Frank Gehry received an award at the

Frank Gehry received an award at the Congress for the New Urbanism conference in Pasadena for his Disney Hall, a move that was controversial among members and surprising to some outside of the organization. Five Civic Art Awards were selected and presented by CNU’s 77-member host committee. The awards were not juried and most went to public officials. Longtime new urbanist Rick Cole, city manager of Ventura, was recognized for Policy and Implementation. Los Angeles Mayor-Elect Antonio Villaraigosa, a supporter of transit, was given an award for Transportation. Phil Angelides, California state treasurer and former developer, was given a Lifetime Achievement award. The Natural Resources Defense Council was recognized in the Environment category. But it was the award to Los Angles-based Gehry for Physical Design that generated buzz on PRO-URB, a discussion group of urbanists, and on the part of bloggers. “Seriously folks, this is a remarkable piece of architecture, and quite pleasurable, both inside and out,” said architect Kevin Klinkenberg on PRO-URB. “ ... the experience would be off the charts if it were surrounded by some real urbanism.” Others questioned whether Gehry, who has been critical of New Urbanism, or the Disney Hall were worthy of an urbanism award, whatever the merits of the architecture. “As others have noted, the street has been virtually ignored and while I don’t expect stores on the street level of civic buildings, it would be nice to have some recognition that humans are ambling past,” said architect Bill Dennis. He also noted that Disney Hall sits on an unremarkable city block and terminates no vistas, unlike Gehry’s famous museum in Bilbao, Spain. Some bloggers were simply amazed. “Frank Gehry as a paragon of New Urbanist achievement? No; it's a world turned totally upside down,” said The Gutter, an architectural blog. Author David Sucher probably went too far when he claimed: “It should be fairly obvious now that some in CNU have crossed over to the dark side and support starchitecture.”