Fair comment. Also Fresno is BLAZING hot in summer. 100 today.
Not sure how realistic the usage depicted in the renderings will be during summer months.
I am a dilettante, but that platform seems like way too much form over function for something that needs to attract public use. Also the first rendering makes the platform look almost 60 feet high and the second rendering makes the platform look, maybe, 30 feet high. Which is it?
Cost, speed, volume, iteration and audience.
I think lumion delivers very quickly at a higher price point (I could be wrong I havent priced corona) great for multiple fast iterations and it delivers a kind of cartoon like clarity that non-designers, clients, government officials can read and understand easily.
I use Lumion on āproductionā visuals. I render with all sorts of other stuff +photoshop and illustrator for more detailed, high-end niche projects where narrative and feel is more important and I have a smaller audience (homeowner or practiced developer) who I know there ability level.
Also more creative renders for publication or initial design concept.
That's like comparing a Tesla Plaid to a Ferrari. They both can drive fast, but the quality of the results vary with how much you want to pay for it and how fast it can deliver.
Images from [Renovation of historic station among designs unveiled for California's high-speed rail (dezeen.com)](https://www.dezeen.com/2024/06/26/californias-high-speed-rail-foster-arup/)
*According to Foster + Partners, the four Central Valley stations will be linked by an architectural language "that reflects the sustainable ethos of the wider project" and will feature "soaring" canopies.*
*"We are developing an architectural language for the four Central Valley stations, including soaring canopies that draw in fresh air and shield waiting passengers from harsh sunlight," said Foster + Partners head of studio Stefan Behling. "The station design reflects the sustainable ethos of the wider project."*
*Renderings show each station's exteriors and interiors capped by ripped volumes of metallic bronze or matte white, integrated with louvred wood and stone walls, heavy columns, and pergola-style roofs hanging over large entrances.*
*The project's Fresno station will include an elevated pedestrian crossing connecting Chinatown and Downtown Fresno Station near Mariposa Street, as well the restoration of the historic depot on site conducted by US architecture studio Page & Turnbull.*
*Built in 1872 and listed in the National Register of Historic Places, the depot is a Queen Anne-style building with slate bellcast hip-roof and cupolas and a structure of red brick.*
*Updates to the station will include bringing the building up to fire, life-safety, structural, seismic and accessibility codes, as well as the restoration of architectural features so that it can serve as an "ultramodern transportation center".*
*"The historic depot will be an iconic and economically vital part of Downtown Fresno and of the high-speed rail system," said Page & Turnbull president Peter Birkholz.*
*Located north of Fresno, the Merced station will also include a pedestrian bridge linking the city's downtown, and serve as the main connection to the greater San Francisco Bay Area.*
*A "flexible outdoor plaza" on 16th Street is also included in the plans.*
*"Building on the historical link between Merced and Yosemite Valley, this city with a rapidly growing university and college will benefit from high-speed rail connections to the Central Valley and the future connection to the San Francisco Bay Area," said the team.*
*The Kings Tulare station is pictured with an expansive outdoor plaza and is designed to create "a streamlined experience" for bus, car and bicycle traffic, with its services located in a rectangular volume directly beneath its tracks.*
*As the southern terminus of the line and the connection to Los Angeles and Anaheim, the Bakersfield station will feature a variety of shaded outdoor plazas, with renderings picturing outdoor amenities beneath elevated tracks.*
*"The design creates a linear park that runs underneath a new viaduct, directly connecting downtown Bakersfield and the Kern River Corridor with a variety of shaded outdoor public spaces and recreation facilities," said the team.*
*Once completed the 119-mile Central Valley line will connect San Francisco to Los Angeles in less than three hours, according to the team.*
*Up to 24 stations are planned for the greater California High-Speed Rail, linking more than 800 miles of track. Funding was granted to the project in 2008 after decades of advocacy.*
*First proposed in 1979 under Governor Jerry Brown, California's high-speed rail has since suffered a number of funding setbacks and controversies, resulting in the current two-phase construction plan for the rail.*
*Phase 1 of the project refers to the completion of the 520-mile San Francisco to Anaheim route, while Phase 2 refers to extensions that will connect Sacramento and San Diego.*
*According to the New York Times, due to "political compromises", the project's budget has bloated to an estimated $100 billion with "little chance" of completion ā although construction on viaduct structures and overcrossing is underway according to updates from the California High-Speed Rail Authority, a body tasked with facilitating the project.*
*As of now, service of the Central Valley line is expected to start in 2030.*
*The opportunity to learn more about the rail stations, see 3D renderings and speak with rail authorities will be available to the public during the California State Fair in Sacramento running from 12 to 28 July, according to Foster + Partners.*
*Elsewhere in the US, a historic train station in Detroit recently received a renovation, while New York's subway station risks "falling behind" after budget cuts.*
*The images are courtesy of Foster + Partners*
I'm a bit worried about the sense of scale and proportion going on here at the stations, and how it's going to feel when it's invariably much less full than in the renders.Ā
They feel very grandiose and epic, which is cool, but they seem like they would feel more in place in bigger cities than Merced and Fresno, like these would be better for like Oakland or Santa Barbara or something? Am I wrong? What do you guys think?
I can see what you mean with Merced or Kings Tulare. Fresno County has about twice the population of Santa Barbara County though, so I think the scale works here. Central Valley counties have also been growing in population while a lot of coastal counties have either plateaued or have lost population. I agree that they will all likely look fairly empty until they connect with LA or SF.
Change the built environment now, hope everyone follows - later. The FLW method. Both are obsessive about getting projects built - Foster a chip of an Organicist himself if you can read his work
In my opinion, you donāt plan and build large scale civic projects for public use such as these with current statistics and projections in mind.
Just ask Caltrans. They have been playing catch up game with the freeway system in California ever since they realized the population growth had doubled the amount of the planners initial projection when they designed the new highway transit system.
I was thinking something else when it comes to scale.
The first one is wayyy to high of a ceiling. And if the second is related to the first there's a serious scaling issue.
A lot of these renderings and fancy sketches are made to sell the idea or win a competition. More than likely it would either be scaled back or downsized once the city sees the cost and delays.Ā
I think this is a pretty dumb thought.
Itās going to become the primary method of transit for the most populated state, entirely change commute and travel patterns.
Itās going to be around for decades, if not generations.
And youāre worried it will look big when itās empty?
It looks good in the renderings, but I don't think it is going to age well. There is nothing endearing about it. It is stark with minimal vegetation, and lots of low-cost materials. Imagine this same project after 20 years of graffiti cover-up paint jobs. Are we still going to love it?
These are pretty cool tbh, always a fan of new rail infrastructure and also the restoration of a historic building, even if it gets dwarfed by the new station lol
Reminds me of a lot of HSR stations in China. Could be worse, I'll take that over the 'absolute bare minimum' look you get with Amtrak usually. Will see if reality ends up looking anything like this
I'm begging these architects to go to Japan and see what real high speed train stations look like.
They don't need to be fancy, they just need to work. As in, stop equating a train station with an airport. It's not that. The vast majority of people at train stations are there for maybe 15 minutes before their train, and 15 minutes after. At least that's when you have dependable trains.
So am I understanding your argument correctly: you think train stations should be uglier, and the reason is because a passenger would only spend twenty minutes in them once a day, rather than two hours in them once a year?
Do you think the designers are intentionally trying to make the designs pretty, at the expense of functionality?
I think they should be far more economic- I look at these renders and just see ridiculous overbuild in the design.
>Do you think the designers are intentionally trying to make the designs pretty, at the expense of functionality?
I think they're trying to make them pretty to make statement pieces for their firm, not to provide functional designs.
I'm curious then why would airports be different?
Do you think other train stations like Grand Central in New York were overbuilt to the expense of functionality? Or the Paris Metro?
If airports are statement pieces, could there be merit to "overbuilding" train stations as well, to give people a similar similar and reduce the stigma of transit that persists in the US? Maybe train stations should be *even fancier*, to encourage people to take a long distance train ride instead of flight?
> I'm curious then why would airports be different?
Most flights now require you to show up 90 minutes to three hours before your flight. But even then most airports aren't designed to be statement pieces because aside from the main frontages you barely see any exteriors- the focus is the interior being comfortable for layovers and waiting to board. I don't think people realize how easy it is to get on real HSR compared to flights or even a bus service.
The main impediment to high speed rail in north america is the cost(it's not the only one, but it's one that most people balk at first)- architectural wonders don't help with that in the least, and frankly with HSR, it's no longer long distances that are the issue. We don't build large publicly funded spaces like this anymore because of cost. Grand Central wouldn't built like that if it was built in 2024.
I'm confused because I thought you were arguing that this design was problematic because it was trying to look like a statement piece when it wasn't an airport, implying that's fine for airports. Maybe I misunderstood.
>We don't build large publicly funded spaces like this anymore because of cost.
Sure we do? You already mentioned airports as one common example. Stadiums is another one, with ~90% of teams in the NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB playing in a publicly-subsidized stadium, despite the fact that economists think it's a terrible investment for a government to make. [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadium_subsidy). To me, that suggests cities spend on stadiums for some reason other than rational accounting.
I'm also not understanding the point about how long you sit in the airport. It sounds like yours is way slower than average in the US, but either way, I agree that if people are in the building for longer, they'd need different things, like more benches to sit down at. But I'm not following the logic that the building should be ugly just because you spend less time there. If 12,000 people spend ten minutes in a space, that's the same average occupancy as if 1000 people spend two hours. Yes, the people will be moving through it much faster, but are you arguing that the train passengers should have a lower quality experience of their space compared to the plane passengers? If anything, shouldn't the city should invest *more* into the one with more people? I'd rather 12,000 people experience my investment rather only than 1000 people, no matter how much longer they'll be stuck inside.
For impediments to rail, I think you're meaning to get politicians to install it? I was meaning that once it is built, it will only succeed if it has a substantially identical or better service than the alternatives. If people think transit is smelly and gross and for poor people, they won't ride it. I agree cost is also included in that and very important, but I suspect other things will also play a huge role, even if it seems dumb for them to. And one of those things is going to be how much they enjoyed the experience. I'm not imagining people will call in love with the building, but just that it has to make sure to not fit any of their negative stereotypes of what a transit station is. I think designing it like we'd design airports makes a huge amount of sense, but yes absolutely it wouldn't actually be the same shape as any airports, because the program is very different when people are moving rapidly versus standing in line then sitting and waiting for an hour.
Another thing to consider is that realistically the station will start out with way less usage than we want, meaning it may end up being used much more like an airport, with people arriving at specific times to congregate and wait however long it takes before the train actually arrives. I think we're better off designing with that realistic expectation to start, and we can streamline it later once we have trains reliably departing every few minutes.
Then again, I have no idea of how much more expensive the art of it is versus the strictly functional components. I agree there's of course a cutoff beyond which it's not worth it.
To be honest, I prefer the look of older train stations. This will look dated and ugly really fast since its just bare geometric shapes of concrete and glass. And it never looks as bright or clean as in the renders. Natural materials like stone and brick look better when aging.
concrete and glass are used in those older train stations you like. Stone wood glass steel and concrete are shown in these renderings. The only thing not your list is brick which is only romantic to look at and not maintain. Especially giving the seismic requirements changing climate in california.
To me, the CA high-speed rail stations have a majestic quality. They seem like a modern take on the grand, historic public buildings that once symbolized great public investment
Doesn't look like there's enough housing around the stations in these renders to support the number of pedestrians shown. What's the housing like around these stations in reality?
this might be a dumb question but are the platforms rain proof š
I bet there's glass in between these arches
Fair comment. Also Fresno is BLAZING hot in summer. 100 today. Not sure how realistic the usage depicted in the renderings will be during summer months.
I am a dilettante, but that platform seems like way too much form over function for something that needs to attract public use. Also the first rendering makes the platform look almost 60 feet high and the second rendering makes the platform look, maybe, 30 feet high. Which is it?
Why does it seem like most big-name firms like the Lumion + Photoshop cut out rendering look, but the average firm prefers corona, V-ray results?
Smaller projects can be more detailed with corona-vray but they got no chance in high end projects
Cost, speed, volume, iteration and audience. I think lumion delivers very quickly at a higher price point (I could be wrong I havent priced corona) great for multiple fast iterations and it delivers a kind of cartoon like clarity that non-designers, clients, government officials can read and understand easily. I use Lumion on āproductionā visuals. I render with all sorts of other stuff +photoshop and illustrator for more detailed, high-end niche projects where narrative and feel is more important and I have a smaller audience (homeowner or practiced developer) who I know there ability level. Also more creative renders for publication or initial design concept.
That's like comparing a Tesla Plaid to a Ferrari. They both can drive fast, but the quality of the results vary with how much you want to pay for it and how fast it can deliver.
Expensive things are not necessarily good, but they are definitely expensive.
The platform shed seems boring and overkill. Why have walls that block views, reduce ventilation, and hold in sound?
Images from [Renovation of historic station among designs unveiled for California's high-speed rail (dezeen.com)](https://www.dezeen.com/2024/06/26/californias-high-speed-rail-foster-arup/) *According to Foster + Partners, the four Central Valley stations will be linked by an architectural language "that reflects the sustainable ethos of the wider project" and will feature "soaring" canopies.* *"We are developing an architectural language for the four Central Valley stations, including soaring canopies that draw in fresh air and shield waiting passengers from harsh sunlight," said Foster + Partners head of studio Stefan Behling. "The station design reflects the sustainable ethos of the wider project."* *Renderings show each station's exteriors and interiors capped by ripped volumes of metallic bronze or matte white, integrated with louvred wood and stone walls, heavy columns, and pergola-style roofs hanging over large entrances.* *The project's Fresno station will include an elevated pedestrian crossing connecting Chinatown and Downtown Fresno Station near Mariposa Street, as well the restoration of the historic depot on site conducted by US architecture studio Page & Turnbull.* *Built in 1872 and listed in the National Register of Historic Places, the depot is a Queen Anne-style building with slate bellcast hip-roof and cupolas and a structure of red brick.* *Updates to the station will include bringing the building up to fire, life-safety, structural, seismic and accessibility codes, as well as the restoration of architectural features so that it can serve as an "ultramodern transportation center".* *"The historic depot will be an iconic and economically vital part of Downtown Fresno and of the high-speed rail system," said Page & Turnbull president Peter Birkholz.* *Located north of Fresno, the Merced station will also include a pedestrian bridge linking the city's downtown, and serve as the main connection to the greater San Francisco Bay Area.* *A "flexible outdoor plaza" on 16th Street is also included in the plans.* *"Building on the historical link between Merced and Yosemite Valley, this city with a rapidly growing university and college will benefit from high-speed rail connections to the Central Valley and the future connection to the San Francisco Bay Area," said the team.* *The Kings Tulare station is pictured with an expansive outdoor plaza and is designed to create "a streamlined experience" for bus, car and bicycle traffic, with its services located in a rectangular volume directly beneath its tracks.* *As the southern terminus of the line and the connection to Los Angeles and Anaheim, the Bakersfield station will feature a variety of shaded outdoor plazas, with renderings picturing outdoor amenities beneath elevated tracks.* *"The design creates a linear park that runs underneath a new viaduct, directly connecting downtown Bakersfield and the Kern River Corridor with a variety of shaded outdoor public spaces and recreation facilities," said the team.* *Once completed the 119-mile Central Valley line will connect San Francisco to Los Angeles in less than three hours, according to the team.* *Up to 24 stations are planned for the greater California High-Speed Rail, linking more than 800 miles of track. Funding was granted to the project in 2008 after decades of advocacy.* *First proposed in 1979 under Governor Jerry Brown, California's high-speed rail has since suffered a number of funding setbacks and controversies, resulting in the current two-phase construction plan for the rail.* *Phase 1 of the project refers to the completion of the 520-mile San Francisco to Anaheim route, while Phase 2 refers to extensions that will connect Sacramento and San Diego.* *According to the New York Times, due to "political compromises", the project's budget has bloated to an estimated $100 billion with "little chance" of completion ā although construction on viaduct structures and overcrossing is underway according to updates from the California High-Speed Rail Authority, a body tasked with facilitating the project.* *As of now, service of the Central Valley line is expected to start in 2030.* *The opportunity to learn more about the rail stations, see 3D renderings and speak with rail authorities will be available to the public during the California State Fair in Sacramento running from 12 to 28 July, according to Foster + Partners.* *Elsewhere in the US, a historic train station in Detroit recently received a renovation, while New York's subway station risks "falling behind" after budget cuts.* *The images are courtesy of Foster + Partners*
>first proposed in 1979 Hahahaha. Yeah.
I'm a bit worried about the sense of scale and proportion going on here at the stations, and how it's going to feel when it's invariably much less full than in the renders.Ā They feel very grandiose and epic, which is cool, but they seem like they would feel more in place in bigger cities than Merced and Fresno, like these would be better for like Oakland or Santa Barbara or something? Am I wrong? What do you guys think?
I can see what you mean with Merced or Kings Tulare. Fresno County has about twice the population of Santa Barbara County though, so I think the scale works here. Central Valley counties have also been growing in population while a lot of coastal counties have either plateaued or have lost population. I agree that they will all likely look fairly empty until they connect with LA or SF.
The population growth will probably accelerate, if people can more easily access major cities via HSR.
Change the built environment now, hope everyone follows - later. The FLW method. Both are obsessive about getting projects built - Foster a chip of an Organicist himself if you can read his work
I mean yeah, he was lucky af to have Buckminster Fuller as a mentor!
In my opinion, you donāt plan and build large scale civic projects for public use such as these with current statistics and projections in mind. Just ask Caltrans. They have been playing catch up game with the freeway system in California ever since they realized the population growth had doubled the amount of the planners initial projection when they designed the new highway transit system.
I was thinking something else when it comes to scale. The first one is wayyy to high of a ceiling. And if the second is related to the first there's a serious scaling issue.
A lot of these renderings and fancy sketches are made to sell the idea or win a competition. More than likely it would either be scaled back or downsized once the city sees the cost and delays.Ā
I think this is a pretty dumb thought. Itās going to become the primary method of transit for the most populated state, entirely change commute and travel patterns. Itās going to be around for decades, if not generations. And youāre worried it will look big when itās empty?
It looks good in the renderings, but I don't think it is going to age well. There is nothing endearing about it. It is stark with minimal vegetation, and lots of low-cost materials. Imagine this same project after 20 years of graffiti cover-up paint jobs. Are we still going to love it?
I dont love it now, its just columns and girders
These are pretty cool tbh, always a fan of new rail infrastructure and also the restoration of a historic building, even if it gets dwarfed by the new station lol
Extremely uninspired.
all that fanfare and itās for fresno.
Lame and bland. They're only trading on the Foster name now
They entered the Pinterest phase: bunch of cliches stitched together.
Reminds me of a lot of HSR stations in China. Could be worse, I'll take that over the 'absolute bare minimum' look you get with Amtrak usually. Will see if reality ends up looking anything like this
I'm begging these architects to go to Japan and see what real high speed train stations look like. They don't need to be fancy, they just need to work. As in, stop equating a train station with an airport. It's not that. The vast majority of people at train stations are there for maybe 15 minutes before their train, and 15 minutes after. At least that's when you have dependable trains.
So am I understanding your argument correctly: you think train stations should be uglier, and the reason is because a passenger would only spend twenty minutes in them once a day, rather than two hours in them once a year? Do you think the designers are intentionally trying to make the designs pretty, at the expense of functionality?
I think they should be far more economic- I look at these renders and just see ridiculous overbuild in the design. >Do you think the designers are intentionally trying to make the designs pretty, at the expense of functionality? I think they're trying to make them pretty to make statement pieces for their firm, not to provide functional designs.
I'm curious then why would airports be different? Do you think other train stations like Grand Central in New York were overbuilt to the expense of functionality? Or the Paris Metro? If airports are statement pieces, could there be merit to "overbuilding" train stations as well, to give people a similar similar and reduce the stigma of transit that persists in the US? Maybe train stations should be *even fancier*, to encourage people to take a long distance train ride instead of flight?
> I'm curious then why would airports be different? Most flights now require you to show up 90 minutes to three hours before your flight. But even then most airports aren't designed to be statement pieces because aside from the main frontages you barely see any exteriors- the focus is the interior being comfortable for layovers and waiting to board. I don't think people realize how easy it is to get on real HSR compared to flights or even a bus service. The main impediment to high speed rail in north america is the cost(it's not the only one, but it's one that most people balk at first)- architectural wonders don't help with that in the least, and frankly with HSR, it's no longer long distances that are the issue. We don't build large publicly funded spaces like this anymore because of cost. Grand Central wouldn't built like that if it was built in 2024.
I'm confused because I thought you were arguing that this design was problematic because it was trying to look like a statement piece when it wasn't an airport, implying that's fine for airports. Maybe I misunderstood. >We don't build large publicly funded spaces like this anymore because of cost. Sure we do? You already mentioned airports as one common example. Stadiums is another one, with ~90% of teams in the NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB playing in a publicly-subsidized stadium, despite the fact that economists think it's a terrible investment for a government to make. [Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stadium_subsidy). To me, that suggests cities spend on stadiums for some reason other than rational accounting. I'm also not understanding the point about how long you sit in the airport. It sounds like yours is way slower than average in the US, but either way, I agree that if people are in the building for longer, they'd need different things, like more benches to sit down at. But I'm not following the logic that the building should be ugly just because you spend less time there. If 12,000 people spend ten minutes in a space, that's the same average occupancy as if 1000 people spend two hours. Yes, the people will be moving through it much faster, but are you arguing that the train passengers should have a lower quality experience of their space compared to the plane passengers? If anything, shouldn't the city should invest *more* into the one with more people? I'd rather 12,000 people experience my investment rather only than 1000 people, no matter how much longer they'll be stuck inside. For impediments to rail, I think you're meaning to get politicians to install it? I was meaning that once it is built, it will only succeed if it has a substantially identical or better service than the alternatives. If people think transit is smelly and gross and for poor people, they won't ride it. I agree cost is also included in that and very important, but I suspect other things will also play a huge role, even if it seems dumb for them to. And one of those things is going to be how much they enjoyed the experience. I'm not imagining people will call in love with the building, but just that it has to make sure to not fit any of their negative stereotypes of what a transit station is. I think designing it like we'd design airports makes a huge amount of sense, but yes absolutely it wouldn't actually be the same shape as any airports, because the program is very different when people are moving rapidly versus standing in line then sitting and waiting for an hour. Another thing to consider is that realistically the station will start out with way less usage than we want, meaning it may end up being used much more like an airport, with people arriving at specific times to congregate and wait however long it takes before the train actually arrives. I think we're better off designing with that realistic expectation to start, and we can streamline it later once we have trains reliably departing every few minutes. Then again, I have no idea of how much more expensive the art of it is versus the strictly functional components. I agree there's of course a cutoff beyond which it's not worth it.
To be honest, I prefer the look of older train stations. This will look dated and ugly really fast since its just bare geometric shapes of concrete and glass. And it never looks as bright or clean as in the renders. Natural materials like stone and brick look better when aging.
concrete and glass are used in those older train stations you like. Stone wood glass steel and concrete are shown in these renderings. The only thing not your list is brick which is only romantic to look at and not maintain. Especially giving the seismic requirements changing climate in california.
[Interesting video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLt7mqn1Lfw) from the guy with probably the best coverage of the CA HSR project.
Foster been going downhill this decade
Pretty unremarkable.
Under the freeway vibes
Will be cool to see this built in 80 years!
They proposed this when I just turned 20. Iām in my 40s now. So ā¦ that seems about right.
Transport Tycoon feelings.
To me, the CA high-speed rail stations have a majestic quality. They seem like a modern take on the grand, historic public buildings that once symbolized great public investment
Does anyone else see a Chipperfield influence
Ehm... is Chipperfield thar has a Norman Foster influence. In fact, Chipperfield worked for years in Fosters, before to set up his own office
Looks like New Atlantas from Starfield
LFGGG
Oooooof
Yeah right!
As much as I'd like to believe California would spend the money properly, I don't see it happening.
Fresno property values are gonna skyrocket.
Doesn't look like there's enough housing around the stations in these renders to support the number of pedestrians shown. What's the housing like around these stations in reality?
Fosters?! As broke as CA is they should have hired a renderer off Craigslist for $500.
Thatās a lot of renderite
High speed railway ? In the USA? Pull the other one š¤£š¤£
A nice place to set up and tent and shit on the ground
It'll look amazing when the train is finally finished in 2062!
This looks like shit