Preservation or Parking?

Advocates for saving Paul Rudolph’s Riverview High School suffered a blow at this Tuesday’s Sarasota County school board meeting. In effect, the school board voted 3-2 to demolish the 1958 paragon of natural ventilation and intelligent shading. The details of the resolution are complicated, but the result is that without further action, the modern masterpiece—one of 2008’s “100 most endangered sites” according to the World Monuments Fund—will be paved over for a parking lot within the next year to service the new, larger high school currently under construction adjacent to the old building.

The school board had been willing to consider allowing the Rudolph structure to remain, if a suitable alternate plan were drawn up and financing for it were made available. In response to a March 2007 call for proposals by the Sarasota Architecture Foundation (SAF), an adaptive reuse plan by New York architect Diane Lewis to create a Music Quadrangle came to the table.

Lewis’s plan is unique in that it focuses on cultural enrichment closely related to Riverview High School’s musical forte. Other positive aspects of the Lewis proposal include a master plan that retains green space without sacrificing critical parking—which not only helps with the heat sink effect but gives neighbors across the street a reprieve from viewing a field of cars.

Financing, however, is tricky. The catch 22 is this: the school board has the power to offer the Rudolph building for development, but doesn’t want to take that leap until funding is secured. But funders are reluctant to come forth if the school board doesn’t officially offer the building for development. “The model for a cultural development project,” Lewis explained, “is way beyond the resolution that the school board adopted from the National Trust charrette,” in April of 2007. For the building to be saved and redeveloped, “the school board has to be in good faith offering the property for development,” she added and emphasized that “the conflict in the project is that the school board has not yet offered the building.” But as she sees it, Sarasota citizens, including philanthropists and developers, are concerned with the area’s cultural heritage and ready to move forward with the plan as soon as the building itself is guaranteed.

Political pressure against saving Riverview makes it hard for the school board to get behind saving the Rudolph building. Many in the community are so fed up with the deteriorated school that they can’t seem to imagine the new vision for it. “I don’t think [teachers] understood that the building would not be the same as it is now,” says SAF chairman Les Fishman. “They were looking at this building thinking it’s going to be the same stinking, dark building that’s been there. They never took the time to look at the proposal.”

The original building is a victim of haphazard and insensitive renovation. For example, with the advent of air conditioning the breezy open spaces were blocked off resulting in a serious mold problem. In the Music Quadrangle scheme, Rudolph’s building would be stripped to its steel skeleton and rebuilt using its original design features, updated with current technology.

Metropolis has been a staunch supporter of saving the Rudolph building. Editor in Chief Susan S. Szenasy spent the better part of 2007 touring more than 30 architecture firms, as well as public venues, across the nation with the magazine’s film Site Specific: The Legacy of Regional Modernism, which emphasized Rudolph’s contribution to the Sarasota School of Architecture, and the plight of Riverview High. The film created much discussion about historic preservation, adaptive reuse, and climate sensitive regional architecture, as well as interest in saving the Rudolph building.

“I’m holding out hope that the Lewis scheme will be built, mainly because it shows great sensitivity to the spirit of Rudolph’s design and a deep understanding of the local resources—climatic, material, as well as cultural,” remarked Szenasy.

Indeed, contrary to local media reports, Riverview’s fate is not yet sealed. Lewis is confident that this is only the beginning. Her associate, Daniel Meridor, the Music Quadrangle’s project architect, explained how the community in Sarasota is only now waking up to the idea that the issue goes beyond parking spaces and retention ponds to the question of public space that can be financed by private money.

In the end, this modern masterpiece can be saved if the alternate vision is effectively communicated. It’s now up to the people who live in the area and use the space to discover their heritage for themselves. If they can see beyond the broken relic and the parking lot, and envision their future to include a beautiful, high-tech, site specific building that supports the local culture, then everyone will win.

Click on the image below to watch Site Specific: The Legacy of Regional Modernism. This film was made possible by Haworth, Interiors from Spain, Shaw Contract Group, and Wilsonart Contract. If you do not see the image of the film, you may need to download the latest version of Adobe Flash (9.0)

Site Specific The Legacy of Regional Modernism