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Lets face it all the talk in Congress about cutting spending is just talk. In this case the royal members of the US House and Senate are going to spend almost a billion dollars sprucing up their hometown turf.
National Mall getting a $700 million redesign By Donna Leinwand Leger, USA TODAY WASHINGTON – The National Mall, which stretches from the Lincoln Memorial to the U.S. Capitol Building, will be transformed from a swath of trampled grass to a grand urban park with spectacular gardens, a skating rink and a tree-framed theater, the Trust for the National Mall said Thursday. The Trust, which is working with the National Park Service to revitalize the Mall, unveiled the winners of a design competition to remake three sections. The projects are part of a $700 million plan to transform the nation's "front yard" into a world-class park. Former first lady Laura Bush, the honorary chairwoman of the fundraising campaign, said she often donned sunglasses and a baseball cap for anonymous early morning strolls on the Mall during her White House years. She said the "innovative" designs will enhance the experience for the Mall's 24 million visitors each year. "The Mall is suffering from overuse," said landscape architect Kathryn Gustafson of Gustafson Guthrie Nichol, who helped create the winning design for Union Square, the area that includes the reflecting pool at the base of the Capitol lawn. The first project is scheduled to be done by 2016 to mark the centennial of the National Park Service. Highlights of the three projects: •At Union Square, a reflecting pool that morphs from fountain to hard surface to pool will accommodate different events and minimize damage to the grass, Gustafson said. The design includes an outdoor museum of gardens extending from the U.S. Botanical Garden. •Constitution Gardens, the park and pond north of the Lincoln Memorial's reflecting pool, will be updated to be ecologically sustainable and to revive the "social life" of the park, said Peter Walker, whose firm, Peter Walker and Partners, created the winning design with Rogers Marvel Architects. In summer, picnickers will be able to rent toy boats to sail on the pond, architect Rob Rogers said. In winter, the pond will become an ice rink. The design includes intimate areas for reading, picnicking and resting, and an indoor pavilion with a restaurant and terrace. •The Sylvan Theater amphitheater, on the grassy slope around the Washington Monument, will be framed by trees that landscape architect Hallie Boyce of OLIN called a "magical setting for performance." |