Honeycomb design full of science fiction, infinitely extending stairs, and nearly 200,000 related labels on INS.
As early as 20 19, this staircase in Hudson Square was a must-see for many tourists.
The building is 16 stories high, nearly 50 meters high, and even overlooks the Hudson River and Manhattan not far away.
According to The New York Times, two years before the tragedy, tourists and experts worried that the unprotected design of the ship might bring safety risks.
However, this "safety warning" has flooded countless people. It was not until the lives of three young people disappeared within a year that this designer's fun-filled social place was widely concerned.
Online celebrity landmarks where young people gather.
You may be no stranger to the designer of this ship. He is Thomas Heathwick, the hottest architect in the world at present.
At the age of 39, Thomas defeated Zaha Hadid, who is known as the "devil in architecture", and won the right to design the British Pavilion of the 20 10 Shanghai World Expo.
British Pavilion of Shanghai World Expo
At the same time, the magical new landmark 1000 tree along the Suzhou Creek in Shanghai and the main torch platform (204 copper petals) of the London Olympic Games in England were all from his hands.
Photography @ Qingyanzhu
Thomas, known as Leonardo da Vinci in architecture, often jumps out of the limitation of "architecture is just architecture" and has rich imagination and creativity.
According to Thomas, the ship is not a rigid static sculpture, but a social place full of fun.
As one of the most complicated steel structures in history, the ship is full of gimmicks and looks like a "big pine cone" from a distance.
This huge viewing staircase consists of eight overlapping stairs and platforms. It is polished to copper color and colorful, which can be said to be eye-catching.
The architectural inspiration comes from stepped wells in India, including 154 stairs and more than 2,500 steps, which attract people at the bottom of the well step by step.
Diving down and looking down gives people a strong visual and psychological impact.
The entire Hudson Square costs $25 billion and is the largest mixed-use private development project in American history.
The $200 million ship is open to the public free of charge. It is not only a traffic place, but also a place where new york locals climb stairs for fitness and gathering.
The internal route is like a layered mountain peak, which is one kilometer long. Visitors can climb, explore and overlook it.
Although the background of the project mentions "healthy city" and "citizens first", the three elevators are only provided for the elderly and the disabled.
Containers with countless stairs are actually inconvenient for children or adults pushing strollers.
Container elevator
This project still attracts young people who like to follow the trend and climb stairs. In early 2020, the first person who committed suicide on a boat was a freshman from New Jersey.
The second case occurred in June 5438+last February. A 24-year-old depressed girl committed suicide. A few weeks later, another 2 1 year-old man in San Antonio committed suicide and jumped off the building directly, taking his own life.
After three consecutive accidents, the developer of Hudson Square finally announced that the ship would be "closed indefinitely" until the best countermeasures were discussed.
"I knew someone would commit suicide in this building."
Before the ship tragedy happened, there were doubts. Audrey Wax, former deputy editor-in-chief of Architect magazine, put forward:
"When people climb the stairs, although the height of the railing is always above the waist, as long as people stand tall, they will have a tendency to jump."
There are also criticized whirlpool shapes and dazzling effects. Some people say that it can cause serious dizziness and instability in the container.
Architectural color is a kind of public color. In construction of psychology's research, the change of color will lead to strong psychological suggestion. Especially when surrounded by colorful buildings, people's emotions are often accompanied by impulses. or vice versa, Dallas to the auditorium
For example, the ferrier Bridge in London, England was once black, and people often committed suicide by jumping off the bridge and drowning. Later, the city government of London simply followed the advice of medical experts and painted the bridge from black to blue, which reduced the number of people who committed suicide by jumping off a building by 56.4%.
When architecture affects emotions, these factors will be further amplified for young people.
Charlotta Todd of chalmers university of technology, Sweden, suggested that young people's suicides are often impulsive and sudden.
"They may not really want to die, but just want to put some things on hold. This may have been going on for some time, or it may be something insignificant to experienced adults, such as breaking up with your partner, quarreling with your parents, failing the exam, or being gossiped. "
This is where the ship caused great controversy. Although it has built an online celebrity building that has attracted countless young people, it has not made a really effective brake valve.
Dr. Jill Harkavy Friedman, vice president of research at the American Suicide Prevention Foundation, suggested to architects and builders: "Suicide prevention should be considered when designing buildings, because people never know who may be in danger."
Therefore, in high-rise buildings, even the smallest preventive measures may affect the instant decision-making of young people who want to commit suicide.
"Romantic" Network Celebrity Suicide Holy Land
There are not many buildings in the world where people commit suicide on their own initiative, such as ships.
In Wikipedia's ranking of online celebrity suicide shrines, the Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge in China ranks first in popularity.
One of the most famous cases to prevent this situation is a line written by volunteers on the railing of Nanjing Yangtze River Bridge, "Where is the capital of Madagascar?" .
They hope to use this question to let the people who jump off the bridge temporarily, rethink and leave a buffer time.
The Golden Gate Bridge is also one of the most popular suicide sites in the world.
The Golden Gate Bridge is considered as a miracle of bridge engineering in the 20th century. With a total length of 2.7 kilometers, it is one of the largest single-span suspension bridges in the world.
When people walk on this magnificent bridge, they will be shocked by the beautiful scenery that looks like a fairyland, further awakening the suicidal tendency in their hearts.
However, a few seconds after jumping from the highest bridge deck of 227 meters (745 feet), most people will be washed away by the extremely fast river and die immediately before they have time to repent.
It is worth emphasizing that the Nanjing Bridge and the Golden Gate Bridge are landmarks of the past era, and their foresight is far less than now.
After new york has many landmarks, such as Empire State Building and World Trade Center, ships should learn a lesson and pay attention to the safety of facilities, instead of blindly pursuing sensational effects.
It is hoped that builders and architects can regard health and safety as the cornerstone of urban architecture. After all, the ultimate goal of building services is always people.