Student ideas for the future of St. Paul's Ford plant
Architecture students at the University of Minnesota will present their proposals on what to do with a soon-to-be-defunct Ford Motor Companies Twin Cities Assemblies Plant. Ford is due to stop manufacturing pickup trucks at the Highland Park site in St. Paul in 2009.

According to a press release from the university, "The final-year students, from professor Lance Neckar's Landscape Architecture studio and professor John Comazzi's architecture studio, have spent the semester creating research and design proposals for the plant. With a focus on remediation of the site, the students have considered in-situ processes such as phyto-remediation, bio-remediation, engineered solutions and ground and surface water cleaning."

You can see the designs for yourself on Wednesday evening (5:30 - 7:30 p.m.) at Rapson Hall, 89 Church Street SE, Minneapolis. More information is available here.

Maybe the Ford Plant doesn't have to close
David Morris of the Institute for Self-Reliance argues that the Ford Plant, located in St. Paul's Highland Park neighborhood and slated for closing due to slow pickup sales, should manufacture hybrid plug-in F150 Ranger trucks. Ford built and leased 1,500 such pickups in California a couple of years ago. The pickups were popular with drivers and saved energy, but Ford scrapped the idea. Now Ford has a new CEO, the end of oil seems near and Morris says the company might be open to the idea of a greener vehicle. It was published in yesterday's Strib and is available here.

In the papers ...
There's lots of news to pass on. The Star Tribune reported on John Dwyer's Clean Hub. We featured an interview with Dwyer, the founder of Shelter Architecture, on the Building Minnesota podcast. You can listen to that at podlounge or at iTunes.

The Star Tribune has also published stories on possible uses for St. Paul's Ford Plant and a farewell column from architecture critic Linda Mack.

Meanwhile, the national media has been covering the June 23 opening of Philip Johnson's Glass House. On Tuesday, Ada Louise Huxtable wrote a memorable piece in the Wall Street Journal. A friend of Glass, she mourns the loss of the painting "Burial of Phocion" by Nicolas Poussin. The painting remains in the house, she writes, but it has faded, nearly beyond recognition. The rest of the house and the grounds have been managed admirably, she writes. The Times also did a piece on the building, which you can read here, if you are a Times Select member.



And then there was this piece, buried in the Times national section the other day. Cleveland wants to demolish Marcel Breuer's Cleveland Trust Tower (above, photo by David Maxwell for the New York Times). Preservationists want to save it. Irony alert: The design of the Cleveland Trust Tower is essentially the same building Breuer had proposed to construct on top of Grand Central Station in New York, a fight that helped birth the preservation movement.

What should happen to St. Paul's Ford Plant?
AIA St. Paul recently released a summary of their Unauthorized Design Charrette for the Ford Plant. Eight teams of several volunteers each discussed ideas for reusing the soon-to-be-vacated manufacturing plant. You can download the PDF summarizing the day's event here.

After Ford plant closes in 2008, what next?
There's lot of speculation about the future of St. Paul's Ford plant. The last Ford Ranger pickup will roll out the door next year. Tim Nelson and Jason Hoppin of the Pioneer Press speculate that Google might consider a portion of the 123-acre site as a home for a Midwest data center. Others believe the site might be a great place for housing. Architects and average citizens get their chance to brainstorm about all this at an "Unauthorized Design" charrette. Sponsored by AIA St. Paul, the event takes place from 8:30 a.m. - 5 p.m. on Saturday, March 10 at UAW Local 879. (Photo by Dan Oldre, from Flickr.com)