Centro garage dedication a success

We attended the Centro parking garage dedication this morning, of which we were the Landscape Architects. Aleks Istanbullu (architect) and Daniel Martin Diaz (public artist) did a great job designing and enhancing the structure, which is slated to have retail space developed on the ground level and University of Arizona housing on top.

As a parking garage, it is a great and needed addition to the east side of downtown Tucson. It will also help alleviate some parking issues for those wanting to hang out on 4th Avenue. I think this is a great perspective of the building, walking through the Underpass. The art panels at the corner of the structure will be backlit at night too. We'll get pictures of that for sure!

Planting space was a bit limited on this site. We had a few key spaces to work with, namely planters located on the 3rd floor containing vines that will grow up the screens adjacent to the art panels. We look at these vines as a way of providing more greenery to the structure and offsetting the metal artwork. It will take a little bit of time before the vines get to this point, but we think it will look great when it does!

Incorporated into the on-street layout was a future Modern Streetcar stop, so when that project is finished, you'll be able to take the streetcar right to/from this location.

We also produced a plan and calculated water usage/storage as part of the City of Tucson's Water Harvesting Ordinance. All planting areas were recessed to capture water runoff and rainfall. We also used drought tolerant plants throughout the site, but didn't sacrifice on texture or adding seasonal color in areas.

Hope you enjoy the new addition to downtown Tucson! We do.