The Downtown Cary, NC Park Showcases the Power of Civic Infill
The Downtown Cary, NC Park Showcases the Power of Civic Infill
How world class public design triggers private investment
Imagine if the renowned design thinkers Vitruvius, William “Holly” Whyte, and Witold Rybcznkski found themselves headed to the obvious destination of any global architectural study tour–Cary, North Carolina. Arriving on a sunny Saturday morning, Downtown Cary Park is a sight to behold–throngs of people gather to picnic, scale up custom-built playground structures and slides, and revel in the exciting and unfamiliar surroundings.
Opened in November to much fanfare and coverage from national architecture press, this park is a $68 million achievement in the Wake County municipality with significant momentum for urban growth. Since its opening, I’ve visited the park twice, both times with my basset hound, Miss Dolly, who I could hardly convince to leave the ‘Barkyard’. Her chaperone appreciated the chance to let her off leash and enjoy a beverage from the adjacent, park-operated ‘Bark Bar’. There is nothing equalling this experience within 100 miles of sweet, charming Cary.
The Triangle now has a world-class urban park. That's a designation I do not make lightly. Having pursued a Master’s degree in landscape architecture and now working as a landscape designer, I consider myself reasonably well-referenced. This park is a new category for the Triangle. The region has exceptionally designed landscapes at museums, state parks, and campuses, but I falter to cite a park in North Carolina with such a diverse program and exceptional finishes in an urban context.
Vitruvius and Whyte, having downed their glasses of Chardonnay at The Bark Bar, are deep in discussion, volleying reactions quicker than the ping-pong players at adjacent tables. Holly, best known for his efforts of restoring the then needle-ridden Bryant Park in New York to its contemporary success, is focused on the diversity of activity. “The social spaces of this park are impeccable. People aged 8 to 80 are all finding ways to interact and enjoy the unexpected, the social. Just look at those people along the railing, staring at that funny-looking dog. They’re captivated by the theater of it all.”
Vitruvius, most frequently remembered for authoring a classic and influential set of volumes on architecture, is, of course, referencing his famed trias—utility, Firmness, and Delight.#,# “Sure, Holly, the people love it. But the built forms are perfect. Hefty stones are arranged placidly in the landscape, and that pond of water is not only beautiful but also functions to hold the rainwater from all surrounding surfaces. The radial roofs and their zinc eaves…I’m enraptured.”
There is much for our friends to obsess over. Prize-winning Canadian architectural writer Rybcznkski is sipping a Hi-Wire IPA, intently thumbing around Google Earth, trying to place the park in its context. “This is a triumph of modern landscape architecture and architecture, joined in great unity by material and circulation. But I struggle to recognize its place in an urban context. Sure, there are new condos and 5-over-1s at the perimeter. But merely two blocks from here, suburban homes sit on quarter-acre lots. Is this really ‘downtown’? What does ‘downtown’ mean to Cary? To North Carolina? To humanity?”
Parks are, by their nature, centripetal, a convening force for an increasingly diverse and divided society. Yet they’re impossible to divorce from their surrounding context. Great places should be both destinations and the backbones of diverse, thriving neighborhoods. In Cary, we find an odd paradox–a world-class urban park in an un-urban context. The work to make it more than a destination for curious visitors and architectural buffs has only just begun.
Rybczynski’s challenge to our profession, from the closing essay in a compilation published in 1992, is more relevant today than it ever was.
“One of the greatest architectural shortcomings of our cities today is the apparent inability of contemporary architects to produce a large number of unassuming but satisfying buildings that form the backdrop for the occasional important monument. We need good background buildings, but who wants to design them?
In another essay from the same compilation, Rybczynski describes the rowhouse characteristic of many East Coast cities and how they defined city life:
“One has the impression that just as many people enjoyed the bustle of the city streets and squares, they also liked the gregariousness of living in relatively close proximity in compact, well-defined neighborhoods.”
The author departing his former residence, an unassuming yet satisfying 1000 SQFT South Philadelphia Rowhouse. Go Birds! Photo: Derek Frisicchio
Many in my profession dream of making a big impact, and they often conflate impact with prestige. The more head-turning the park, school, and airport, the more lives we’ll touch (and magazines we’ll be featured in). We aspire to envision, draft, and administer the construction of superstar projects. Very few of us ever will. Only a handful of globally relevant landscape architecture firms were invited by Cary to submit proposals to design this magnificent place.
The lasting urban impact of Downtown Cary Park will be the ‘background buildings’ it begs for: the rowhouses, townhomes, triplexes, and cottage courts that Cary and every other city in North Carolina desperately need. Designers should be clamoring to fill our cities with buildings folks associate with their connection to a place, thereby giving an urban context to an urban park.
We need gregarious buildings. Small buildings. Buildings that forgo garages for accessory dwelling units. Buildings from where we can walk our basset hounds to the Barkyard in ten minutes or less. I say so both as a designer and as an aspiring homeowner who’s watched housing affordability here plummet in recent years. Living smaller is more attainable and even preferable to many.
Downtown Cary has a physical context that could make the walkable lifestyle you’d find in Philadelphia or Barcelona achievable. A relatively gridded street network radiating from downtown is the fortunate consequence of its legacy as a rail town. The only urban amenity it lacks is a full-service grocery.
The trio departs, headed to RDU to catch one of its now numerous international flights. They’re off to tour other superstar parks, jetting off to Cairo, Lisbon, and Bangkok. One imagines, though, that Downtown Cary Park is forever in their memories and public lecture slides.
There is decidedly little prestige in designing ‘background buildings’. Yet the best spatial thinkers, well-known and unheard of, operate under the same principle: places are made. They are designed and built piece by piece, and in the best circumstances – well cared for and enjoyed by coming generations.
Brian Vaughn is a landscape designer based in Durham, North Carolina. He graduated with a Master's Degree in Landscape Architecture from NC State University, following a stint in Philadelphia working in energy demand management and construction administration as a Venture for America Fellow. In 2022, he contributed to an ASLA Honor Award-winning student team, ‘Fixed In Flux: A World Class Park Embracing Rising Waters’. On the weekends, you might find him driving his Camry back to Cary for Dolly’s playdate with Colin the Corgi from Clayton.
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