And Grant is RIGHT ON in his post above:

If the current “dumpy-frumpy” design is generating well-deserved protests even before it is built, just THINK what people will be saying [or laughing] in 50 years!!!

It is time to dream BIGGER and BETTER.

Chris

From the last paragraph, this comment caught my attention because it parallels the feedback once given to such international icons as the Eiffel Tower, The Eye of London, or the Empire State Building. Where the feedback sharply diverges is that these past cynics were criticizing how grandiose the new “eyesores” would be – not how modest, as is the case today.

If the city goes ahead with its current plans I hope that 50 years from now, on architectural tours of Norfolk, MacArthur Center Station will be explained in the context of one of America’s darkest economic times. “They didn’t have the resources to think big,” a docent will say, “So they went cheap. Let’s move on.” To my mind, “tough times” is the city’s only defensible position – but on the other hand, the budgets for light rail were set long ago.

The City of Norfolk’s own urban planning mantra is “highest and best use.” I look forward to more dialogue in this context.

It’s odd that the I can only find three photos of Union Station, since the building building that formerly housed the Sergeant collection was torn down to make way for MacArthur Station.

Norfolk was once known as “The Sunrise City On The Sea”

“TOOK no prophetic mind to conceive the prediction
made many years ago that somewhere along the At-
lantic Coast, south of Baltimore, would be built the
largest, most prosperous city of these United States.
With but a cursory vicav of the map of the country, many
locations can be selected that would satisfy the requirements
of a large and progressive population; but as the eye surveys
the various advantages both of land and water along the coast
line, the vision unconsciously centers and rests at one main
point where nature has been most lavish in all her best gifts
topographically as well as geographically, and that point is the
city of Norfolk.”

Perhaps, City leaders will re-evaluate their designs for MacArthur Station, and construct something to serve, both economically and architecturally, as the city’s “one main point” and we can again see the sun rise on Norfolk.