The Puget Sound Business Journal reports on a revamp of one of the most bland and uninspired streetscapes in the city:
The Sheraton Seattle will spend $2 million to build a landscaped pedestrian walkway at its downtown hotel location.
Sheraton officials said the “Garden Walk” will be built along Seventh Avenue and will include vine-covered walls, large mirrors, water features and sculptures. Construction will begin Aug. 14 and is expected to be completed by spring 2011.
The building currently affronts the street with a block-long white wall, so this revitalized streetscape sounds like a big improvement. SeattleScape has some cynicism, however, about the sustainability of this garden walk.
Again, actual street-level tenant space, with doors and windows, could last the lifetime of the building with a changing array of establishments naturally responding to their street-level location with appropriate displays and accessibility. Yet the placement of mirrors seems so impermanent. Does the Sheraton Hotel management really intend to maintain and likely replace those mirrors essentially ad perptuum?
Even if the answer is no, doing something to upgrade the streetscape is better than nothing.
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