Ocean Drive Master Plan

Miami Beach, Florida | ongoing

Ocean Drive is Miami Beach’s façade to the world, yet it is also a busy, active street. This master plan contemplates widening the building-fronting sidewalks, while projecting new ideas about the street itself. The tapestry comprises street, sidewalk and sidewalk dining zones into a single paved and landscaped surface that reduces functional distinctions; on this singular skin, bollards are used to differentiate areas for pedestrians and cars. Moreover, it transforms abundant asphalt into a graphic tapestry connecting the drive’s famed architectural facades with the fronting park in a seamless way.

The pavement surface is interpreted not through the lens of highway vocation (as A1A, the coastal highway) but as an independent skin. The polka-dotted surface is informed by playful circular motifs found throughout Miami Beach, but here repeated to emphasize a tactile surface. The cadence of fronting streets, lots, and buildings, so characteristic of Miami Beach, is reflected in alternations of the background surface color. The decorative ribbon of pavement suggests future uses of the road for special events, parades, and races, as well as a pedestrian mall.