Search Results for 'm street underpass'

UrbanTurf: NoMa BID Selects Rainstorm Installation For M Street Underpass

April 17, 2016

Construction will start this year on a new look for a central underpass in NoMa: perpetual rain. In the winning proposal to enliven the M Street underpass in NoMa, rain made of light will shower over commuters’ heads as they walk through the space. Read more.

Greater Greater Washington: NoMa’s M street Underpass Transformation

April 20, 2015

The M Street underpass, outside the NoMa Metro station, is going to be an outdoor art project. LED lights will illuminate the sidewalk, hopefully turning a dreary scene into a park-like gathering spot. Read more. 

Urban Turf: NoMa BID Selects Rainstorm Installation For M Street Underpass

April 17, 2015

Construction will start this year on a new look for a central underpass in NoMa: perpetual rain. In the winning proposal to enliven the M Street underpass in NoMa, rain made of light will shower over commuters’ heads as they walk through the space. Read more.

K Street NE Underpass

March 15, 2023

At more than 400 feet long, the K Street underpass is the longest in NoMa. It comprises six traffic lanes, including the K Street bikeway, and two narrow sidewalks that are each approximately 8 feet wide. The sidewalks are impinged upon by streetlight poles, posts supporting the elevated tracks, and drainage grates. Considering these constraints, NPF, with the input of local stakeholders and government partners, selected a digital display strategy called the “K Street Virtual Gallery” as a unique and exciting solution to the dark, unwelcoming conditions. For this underpass, instead of the project being the installation of infrastructural art to provide permanent lighting and appeal, the Foundation chose to leave the existing lighting in place and enhance it by providing the means for artists to project digital art pieces and light up the walls.

The K Street Virtual Gallery employs 12 laser projectors to create a series of large “canvases” on the reticulated stone walls in the darkest areas of the underpass, and it can be reprogrammed as often as wanted and practical. As a dynamic piece of technology, it will allow for a wide variety of artistic and cultural themes to be addressed and for different curators to be engaged to develop exhibits offering different perspectives. Finally, the K Street Virtual Gallery will provide a platform for artists to develop and adapt their work for digital display.

The first call for artist entries for the K Street Virtual Gallery was issued on November 8, 2022, and the first exhibit will open in early 2023. The NoMa BID and NPF will support the first several exhibits, in order to understand and demonstrate the capabilities of the equipment, with the help of contractor and concept designer Design Communications Ltd. In the future, however, the Foundation and the BID anticipate that other organizations will be invited to participate in creating and curating exhibits.

L Street NE Underpass

March 15, 2023

Improving the L Street underpass was the second phase of NPF’s plan to transform the railway underpasses into sites of contemporary light-art installations. After the international design competition described above, San Francisco–based firm FUTUREFORMS (formerly known as Future Cities Lab) was named in June 2015 as the designer for the space. The firm is an award-winning interdisciplinary studio employing a team of artists, designers, architects, technologists, lighting designers, and more. Lead artist Jason Kelly Johnson said of Lightweave, “It was exciting working with the NoMa Parks Foundation and the community to bring this concept to reality. The idea was to create something interactive, playful, and unique to the site. We were inspired by the idea of translating sounds from the site into sculptural forms.” The installation work for Lightweave began in 2018, a few weeks after the unveiling of Rain.

The installation comprises six spiraling lattices of stainless steel and bent LED tubing suspended above the underpass sidewalks — three above each passageway, hung from freestanding armatures — that light up the space 24 hours a day, with LED colors changing and moving in response to sound waves from the sidewalk spaces and vibrations from trains passing overhead.

Lightweave was lit up and opened to the public on April 9, 2019. Sadly, as described above, it was severely damaged by a 2020 fire in the underpass. Because of the pandemic, the installation could not be repaired until 2022, when the Foundation paid for and supervised the restoration.