The Times Union this morning announces another plan to redevelop the Harriman Office Campus, which would involve moving Albany High School there. The current high school would be razed and the campus turned into dorms for UAlbany and the College of Saint Rose, which I suppose might reduce residential problems in the current student ghetto.
One advantage of the plan is that no one will miss the 1970s neo-brutalist look of the current high school, or the undistinguished modern architecture at Harriman -- in stark contrast to the original Albany Academy, still beautiful and functional (now as the school district HQ) after 200 years. Modern architects are still at it, as can be seen from the stupefyingly banal rendering of the proposed SUNY Adirondack building in Wilton on Page B3 of today's TU (no link up).
Unclear to me is how moving the high school ties in with a potential expansion of UAlbany's western campus, which neighbors Harriman, or potential private-sector development at Harriman (a previous plan called for a tech park there), or how many state jobs there would be displaced and whether they would be relocated within the city of Albany. I'm also not certain that it's a good idea to move the high school away from the center of town, although its current neighbors probably wouldn't mind.
Comments