Gale Industries/KPF – Office Tour in New York

I recently enjoyed lunch and a visit with Tom Murcott of Gale Industries in New York. A tour of the shared office space between KPF (www.kpf.com) and Gale (www.galeintl.com) makes any architectural and/or urban planner enthusiast get excited. With the scale models of Songdo International Business District in Korea, the Meixi Lake District in China, and the World Financial Center and surrounding Pudong District in the heart of Shanghai, a world tour is accomplished on the office floor in the middle of NYC. Tom is an established professional who has been in the Asian markets for many years, and a huge promoter passionate about the markets and the city building efforts throughout Asia.

The most intriguing part of the visit was the sheer scale and breadth of these projects. Gale is one of today’s city builders, literally. As a business plan, it’s hard to bet against a group who has already accomplished so much, but more importantly who seem to be on the wave of what is the future of development. These countries are experiencing what we saw in the US happen during the 20th Century with industrialization and increased growth after two world wars. However, instead of the Pullman Company and highways spreading and sprawling the cities, there appears to be a lot more focus on vertical cities, mass transit, and large scale city and conservation plans. The important thing in these projects is creating the scale and substance necessary to achieve the momentum required for successful long term growth. It seems the scale of these projects more than accomplish this. It will be interesting to see what the plague of the international economy does to these projects. I can only hope that this wave continues to increase the density and conservation in these developing countries.