Monday, Oct 12, at 6p.m. about fifty local residents converged on the Arts Collinwood Gallery at the corner of Waterloo Rd. and E. 156 St. Northeast Shores Development Corp (NSDC) had sent out a general invitation to attend a meeting to see and discuss the plan for the Tower to be built on the new grass space just outside the meeting site. 

John Boksansky, the Development director of NSDC spoke briefly to open the meeting. He reminded the audience that this is a part of the Waterloo Road Project which NSDC initiated about five years ago and has been nurturing ever since. The grass patch outside the door where the sidewalk was widened in July is the first visible sign of progress on this project, but John pointed out that "though progress has been slow, it has not been negligible." In fact, the numerous public meetings that elicited so much neighborhood input have now led to the current situation where $2.8 million have been set aside for this project by the city. 

John then introduced the two speakers, Mike Moritz, a local resident who is a member of the Board of Arts Collinwood, and is an artist who designs public art projects and who, as a businessman, is a steel construction fabricator. Beside Mike stood the other speaker, Chris Diehl who, as a faculty member in the architecture dept at Kent State U, had been leader of the design of the Waterloo Project. Chris is also an artist and was present in that capacity. The project had specified that a tower should be built to occupy the new green space, but only a barebones design had been proposed as a placeholder for the final design.  

In June, a public meeting was held by NSDC at Arts Collinwood location. Attendees at that meeting were shown the basic proposed tower design. It was approximately thirty feet tall and consisted of three equal-sized open cubes outlined by steel beams and resting one upon another. We were told this design would get a little tweaking, and were asked for suggestions for its size and location. We were told that the tower was intended to serve the following three goals:

1)To be a highly visible marker of the new Waterloo Arts and Entertainment District.

2)To be a flexible framework on which a changing set of public art displays could be mounted.

3)To provide a stage for ‘guerrilla art’ such as concerts, poetry readings and plays.

Having learned that electric outlets will be mounted on the tower to support lighting and sound amplification, we went outside on the proposed grass plot and suggested a footprint of ten feet square and marked out on the ground a suggested location and orientation. We also suggested that there be a small thrust stage in front of the tower. We felt these specifications would best serve the three purposes described above. There was lively discussion throughout that June meeting but those present had no difficulty reaching a consensus on the suggested size and orientation. 

Chris told us that public bidding had selected Mike to propose desired design tweaking and to bid on its construction.

Mike then described the tweaking he proposed as follows:

1)The original design had diagonal steel cross members for each of the four sides of each of the three cubes. Since these would obstruct the view, they had been replaced by corner braces to provide the needed stabilization. This greatly improved utilization options and passed the engineering stability tests.

2)The tower had been given a small lean to improve its eye appeal without significantly raising cost or impairing stability.

3)The color and finish of the steel beams had not been specified in the original proposal. Mike said he had reviewed the alternatives available and had decided that stainless steel was the best of the options because of its simplicity and because it would have much lower maintenance costs than the other options.

Discussion was then open to the floor and a heated debate began. Susie Darlin, a local designer had two objections to Mike’s design:

1)It was too tall and overpowered the Arts Collinwood building with its nice turret.

2)Its cubic block outline lacked organic appeal.

Many of those present agreed with Susie’s objection. But Chris reminded us that the design had to be very simple to accommodate the variety of uses it must support. On being pressed from the floor he admitted that at one point Mike had built a small model that featured some nice organic curvature, but they had reluctantly decided that the engineering to guarantee its stability under high winds would seriously delay its completion and make its cost infeasible. Upon questioning, Mike said he was uncomfortable with the process that had been followed throughout this project. Several in the audience supported this judgment. Sarah Gyorki, director of Arts Collinwood, recapped a brief history of the Waterloo Streetscape Project, indicating that popular input and feedback had been much sought. And your reporter, having attended numerous meetings at which resident suggestions and feedback were provided, feels that these objections were not, in fact, well-founded. You have to remember that this neighborhood was stranded for more than two years with no local newspaper. My hope and belief is that the new Collinwood Observer will henceforth fill this gap and promote and enable such public interest, discussion and feedback.  

At this point Chris unveiled a fact that had not so far been revealed to us, namely that a grant to fund the proposed tower has been received from the county and expires in a month or so. He explained that a further delay in the closing date cannot be obtained and that failure to build this tower would pretty well guarantee that all future requests to the county for funding would be denied. This means that we actually can propose only tower modifications that are minor and can be simply and inexpensively implemented. Reluctantly, the speakers agreed with Mary Zodnik, co-owner of the Azure local stained-glass business, that the present meeting had not much more scope than a basic up or down vote.

There followed a lively discussion of the limits and merits of popular control of such projects and Chris Dixon, a local photographer and supporter of our art scene pointed out that if popular support had been required then the Eiffel Tower would never have been built. 

Susie Darlin suggested that maybe the uppermost cube of the tower might have some simplification and that suggestion was well received by all. She said that would go at least part way to meeting her earlier complaints. Your reporter reminded all that although the tower had occasionally been described as a piece of public art, the proposed design really regarded it more as a picture frame than a picture. Chris supported this view and at least a number of those present seemed to find merit in this view. 

The meeting was lengthy with much to and fro but when it eventually broke up around eight o’clock, most of those present seemed to agree that the tower, in its role as a platform for public art, fills the role admirably, and will meet its goals if the minor tweaks suggested can be at least partially implemented, and if we residents can do a good job of putting it to its intended uses creatively. Your reporter sees the development of Waterloo Village over the last few years as a very promising sign that the tower will, indeed, be used creatively and with energy.