visitors per year.
Following an international outreach, Thomas Balsley Associates was commissioned to complete Saarinen’s 20th century modernist vision with a 21st century landscape and urban design approach. Extensive historical, urban design and site specific research informed a series of conceptual design studies, each revealing dramatic new ways to introduce Arch visitors to downtown St. Louis. All included covering the sunken interstate highway and the “pedestrianization” of the flanking Memorial Boulevard.
The passage and pauses have been carefully conceived as celebrations of the diversity of contemporary urban life and include landscape narratives on the Jefferson Expansion and Lewis and Clark Expedition. Great lawns for celebrations, daily civic gatherings, cafes, interpretive kiosks, interactive fountains, distinctive paving and native plantings have been composed into a distinctive and memorable landscape worthy of its designer and the rich contemporary heritage of the Arch.
Skyline Park
After an extensive public dialogue on its original design and performance, the City of Denver decided on a redesign of Skyline Park, downtown Denver’s only public open spaces. The three-block-long, three-acre, linear park is at the center of downtown Denver and is bisected by the 16th Street Mall, a lively pedestrian space that connects many of Denver’s attrac...
Naftzger Park
Naftzger Park offers a contemporary and communal gathering space in downtown Wichita with enough variety to appeal to everyone. Designed to activate an area of town between Old Town and a burgeoning new entertainment district, the park is at once an urban foye...
Main Street Garden Park
Thomas Balsley Associates was selected from an outreach to international design firms to design the first new park for the Dallas Central Business District in 50 years. A key component in the downtown revitalization strategy, Main Street Garden Park required the razing of two city blocks of buildings and garages making way for its transformation into a vibrant...
Milton Street Park
Milton Street Park is a 1.2-acre linear urban park alongside the Ballona Creek Bike Trail in Los Angeles, California. The plan incorporates numerous green-design elements, including the use of recycled materials, native planting, flow-through planters and treatment alongside the 1,000-foot-long, 45-foot-wide stretch of land. A variety of special elements such...