Downtown intersection to be named Thomas Merton Square

2008-03-18T14:55:00.001-04:00

Friday, March 14, 2008

By Peter Smithpsmith@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal

Downtown epiphany changed monk's course

A downtown intersection will bear the name "Thomas Merton Square" in honor of the monk's flash of inspiration.
The Louisville Metro Council has approved the name for the intersection of Fourth Street and Muhammad Ali Boulevard -- though no streets will be renamed -- in advance of a celebration Tuesday of the 50th anniversary of what is often called Merton's "Louisville Epiphany."
That's when a routine errand crystallized Merton's growing realization that he couldn't hide behind monastery walls from the people and problems of the outside world.
"Thomas Merton is an international treasure, so to have the opportunity to recognize locally a man of his stature and recognize the contributions he's made to the world community in general is indeed something we all look forward to doing," said council member David Tandy, D-4th District, who represents downtown and sponsored the measure.
A sign proclaiming Thomas Merton Square will be unveiled Tuesday evening.
The resolution notes that the intersection has become "synonymous" with Merton's experience and also declares the 12 months beginning Tuesday to be "The Year of the Epiphany."
By 1958, Merton, who lived at the Abbey of Gethsemani in Nelson County from 1941 until his accidental death in 1968, was a best-selling writer on prayer and spirituality, but he hadn't traveled as much outside the monastery as his supervisors would later allow him to do.
On March 18, 1958, an errand to a print shop put Merton among the pedestrians at the intersection of Fourth and what was then Walnut Street.
In this ordinary scene, he later wrote of feeling awakened from a "dream of my separateness."
He was "suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all these people … walking around shining like the sun."
It was after this event that Merton began writing forcefully on the social issues of the day, supporting civil rights and interfaith dialogue and opposing the Vietnam War and the nuclear arms race.
"A lot of these types of epiphanies and mystical moments have happened (to others) in nature and solitude," said Thomas Williams, past president of the Louisville Bar Association, who sought the resolution on Thomas Merton Square and helped organize Tuesday's anniversary commemoration.
"This monk that lives behind the cloister, to come out and have an epiphany at a shopping center is really neat, that he was seeing the spark of divinity in people," Williams said.
Terry Taylor of Interfaith Paths to Peace, one of the sponsors of the event, added that the "monastery wall crumbles" on that date in 1958.
"He invites everyone in to take part in contemplative spirituality, but almost more important, he … sees he's connected to everyone else," Taylor said.
A historical marker about the epiphany has long stood at Fourth and Ali, and Bellarmine University has a statue of Merton and houses his archives and paintings at the Thomas Merton Center.
Taylor noted that the change to the city's streetscape has "perhaps the two most famous people in Louisville, Thomas Merton and Muhammad Ali, coming together."
Paul Pearson, director of the Thomas Merton Center, said many people around the world "know about Louisville because of Merton's writings, probably more so than because of the Derby."
Merton's words about the 1958 epiphany may be the most famous from all his dozens of books, Pearson said.
The naming of Thomas Merton Square won't involve changing any street names, nor will it interfere with the branding of the adjacent 4th Street Live entertainment complex.
In fact, its proximity to the nightclubs of 4th Street Live is appropriate, Pearson said, since its mix of ordinary people is not that different from that of the once-bustling shopping district.
Merton also was known to enjoy a drink and visit jazz clubs.
Merton's friend Dick Sisto still performs jazz at the Seelbach Hilton at the intersection, and the restaurant Merton often visited, Cunningham's, is now located just a short walk away on Fourth Street.
Reporter Peter Smith can be reached at (502) 582-4469.

Green is growing: Environmentally friendly building movement is gaining momentum in Kentucky

2008-03-18T14:53:00.001-04:00

Friday, March 14, 2008
By Diane Heilenmandheilenman@courier-journal.com
The Courier-Journal

Kentucky is going green, slowly.

The new Bernheim Arboretum Visitor Center in Clermont, Ky., scored a prestigious LEED Platinum certificate in December. It is one of 72 buildings nationally with that designation. A renovation of historic Lincoln Hall at Berea College earned a Silver certificate in 2004, the first LEED building in Kentucky.
In between are only seven other LEED projects in Kentucky. (See accompanying story for a list.)
But the trend has started. There are 33 LEED wannabes on the list, waiting for appraisal by the U.S. Green Building Council.
LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. It is a rating system for the design, construction and operation of environmentally friendly buildings. It is the only such system in the United States.
Legacy Lofts, due to open this year in Louisville, looks for Platinum. Alltech International in Nicholasville, Ky., also is going for a LEED honor, and so is Mammoth Cave Visitor Center, the Oldham County Public Library and the TARC Bus Maintenance Annex for Metro Louisville.
We asked the architects of Kentucky's LEED-certified projects and hopefuls why green is good, what it looks like and why it's so slow to happen. Green impact
"Generally, Kentucky has been slow to embrace the green building movement; however, that attitude is changing quickly," said Richard Polk of Lexington's EOP Architects, which designed the makeover of the interior of the 116-year-old historic Lincoln Hall administration building after a central portion collapsed in 2001.
"We were the first architects to design a LEED-certified building in Kentucky. … There is currently a bill moving through the House (www. lrc.ky.gov/RECORD/08RS/HB2.htm) that, if passed, will require state buildings to be designed to meet green building standards."
Polk expects the need for LEED to diminish as green building goes mainstream. "It's my hope that within the next five to 10 years all buildings will be designed and constructed utilizing green building practices for the simple reason that it is the right thing to do."
"The demand will only increase," said Doug Pierson of (fer) Studio in Inglewood, Calif. He is the architect for adaptive reuse of a 100-year-old Louisville warehouse on East Market Street for Gallery NuLu and offices. In fact, Pierson said, 50 percent of his West Coast firm's clients build green beyond LEED credits and don't even bother with certification.
Pat Nall, a principal with Tucker Booker Donhoff + Partners in Louisville, is a believer. He had his first LEED experience getting the firm's new headquarters in a renovated building on East Market green-designed and LEED-certified.
"If I were in a position to be a real-estate developer, all I would do would be LEED projects," he said.
Mark Isaacs is an architect/builder and longtime advocate of sustainable buildings and cities. "We set out to design Legacy Lofts (830 E. Main St.) as a model to the nation of how we could have maximum energy efficiency cost-effectively now. While we believe Legacy Lofts will qualify as a LEED Platinum building, we did not set about to design a LEED building. We set out to go beyond the typical LEED building … to create a viable near-zero-carbon way of life that is affordable now. It was only after achieving that goal that we are certifying the building as LEED."
"I'm 52 years old," Isaacs added. "And I can't wait until I'm 74." That's because 2030 is the year the American Institute of Architects has set as its goal for designing carbon neutral buildings. What's design got to do with it?
Pierson said he and his partner, Chris Mercier, have found "that our design approach -- innovative research, natural materials, contemporary design -- lends itself naturally to green design. Our design approach, therefore, changes very little from a regular project to a 'green' project. What does change substantially is the process of getting a green building 'certified.' "
"Building green does affect both the design of buildings and the design of cities," said Isaacs. "Buildings will tend to have skins that are more taut, that minimize exposed surface area. But green design also leads to buildings and city blocks that orient and open up to the sun." The price
"The battle is still up-front costs versus long-term savings," said Pierson, whose clients are committed recyclers and sustainability advocates Augusta and Gill Holland, owners of a film production company and Gallery NuLu. Eventually, Pierson predicts, green design will be less costly. Right now, he said, "proof of green design through LEED certification is healthy because it quantifies your effort on an even playing field; however, the coordination effort and added scope required by professionals -- architects, engineers and builders -- increases the time and effort required to get a building through the process" of certification.
"For example, the amount of material and effort that we spent on saving existing structural wood and reusing it in a thoughtful way has a huge impact on the reduction of the overall carbon footprint left when the project is complete; however, it goes way beyond the single point that we gain for our effort in the LEED certification process."
The rule of thumb in Louisville, Nall said, is for LEED certification to add about 3 percent to the cost of construction projects under $10 million. For projects over $10 million, the percentage drops to around 1.5 percent. The payback from energy savings takes an average of three years, Nall noted.
But, Nall said, "I severely underestimated the boost to employee morale. … We had a record year in terms of productivity last year, our first year in our green building." That translated to a gross increase of 5 percent to 10 percent, Nall said. (A recent study by giant global architecture firm HOK indicated that its green buildings are 25 percent more productive than its non-green buildings.)
"Most owners recognize that the payback in reduced utility bills and increased occupant productivity more than offsets the added construction cost," said Polk. "The problem that EOP Architects has encountered is that owners are resistant to pay the administrative costs associated with a LEED submittal. (It's $450 just to get on file.) Owners are also resistant to adding building commissioning services, a LEED-mandated activity."
Commissioning is like a shake-down cruise, he said. It's important with complex interrelated systems. In truth, Polk said, all new construction gets commissioned somehow, but LEED requires a systematic process led by engineers. The payback
Isaacs said LEED and green design are not just nice financially and to occupants. "According to the U.N. climate scientists, there is the real possibility of eliminating life on this planet over the next 100 years if we do nothing about our use of fossil fuels. Just as important, we need to reduce our greenhouse gas production 25 to 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2020."
Still, he said, "(My wife) Sally and I are moving into Legacy Lofts when it finishes late spring/early summer because we want heating, cooling and hot water bills averaging under $10 per month for ourselves."
Reporter Diane Heilenman can be reached at (502) 582-4682.

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Downtown intersection to be named Thomas Merton Square

Green is growing: Environmentally friendly building movement is gaining momentum in Kentucky