Planning the Future of NYC

Please comment on the experience of working on the group project. Highlight personal insights, i.e., what worked well for you, what didn’t and why? You can build on the discussion we began in class, but try to provide some specifics that pertain to your background and experience. You can also talk about new skills you learned by working on the group project. Length about 200 words, to be posted by Friday, May 22nd, 5 PM

I hate group projects: learning to appreciate collaborative efforts

By JB Estil

I am not a fan of group projects. An unequal division of labor, the difficulty in coordinating with group members, and PowerPoint presentations are just some of the many problems I associate with group assignments. I avoid them at all costs not so much because I dislike working with others, but because I hate the fact that the final product rarely showcases each individual’s talents and abilities.

Many of us have fallen into the trap of making generic hit-or-miss presentations that often fail to grab our audience’s attention for more than ten minutes. However, my group experience during this year’s CHC class exceeded my expectations. Despite the difficulties we encountered along the way, we have gained a number of skills that I believe will prove invaluable throughout the rest of our school career. As a result, my experience during this year’s CHC class has revolutionized the way I think of group projects.

One of the things I enjoyed most about this assignment was the fieldwork component. As we have learned throughout the semester, city planning is at its best when it opens up to the community and appeals to its needs and wants. We kept this in mind as we surveyed several neighborhoods throughout New York City; constantly revising our plans to better reflect the particular feelings of the general public. In doing so we were able to propose an plan, which found the intersect between functionality, practicality, and appeal. We realized the importance of involving the public in conceptualizing the future of New York City.

Equally important in the process of planning the future of our city is the ability to sell the idea to the general public. Choosing the right type of media can make all the difference in deciding whether or not a proposal is adopted or pigeonholed. In this respect I felt that my group made the right decision in producing a short film, which presented a balanced look at public sentiment and practical ideas for redevelopment on Governors Island. Through the careful interplay of various media, this project allowed us to present a comprehensive, yet dramatic, look at the island that entertained as well as informed the general public.

Whether or not our project was successful in convincing our colleagues of the feasibility of our plan for Governors Island, I do believe that the my group’s project sparked enough interest that most viewers, including those unfamiliar of Governors Island, could confidently take a position concerning its redevelopment. I attribute this to the collaborative efforts of my group members and their willingness to utilize various resources in the culmination of an innovative look at the potential of Governors Island and its future in New York City.

By integrating our efforts we were able to create a project truly reflective of our skills and talents, even some new found ones. The time and effort expended doing this helped me appreciate working with a motivated group of individuals. Most importantly it has reminded me of the power of collaboration, granted you avoid its common pitfalls.

There are some things one should never tackle solo. This project is certainly one of those things. But ultimately it’s a judgment call - some can go it alone, some can’t. As for me, CHC has redeemed the idea of group projects - I don’t love them, but now I can definitely tolerate them.

Posted 5/22/09, 3:33AM

The Final Blog

The “Mini-Studio Project” is by far my best group project experience. I must admit that I had developed an aversion for group work due to countless situations of unbalanced division of labor for past projects and general indolence on the part of my past group members. Fortunately, this project has been my cure and has instilled in me a renewed faith in academic collaboration.

Remedy aside, this project has also granted me the opportunity to visit Governors Island, a land that was once unbeknownst to me. I am truly looking forward to visiting the island in the future.

Additionally, the fieldwork aspect of the project was a valuable experience. Shaziya and I overcame our initial fears of approaching strangers, while venturing into previously unexplored neighborhoods.

Although lack of technological savvy and resources was a complaint for others, our group had the ambition to seek these resources and to become well versed in these technologies.

I am extremely proud of our group and our final product. We shed blood, sweat, and tears to produce our film. I appreciate my group members’ passion, devotion, and humor. Our frequent all-nighters have fostered and strengthened our friendships.

Here’s to good friends and a great project experience. Cheers!

ELIAS SABER-KHIABANI

A Positive Overall Experience

My first highlight of the project was working with my group members. Prior to this assignment, I had no real contact with any members of our group. By the end of the 3 months developing our project, we can still that the result was a true collaborative group effort. Everyone in the group contributed in a significant way and our individual parts were as accomplished and worthy as our final presentation.

I must also highlight the benefits of doing some actual field work. Prior to this project, I had never done any field work of the sort, of actually going to a neighborhood and interviewing people personally and gathering data. While in the beginning I had doubts that people would cooperative with our study, surprisingly, the majority of the people we encountered were very helpful. This showed me that people happen to be more accessible than they seem and that studies, even for undergraduate students, utilizing this method are quite possible.

Finally, despite my dislike for final presentations, presenting is definitely something I need to grow stronger in. The class provided us with multiple situations in which to rehearse our presentation which I found solidified our final product by a great deal. Though I did not expect and was particularly intimidated by our guests who watched our presentations, I believe they reinforced the authenticity of a typical ‘final-presentation’ environment.

LEONARDO FREIRE (POSTED 5/18/09, 1:48 pm)

 

GREAT LEARNING EXPERIENCE

Initially upon learning that my original group consisted of only Ming and myself, I was absolutely terrified. When Kristan joined our group the Columbia University Expansion project seemed much more manageable [but by no means effortless or painless]. Furthermore, I felt that my view towards Columbia’s planned expansion was a little my biased in favor of Columbia than my partners. Although my opinion was more in favor of Columbia, it was not definite. Until we conducted more research I could not try to define my stance.

In attempt of gaining a deeper background into what the community feels about the plan, other than what is written on the Columbia website and in newspapers, we tried to reach out to Community Board 9 [the local community board]. However, despite multiple attempts and methods of contact, none of our questions were answered. This circumstance may have resulted in our group’s leaning towards approval of Columbia’s plan and acceptance of it occurring.

Our group’s process of dividing the work and being responsible for one’s own part worked well for us. We became expert in our own sections while becoming competent in the sections of others. Kristan and Ming were more comfortable dealing with the social impacts of the plan whereas I was more comfortable working with the economic impact of Columbia’s plan and the numbers concerning our own plan. None of us were familiar with creating video, but we decided that a video would greatly improve our presentation. Thanks to Leo, we were able to learn how to create a video. Kristan took charge since she best grasped the procedure.

Lastly, although there is much room for improvement, all of our presentation skills greatly improved. The advice from our peers, the judging panel, and Prof. Ramasubramanian and increased comfortableness with our presentation topic will help us in the many more presentations we will have to give in the future.

-CHRISTIAN RAMSAY

 

Thoughts on Studio Project

The studio project made me realize that, sometimes, you just can’t pick a side. Researching into Columbia University’s Expansion Project, I initially thought that the plan was a great idea, that it would really help the community. However, when I broadened my research, I found that in reality there was a lot of discontent within the community of Manhattanville about the project and many residents would be displaced. So I kept going back and forth between the two sides, trying to decide which one was better. Every new piece of information we found seemed to always have a “but”. Columbia said that they would foster a greater sense of community, but Manhattanville said that the residents will be kicked out. Columbia said that their plan would bring much needed amenities to the neighborhood, but Manhattanville said that the current neighborhood wouldn’t be able to afford to take advantage of those amenities. Even going to the neighborhood didn’t help me decide. Looking at the area, it really was run down; many buildings were in need of renovations. But being there made me realize that Columbia’s expansion would completely alter the character of Harlem. According to collegeboard.com, 36% of Columbia’s students are white, 14% are Hispanic and 11% are black. In the area of Manhattanville that Columbia wishes to develop, the population was mostly black and Hispanic, and most of the storefronts and many of the signs were posted in Spanish. While an influx of white people is not necessarily a bad thing, it cannot be denied that it will change the character of the neighborhood. Will the storefronts remain in Spanish, or will they be switched to English in order to accommodate the changing population? Will the current store owners even be able to afford their businesses? Will the current residents of Manhattanville feel comfortable living as neighbors to Columbia students? But the neighborhood will be revitalized, the abandoned lots utilized. Isn’t it worth it? Columbia can bring improved public education, more open space, increased job opportunities. Shouldn’t sacrifices be made to benefit the whole? But does it make any sense if the residents can’t afford to live there?

The confusion that this caused me, I believe, was reflected in our group. And because we all had differing opinions, it made me realize how gray the situation is. I felt that we all went on the same journey, but ended up in different places. I went into the project thinking that Columbia’s plan was great, and ended up finding myself siding slightly more with the community than with Columbia. From my observations, it seemed that Ming started the project thinking that the plan was a great injustice, but ended the project thinking that maybe it was a good idea. And it seemed that Christian, throughout the entire experience, wasn’t too opposed to the expansion. I found this fascinating because we did all the same research, knew all the same facts, yet were unable to agree completely on our opinions of the expansion. It really proved to me that there is no black and white.

- Kristan Melo

Governors Island Inc.

There were many challenging aspects of this group project. Three that stand out the most were cooperating with group members, prioritizing and selecting from our research, and getting in touch with people we needed to interview. As with any group work it was important for us to communicate with each other and divide up the work evenly. We had a group leader who facilitated this process and each member of the group chose what he or she would like to contribute. This was reflected in our presentation with each member presenting on his or her area of expertise. The biggest challenge of this part was balancing the workload.
The nature of our project also required us to make many choices of what to put on Governors Island. We were given an island and told to make it into something. This was both empowering and limiting. At first we thought we could put anything we want on the island. Later on we learned of the deed restrictions. Even so there were too many choices of what to do with the open space so we had to prioritize. We finally decided to focus on the three Es which are Environment, Education and Entertainment. Choosing these themes helped to focus us. We looked at the gardens we could build, how to make them more environmentally friendly, and so on. We combined education and environmental awareness by making the high school as environmentally friendly as possible.
One of the greatest challenges of this project was contacting people who had the information we needed. Since I worked on the high school part of the project I can describe that in detail. I contacted the New York Harbor High School and they gave me the name of the person to contact. I wrote an email to that person and did not receive an answer. Only when Natalia helped us get in touch with her father, were we able to get the information. This also happened to be the case with other parts of our projects such as with the artist program. Overall this project was a fun and educational experience, which I enjoyed and want to thank the professor for having us participate in.

-Boris Fligelman

‘Ello Gov’nor!

I adore creative projects, particularly when I get to make them with a great group. Lucky for me, this studio project allowed me to do just that! Our group was given the little island of Governors Island to take control of. The last month of the semester was spent exploring the vast reaches of our minds to collect and connect our various pieces of creative hoop-lah. Our gathered ideas, like fruits in a basket, were juiced and blended to make Governors Island a recreational area that incorporated a variety of different activities, food venues, and educational resources. It was so wonderful to learn about the island that had been floating lazily right at the tip of Manhattan, completely unknown to me. Thanks to Natalia’s father the two Governors Island groups were able to physically experience the island and learn about the island from Jonathon Myers, who turned out to be an extremely valuable resource. It was so helpful to explore the island in order to better decide how to remake it.

This project was a piece of cake. Granted, it involved more sleepless nights and 12-hour days of dedication than any other project I have ever been a part of, and the feeling of stress-induced stomach butterflies and pounding skulls became as famililar as the feeling of breathing in and out. However, all of that was completely overshadowed by the dedication to the project and the enjoyment of my group members’ companies. I learned a great deal about the technological aspects of making a movie - knowledge that will be very useful in expanding my creative options for future projects. I also, of course, learned A LOT about the process of urban planning and how to propose my ideas. This project was an amazing experience that I will remember and treasure as a proud moment in my academic career.

- Katie Horner

Thoughts on CHC Project

Working with a group to find an innovative and creative design for Governor’s Island has been enlightening in many ways. The members of the group and I learned how to approach policy making and proposals as efficiently as we were taught in class from lectures of Robert Moses and professional/controversial critics. Utilizing resources and skills from individual group members, we were enabled to amass quite the intriguing proposal for a future Governor’s Island. Although the project was a great direct learning experience, there were also many failures in our actions. Fortunately, these mistakes served to teach us ways to ignore them if there ever would be a next time.

While working with a group, I found it very difficult to integrate individual ideas to make them work as a collective goal. I felt that each member in the group had the same problem. Although we brought excellent resources to the table, we weren’t able to fully exploit them. This was most probably due to the fact that we each had very different and busy schedules, which made it difficult to physically meet as a group and discuss ways to combine our great ideas. Also, the majority of our group consisted of premed students—although we did have great ideas we didn’t have the time in our schedules to execute them as a group (we were able to work individually as the alternative). For example, we wanted to conduct interviews in order to determine whether or not there was a support base for our ideas. Perhaps a more academically diverse team could have overcome such an obstacle. Pressed with these problems, we sought ways to productively work together. Then, while working together we found great difficulty in obtaining responses to questions from professionals. We actually didn’t get any responses from these sources. Actually going to Governor’s Island was a great experience, both for answers and for enjoyment. For most of the project, we sought factual information. Except for establishing a physical layout of our plans on a map of the island, I felt that we did a great job. We each worked hard at our self-assigned tasks.

Perhaps the most important lesson I learned in this project that the power of collective effort could potentially reap amazing results. Also, I discovered that relying on only one or a few sources could be detrimental. I feel that the mistakes made in this project would not be repeated in the future.

In the end, we are all great, hardworking students who enjoyed the results of this project!

- Raj Mathew

 

 

Ahhh, Group Projects.

Group projects can be particularly frustrating when only one group member knows how to use the technologies needed. This is especially true when it comes to photoshop and editing films. I am very used to this, and as someone who is very familiar with both photoshop and final cut pro, I have come to accept this as a fact of life.

So one can only imagine how I felt when one of the group members spent an entire day reading the final cut pro manual, and another spent hours trying to photoshop swings into the courtyard in front of Liggett Hall.

Time was something none of our group members were stingy on, and I remember at one point stating that it kind of felt like we had been living in one of those old-school crowded tenament homes because of the fact that all six of us had spent so much time together in the same room. I have never become so close to a group as a result of a class project.

I think that our closeness arose from our ambition. From the day we were asigned Governors Island the project somewhat consumed us. It actually became a topic of exited conversation. Things even got heated at moments because we were taking the project so seriously and wanted to think of the best plan for Governors Island. Its a good thing that along with the same ambition, we also had the same vision.

Honestly, I don’t think I could handle school if we did every project like this. However, I am so proud of the work our group has done and I know we probably wouldn’t have been satisfied with any less.

- Natalia Malone

 

 

A Rewarding Experience

Although I came in to the class with a relatively general idea of the concepts behind urban planning, I was able to learn the most through the actual application of these ideas. Gathering data from the public allowed us to shape our plans while still including our own. Although it required many hours during the days we interviewed people, it emphasized the importance of what the public would want as opposed to what someone else would think was best for them.
We also felt a need to justify every action taken on our part involving Governors Island and find a reason as to why we should preserve or convert certain parts of the island. To our amusement, we often found ourselves forgetting that we were not the actual planners in charge of Governors Island. We even decided on removing some of our very detailed plans due to the length of our presentation. This project really put us into the minds of urban planners because of all the problems and questions we had to consider.
Besides gaining useful knowledge, I discovered the invaluable resource of group work. I greatly appreciated the initiative and drive of my group members. Like the other groups, we devoted a lot of time to presenting our information in the best way possible. We pulled many all-nighters that allowed us to create a project we were very proud of. Although we were somewhat unfamiliar with the technology, we utilized available resources to the best of our abilities. The programs used were available on our laptops and also in the Hunter labs on the 10th floor. Although many hours were also devoted to researching info and learning unfamiliar programs and new things about existing programs, like iMovie, it was worth the time and effort. It was a new and rewarding experience for all of us to see our ideas get translated into a final product.

- Shaziya Ali

 

Learning in a Group

This project was definitely a first for me in many ways. Usually when we have group projects, the parts are not as interconnected as it was for this project. Everyone was so dependant on each other, but in the end it came out better than I had hoped (in my opinion). All of the parts flowed together well, and I learned how important communication was. I will never forget the late nights working with Leo and Sapna until we could not look at our screens anymore, listening to our interviews and deciding what we wanted our vision to look like, and the constant emailing between Sapna, Leo, Kayt and I until we had all of the information in one place. We wanted to do so much, but at the same time we did not want to go crazy.
We all had the same general idea for what we wanted to happen to Coney Island, so that was a hurdle that we avoided. At the same time, we each had a different idea on how to present things. My brain went automatically to powerpoint, while Leo went to a video and Sapna wanted a big plan. Fortunately, we were able to incorporate all of these things into one project that showcased what we really wanted it to.
The most important thing that we did during this project was definitely the field work. We had wanted a balance between casino and amusement park, since the area needed money. However, we found out that no one wanted a casino, so we ran into a problem. It took a lot of exploring, but then Sapna came up with the idea of a Cineplex and we all thought it was amazing. The plan then branched off of that to determine what the general organization would be and it took off from there. It made me feel really accomplished when we went out and got information on our own instead of assuming we knew what people wanted or using online sources. I learned a lot about research and balance during this project, which I hope will help me in future projects as well.

-Dalya Abdel-Atti