Can D.C's Homeless Live in Discarded Subway Cars? [View all]

[elleng]

Visionary architect Arthur Cotton Moore’s latest idea: an affordable housing project built out of old Metro cars.

'Last month, The Washington Post floated a pretty wild idea: transforming decommissioned Metro cars into housing for the homeless. The man behind the notion is architect Arthur Cotton Moore, who happens to be a neighbor of ours here at the Watergate complex. So we walked over to his top-floor apartment to learn more.

A lifelong Washingtonian, Moore, 81, has been an avid urban recycler for decades. He’s restored historic spaces such as the Jefferson Building of the Library of Congress, the Cairo Hotel, and the Old Post Office Pavilion and designed new ones like the Phillips Collection. The offices from which he and his wife, Patricia, operate their architectural design firm overlook one such project—the Washington Harbour complex on the Potomac River.

Moore’s 1972 book The Powers of Preservation: New Life for Urban Historic Places highlights examples of his work in Washington, as well as New York, Charleston, Nashville, Winston-Salem, and Baltimore. One of his most celebrated adaptive reuse successes: The combination of Canal Square and The Foundry along Georgetown’s C&O Canal, which Moore repurposed into a commercial square, office spaces, and a concert venue in the 1970s.'>>>

https://www.citylab.com/housing/2017/03/can-dcs-homeless-live-in-discarded-subway-cars/518904/?utm_source=SFFB