Rising Currents: Projects for New York's Waterfront

by Barry Bergdoll, Michael Oppenheimer, Guy Nordenson

In the fall of 2009, The Museum of Modern Art and MoMA PS1 selected five interdisciplinary teams of architects, engineers and landscape designers to propose solutions to the effects of climate change on New York's waterfront. The resulting proposals, exhibited at MoMA in 2010 in the exhibition "Rising Currents: Projects for New York's Waterfront," emphasize "soft" infrastructure interventions that would make New York City and its surrounding areas more ecologically sound and more resilient in responding to rising sea levels and storm surges. These innovative projects include the creation of salt- and freshwater wetlands, a Venice-like aqueous landscape, habitable piers and man-made islands, and a protective reef of living oysters. Published to document the exhibition, "Rising Currents: Projects for New York's Waterfront" presents these five projects in detail through essays that summarize the innovative workshop and exhibition, the dialogues they engendered with outside experts and political figures involved in regional planning, and the climate change and urban planning implications of the proposed solutions.

112 pages, Paperback

First published December 31, 2011

About the author

Barry Bergdoll is professor of architectural history in the department of art history and archaeology at Columbia University and the Philip Johnson Chief Curator of Architecture and Design at the Museum of Modern Art, New York.