Causeway Institute of Art
Genral Douglas MacArthur Causeway, Miami, Florida, USA
A community for the production and expostion of art situated beneath the MacArthur Causeway.
SITE. The General Douglas MacArthur Causeway is a six lane roadway connecting Downtown Miami to South Miami Beach via Biscayne Bay. The structure carries the state roads A1A and 836. Structurally the project is comprised of precast concrete components assembled to accomplish a maximum clearance of 21 m (68ft). In all, the trajectory of the causeway is of 5.6 km (3.5m).
WHY? Miami is a city ruled by the road. As it expands, the city instinctively generates new roads, expressways, bridges and causeways to connect one area to another. These works of infrastructure are designed exclusively for the car, thus rejecting the scale of the human. This proposal seeks to reinstate the human, and thus nature, as the protagonist of our built environment.
CONCEPT. A concrete platform nestled beneath the existing causeway atop which rest a series of modular volumes that cantilever over the water. The desired effect is one of levitation. The modules break from their regularity to adapt to a variety of spatial conditions to meet the demands of a thriving arts community in Miami.
