October 23, 2006

OpenHouse report card: 80,000-plus, but some snafus

Preliminary estimates show that more than 80,000 people showed up for Open House New York earlier this month, setting a new record for the event, P. Joy Villalino, the acting executive director, told NewYorkology.

Among the most popular spots, 3,000 people toured one of the Rockefeller Center roof gardens during the four hours it was open to the public, 1,000 visted the Ling Loft and 1,000 toured the Flushing Library, Villalino said. In all, 180 sites were open during the two-day event with 120 programs and nearly 600 volunteers.

But despite the big numbers, not everything went smoothly. OHNY coordinators were not at all venues at all times, leading to at least the Noguchi Museum trying to charge admission. "All of our events are meant to be free," Villalino said. "Unfortunately we need to really make sure to communicate with the staff on site."

Other venues dropped out at the last minute, including the Empty Vessel Project, which had an accident and had to be moved, and WNET/Channel 13, which didn't plan to have enough staff available to open the building on a weekend.

In addition to fixing those kinks for next year, OHNY hopes to add more alternative-transportation tours, such as the boat and canoe tours and sustainable bike tour. OHNY is also adding more fund-raising events throughout the year, Villalino said, including at least one more in 2006. The goal is to hold six or seven during 2007. Among last year's special events was an architect-led tour of 7 World Trade Center before construction was complete.

If you took any great pictures during OHNY 2006, you still have a few more days to submit them to the Focus on Architecture competition. The deadline is October 25.

After the jump, see more pictures and read part of an e-mail from Carolina Salguero, the director of PortSide NewYork, describing the events at the Mary A. Whalen during Open House New York.

The retired and rusty fuel tanker Mary A. Whalen was docked at American Stevedoring's Red Hook container port during OHNY. It drew about 750 guests during the weekend, according to Carolina Salguero, who add more details:

We had all ages and types of folks aboard. The OHNY crowd is great to work with as they come with a real hunger for information and interest in learning. They are also quite accommodating and accepted lines and waits with incredible grace. Our museum designer Tim Ventimiglia, who works for Ralph Appelbaum the largest interpretitve museum design firm in the world (Tim is working independently with us), was truly impressed and inspired by the curiousity and diversity of the crowd. He said he expected a tanker to attract a lot of men over 40. in fact, we attracted droves of the mom with pre-toddler and toddler set, plus hipsters, artists, blue collar guys (some of whom offered to weld etc for us), neighbors, out of staters, seniors, kids, and at least one transvestite. Our crew loved it.

OHNY extraordinary PR has helped our research. Folks with key info found out about the Whalen and got in touch and came on the tour. We heard from a woman tankerman from the 80s. Two visitors had a friend at Columbia who wrote a Master's thesis on repurposing old tankers which they will get to us. And we also met Karen Dyrland, the daughter of the first captain of the Whalen (once she was rechristened from S. T. Kiddoo to Mary A. Whalen.) Alf Dyrland was captain for 20 some years and was so attached to the boat that when he passed away about 20 years after he retired, they put a drawing of him at the helm on his memorial mass program. We learned a lot from her doing the tour, and she has photos at home she will share with us.

OHNY was a huge boon to us for these connections.

October 23, 2006 11:54 AM in Architecture, Cheap Stuff, History, Kids, Sightsology

®Copyright 2006, All Rights Reserved