Overview

Project Recommendations

The Building

The Plaza

The Imaginarium

The Anchorage Museum at Rasmuson Center expansion has been underway since June 2004 and will provide an additional 70,000 sq. ft. of exhibit and archival space. The building and adjacent public plaza are expected to be completed in 2009.

Project Recommendations

The following recommendations for the Museum Expansion project were prepared by MIG, lead consultant for the Downtown Comprehensive Plan:

• The urban forest should be designed to accommodate pedestrian flows from the northwest and southwest. The design should encourage foot traffic from the new Dena’ina Civic & Convention Center and the 5th Avenue Mall, including signage to and from the two destinations.
• It is important the expansion design encourage connections with surrounding development across 6th Avenue and C Street, rather than block off potential visual or physical connections to them.
• Buffers that address pedestrian safety and convenience should be encouraged along fast-moving traffic corridors.
• There will be an important transit stop on 6th Avenue in front of the urban forest and the vacant site north of 6th Avenue. The design of the forest should offer physical and visual connections to this stop.
• The design should address how loading and delivery ingress and egress can avoid negatively impacting the pedestrian experience and streetscape.
• Sidewalk conditions/widths and traffic circulation should be coordinated with rest of Downtown (especially along the couplets). The width of C Street’s east sidewalk in particular is not conducive to pedestrian activity.