Could a vertical park with a giant ball pit make Times Square more livable?

NYC's transformation of Times Square into a <a href="http://inhabitat.com/tag/pedestrian-plaza" target="_blank">pedestrian plaza</a> was one of the best urban planning moves by the city in recent times—but unfortunately it still isn’t enough to ease congestion in the area. In a bid to create more space in a dense environment, Shanghai-based <a href="http://100architects.com" target="_blank">100 Architects</a> designed Vertical Times, a tower stacked with recreational, commercial, and green space. The proposed 180-foot-tall urban park soars six stories into the sky and offers both active and passive programming designed to appeal to both locals and tourists.

The Vertical Times project evolved out of a discussion about how to insert public functions into a land-scarce space, such as Time Square, that would also increase the livability of the urban environment.

The architects’ solution combined two main concepts—verticality and density—into a multipurpose tower that comprises six sections: a carousel playground, a ball pool, a hammock plaza, Sky Garden, a restaurant, and a Sky Bar on the top-most level.

“The main conceptual idea of Vertical Times lies in multiplying the intended space for public recreation in a vertical way, compacting it in an inhabitable object, sort of imitating the growth model of NYC, due to the lack of available space,” write 100 Architects. “A so-called Vertical Park.”

The architects envision that the 180-foot-tall tower would be built of a concrete-and-steel combined system with a reinforced concrete central core that transmits loads to the ground and contains the elevator.

Metallic tensors would anchor the structure to the ground to absorb vibration and add stability.

Vertical Tower by 100 Architects sketches

Vertical Tower axonometric diagram