RUN NY

RUN_NY We want to provideNew Yorkwith a coloured infra-structure in the sky, connecting tall buildings and allowing for a new type of human mobility in the city. These tracks, besides promoting physical activity, create an artistic installation in the city. Like a new aerial subway network, these tracks crossManhattan, intercepting buildings and creating in these nodes, new spaces with a huge potential for social activities. The Tracks The tracks, bridging across buildings, can be used for running, walking, skating, or simply for relaxing whilst you eat your lunch and watch a street show. Simultaneously, they offer an alternative, mid-height escape route; something that could prove to be essential, or simply reassuring, for the building’s inhabitants.

They are not closed spaces, but permeable to the open air, allowing for freedom of movement, dependant on the duration and type of mobility each user wants. The tracks are organized in different routes, with different lengths – 1, 2, 4, 8 miles, and different colours, like a subway network. This network encourages movement in the city, at a different level, without the constraints of traffic and congestion at ground level. It is especially useful for those who have a sedentary lifestyle, trapped in closed, artificial office spaces all day. They will offer an entirely new perception of the city, and of mobility in time and space.

The Nodes

The points in the network where lines intersect buildings and each other, will create nodes where events will take place. These spaces can take over the whole of an existing floor or simply part of it, or they can even occupy the roof of a lower building, depending on the height of the track. Various physical activities can take place in these nodes: gymnastics, yoga, karate… But they can also be used for cultural and economic activities such as live music, reading, eating and relaxing. Because the tracks are at different heights, in some buildings the existing vertical communication system can be used to connect different tracks and to access the ground. This new network of spaces, or lobbies, shall depend and be promoted by the different buildings as a new community, creating new synergies. They are thought of as places for freedom, where unexpected uses can occur, bringing people together in a new network.

Construction, Flexibility

This structure is light and flexible, comprising a series of tensioned steel cables, anchored to the existing buildings, and a tubular wall and floor system, made of flexible recycled materials, such as rubber and polyester, in supporting pieces and an open mesh. This flexibility should allow for new connections, or the removal of existing ones, with relative ease. These connections should, as a rule, use the existing windows and openings so as to reduce constructions costs. These tracks could also be sponsored by Sports Companies, or companies associated to a healthy lifestyle.

The duration of this structure depends on the interest of the city in its promotion and maintenance. It could start as a periodical event, as an artistic installation, filling the perception of its users with colour.

This idea is sustainable in the sense that, by promoting regular exercise, and relaxation near the workplace, we are promoting physical and mental health, which will also reduce costs in the health system. Any sustainable future needs satisfied people full of energy to produce.