The Salt Exchange, MLA Thesis

TH E S A LT E XCH ANGE Material as identity at the Cayuga Salt Mine

Jinhee Ha Master of Landscape Architecture Design Thesis Cornell University 2016

The Salt Exchange

Material as identity at the Cayuga Salt Mine

A Thesis Presented to the Faculty of the Graduate School of Cornell University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Master of Landscape Architecture

by Jinhee Ha May 2016

Commitee Chair: Jamie Vanucchi Second Advisor: Katie Jenkins

ABS TR ACT

Salt, a prized and portable commodity, expresses itself in a variety of forms and scales. In Northeastern United States, a common use of salt manifests through its distribution for deicing roads, becoming an agent and vector of maintenance regimes, the impact of which is largely unseen. With a subterranean footprint of 18,000 acres at 2,300 feet underground, the Cayuga Salt Mine has been producing rock salt at the lake edge since 1920 in Lansing, New York. The mine plans to develop a new site to maintain subsurface production, creating a future model of simultaneous expansion up Cayuga Lake and closure of sites where salt is depleted underground. This illustrates a persistent shifting of materials on the surface and subsurface through geologic and human-intervened processes. This design thesis exercises the landscape architect’s approach to visualizing the materials and processes of a largely invisible subterranean landscape, in order to keep alive the historical, cultural and economic significance of salt and adapt for its reuse in the face of transition. It does this through a speculative design proposal reconfiguring the mine site to cultivate salt-tolerant vegetation using brine pools while developing a public waterfront, showing one possibility of material exchanges in expanding the temporal realm of design in post-industrial sites.

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ACKNOWL E D GE M E NTS

THANK YOU To my advisors, Jamie Vanucchi and Katie Jenkins for their guidance and feedback To local contacts, Cargill Senior Mine Engineer Dave Plumeau and Lansing community leader Michael Koplinka-Loehr for their willingness to assist To my friends and colleagues in the Cornell Department of Landscape Architecture for inspiration To my family and partner for their unwavering support

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BIOG R A PHI C A L SK E TC H

Jinhee Ha holds a Master of Landscape Architecture from Cornell University. During her time at Cornell, she has oriented her focus onto design strategies that increase legibility of landscape dynamics, studying spatial nexuses of social, economic, and environmental processes of the salt industry in New York State and specifically in Lansing, New York. Her research and work has been funded by the College of Agriculture & Life Sciences, Department of Landscape Architecture, and the Clarence S. Stein Institute for Urban & Landscape Studies. She is a 2016 University Olmsted Scholar. She holds a Bachelor of Arts in history from Carleton College and has worked in exhibit preparation and installation and arts education.

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LIS T OF I L LU STR AT I ON S & F I G U RE S

COVER. Geologic profile of the Silurian Group FIGURE 1. 1928 survey FIGURE 2. Roof bolter FIGURE 3. Truck traffic FIGURE 4. Five miles north FIGURE 5. Syracuse site visit FIGURE 6. Geneseo site visit FIGURE 7. Watkins Glen site visit FIGURE 8. Lansing site visit FIGURE 9. Representation studies FIGURE 10. Material framework FIGURE 11. Material application FIGURE 12. Salt surface interaction FIGURE 13. Pattern and form making FIGURE 14. Graph of road salt production FIGURE 15. Spectrum of spatial salt and vegetation FIGURE 16. Site location FIGURE 17. Geologic profile of site FIGURE 18. Site section and distribution data FIGURE 19. Site diagram FIGURE 20. Fluid materials onsite

FIGURE 21.

FIGURE 22.

FIGURE 23.

FIGURE 24.

FIGURE 25.

FIGURE 26.

FIGURE 27.

FIGURE 28.

FIGURE 29.

FIGURE 30.

FIGURE 31.

FIGURE 32.

FIGURE 33.

Geologic materials onsite Translation of form and bird’s eye view Site plan of design and terrain section Phasing plan diagrams and collapsed section Design axon Geologic pool experience Pier experience Vegetation and light experience Osmotic power light fixtures Intended design conditions Changing scenarios Lansing test sites Lansing legacy

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TABLE OF C ONTE NTS

01 INTRODUCTION

1.1

HISTORY & CONTEXT OF THE CAYUGA SALT MINE -------------------------------------------------------------------- 3

1.2

EXISTING THEORY & LITERATURE --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 9

1.3

APPROACH & METHODS IN RESEARCH & DESIGN -------------------------------------------------------------------- 13

02 DESIGN

2.1

SPECULATIVE DESIGN DRAWINGS -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 25

03 CONCLUSION

3.1

KEY FINDINGS & PERSISTENT QUESTIONS ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 47

3.2

BIBLIOGRAPHY ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 51

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I NT R ODU CT I ON

HIS TORY & C ONTE X T OF T H E CAYU G A S A LT M I N E

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Salt, a prized and portable commodity once a cornerstone of empires and civilizations, expresses itself in a variety of forms and scales. Everyone has had a personal experience with salt, whether that may be through tasting and cooking food or interacting with products of commercial chemistry that need salt, such as chlorinated water, paper products and plastics. In Northeastern United States, a common and frequent use of salt manifests through its distribution for deicing roads, becoming an agent and vector of removal and maintenance regimes.

In an era of declining American industrialization and increasing environmentalism, heightened attention is placed upon the operations and futures of resource extraction industries.

Landscape architects are increasingly recognized as the facilitators of projects where impact statements, remediation, and stakeholder engagement are necessary. New York State is no exception to these processes, and its long history of salt production

begs the question of what consequences exist and what the future holds in regards to salt mine landscapes.

Salt is a material that is generally accepted, considered benign, until its effects reach a threshold.

It is a current necessity for winter deicing in the Northeast, and those in current operation are confronted with efforts to keep up with the demand and expectation that winter roads be clear. Issues in New York salt mines themselves, ranging in scale from the small (salt dust getting into adjacent water bodies) to the large (such as chamber collapses that have resulted in the 300ft drop in the water table), as well as the widespread use of rock salt on roads force officials to address the relationship between the management of water resources, industrial byproducts, and impact on surrounding residents, businesses, and environment.

Syracuse, nicknamed the Salt City, has long discontinued production of salt through its brine pools and solution well mining around Lake

Figure 1. 1928 survey A portion of the survey map of the underground footprint in 1928

Onondaga; however, this industrialization along the shoreline still greatly contributes to issues of water quality and subsurface geology. Additionally, in 1994, the collapse of an underground chamber in Retsof Mine near Geneseo resulted in the disappearance of the Genesee River, dried up drinking wells, sinkholes, and subsidence that is anticipated to continue over the next century.

Cargill Salt and U.S. Salt in Watkins Glen currently engages with the public on the debate of storing gas in unused mine chambers, politicizing subterranean spaces as sites for future economic development. Finally, in order to meet demand to ensure winter roads are clear, the Cayuga Salt Mine in Lansing, also owned by Cargill, seeks to construct a new airshaft for improved ventilation and emergency evacuation five miles north of their current surface mine site to maintain rates of their subsurface production.

BEGIN N IN GS O F T H E MI N E The Cayuga Salt Mine, located on the east shore of Cayuga Lake, less than a 20-minute drive from Ithaca, illustrates an active negotiation between biophysical and human-intervened processes, of which timescales vary from the geologic to the diurnal. Over 400 million years ago, a vast ocean covered what is known today as New York State. Over time, the sea evaporated and isolated into little pools to leave behind thick salt deposits deep underground spanning from Albany to the eastern Ohio border. Before settlers arrived, Native Americans originally discovered salt in the region by encountering brine seeping through the ground. Around 1915, miners started to dig a shaft on the shore of Cayuga Lake in Lansing, as salt was considered to be an extremely valuable natural resource. It was first used for trade purposes and the preservation of food. Since then, the naturally occurring landform has since been appropriated

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Figure 2. Roof bolter A machine stabilizes the roof of the mine with bolts after the cavern has been blasted with explosives

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for extractive and economic use. The uses of salt has changed over time, as it then shifted to become an important player in the freezing industry, as an ice maker. Then in the 1930’s, salt started to be used for ice removal purposes and in the 1970’s, the winter road maintenance market has exploded, keeping salt in demand.

Human development actively changes the landform through the addition of mining infrastructure and constructed materials for extraction. In 1969, Cargill of Minneapolis, Minnesota acquired ownership and currently, Cargill Deicing Technology employs over 200 workers in the Lansing mine, which encompasses about 18,000 acres under Cayuga Lake and adjacent lands. With a 2,300 feet depth, it is the deepest salt mine in the United States. The process of extraction, which includes the creation and maintenance of shafts, tunnels, and rooms, is constantly altering the subterranean landform or void. The process of rail and truck distribution and

transport also actively changes the surface form of the mine.

Three subsurface shafts transport materials back and forth essential to salt mining and production: workers, equipment, and ventilation.

Most equipment must be taken apart to be transported and welded back together underground.

The workers use the equipment to create tunnels and rooms to mine salt. The room and pillar method involves the use of 15-foot wide solid salt pillars to provide roof support while the walls are excavated through controlled blasts. Fallen salt is then crushed and hoisted up one of the shafts. This provides an interesting comparison between the equipment and salt, as they exist as wholes that can come apart. The rooms and pillars underground make up nine miles of tunnels that are 40 feet wide and 10 feet tall, with a pillar of salt every 30 feet.

Above ground, salt is stockpiled or packaged to ready for distribution through rail and trucks.

All of the salt is sold as rock salt for winter road

Figure 3. Truck traffic Much of the salt is distributed from the Lansing mine through semitrucks; during the winter, over 500 trucks could be loaded per day

maintenance. New York States buys about half the salt produced, and the other half is bought by municipalities in the Northeast and MidAtlantic and packaged under Cargill and Agway for consumers. Other unseen aspects of the site manifest through its economic impacts, such as tax revenue, income for Cargill employees, contracts with other businesses, and corporate donations, and social, historical impacts, such as contributing to a community narrative, sponsorship of recreation areas and volunteer hours from Cargill employees.

THE SIT UAT ION Previously mentioned, the Cayuga Salt Mine seeks to construct a new airshaft for improved ventilation and emergency evacuation five miles north of their current surface mine site to maintain rates of their subsurface production.

Their subterranean footprint has grown to the

point where current ventilation and emergency evacuation are no longer productive and close to not meeting regulations. When Cargill acquired the mine in the 1970’s, they discontinued pursuing individual leases with landowners for permission to mine within their subterranean property lines.

They decided to move toward dealing with one permitting process through the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYS DEC), which is responsible for the management of Cayuga Lake. This streamlined the process for getting permission to mine, as it reduced the paperwork for hundreds of properties to dealing with just one organization.

The plan for the new airshaft is the first of a potential future model of continued expansion up Cayuga Lake. It creates a precedent for Cargill expand to another surface site. A member of mine leadership speculated that, though there were no current plans for the expanded site to house more industrial operations than just ventilation and

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Figure 4. Five miles north Behind the chain link fence is the site where Cargill will build a new air shaft for better emergency evacuation and ventilation; this expansion site is located on a former residential parcel

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emergency, they may be open to the possibility to store salt stockpiles, bag salt, and fill trucks, typical processes occurring on the current main site. In the event that this occurs, the current main surface site would close and they would move all of their operations to the new expanded site. This creates an interesting paradigm of simultaneous expansion and closure. What happens to the old site? Does it become a storage site? What should happen spatially and temporally to prepare for closure?

Is there opportunity for design throughout this transition? Ultimately, what does the landscape become? What does this mean for the adjacent residents and supporting community?

My design thesis operates off of this premise of simultaneous expansion and closure and exercises the landscape architect’s approach to visualizing the materials and processes of a largely invisible subterranean landscape, in order to keep alive the historical, cultural and economic significance of salt and adapt for its reuse in the face of transition. This

thesis questions how a future alternative landscape design that acknowledges spatial, temporal and material conditions enable further engagement with salt mining processes and the visualization of salt memory at the Cayuga Salt Mine.

S TAT E OF T H E FIELD We, as landscape architects, currently find ourselves at a favorable moment, when a holistic landscape approach accrues more value and we assume more responsibility in addressing social and ecological challenges. With this new reconceiving of the scope of our work, this begs the question of what my role is as a landscape architect. Do I do everything? Do I do nothing? How do landscape architects intervene? What is at the crux of landscape architecture design?

Because landscape architecture grounds itself in working across scales and tracking processes

and dynamics which have no hard boundaries, it has the flexibility to wrestle with a large spectrum of concepts and ideas, synthesizing and distilling information visually to explore, discover the potential of another way of doing things. This flexibility, as well as its position in between many fields such as art, architecture, planning, biology, geography, sociology and anthropology, allows us to study complex and problematic sites, such as extraction operations and their context.

In a time when studying post-industrial sites is in vogue, I ask the question of where the most value is in this realm of landscape architecture research.

I find the value to be in finding opportunities for the design of a new landscape-based industry. If we, as landscape architects, are trying to expand the realm of our work and potential, why do we default to post-reclamation parks and plazas? Why cannot we help design an industry that improves ecological conditions, engages various users in different ways, and generates revenue?

I argue that the role of landscape architect is to mediate the goals, challenges of a site and engage with relevant players, to develop a design that acknowledges existing landscape processes and dynamics to become a productive landscape, creating meaning in its users. The Cayuga Salt Mine is a great example to stake this claim. It is at the cusp of great spatial, temporal, and material change, as they continue to expand up Cayuga Lake and potentially consider new surface operation sites closer to their subsurface work area. There is opportunity for this site, throughout its closure and future to become a more productive landscape.

This design thesis will show one possibility in considering the closure of industrial sites and finding ways to incorporate an exchange of byproducts to create a related landscape-based industry that enables further engagement with the materials and processes of salt mining. This project may be reciprocal to other industrial or soon-to-be post-industrial sites.

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EXIS TI NG THE ORY & LIT E RAT U RE

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The rural nature of some extraction industries renders it invisible to the public eye. The only times when they are featured nationally or internationally is when something goes horribly wrong. The Cayuga Salt Mine had a recent scare in December 2015 when seventeen employees were trapped in the subsurface shaft overnight when the elevator got stuck. However, the level of risk for being a salt miner at Lansing is statistically safer than being a farmer or working at Cornell University.

The headline “New York miners rescued after 10 hours stuck in elevator shaft in America’s deepest salt mine” accompanied an article in US. News and World Report, and the story made national news in NBC News, CNN, and the New York Times.

These rural sites become scrutinized at certain inopportune moments and then forgotten. These industries become demonized because of this but also because of a power dynamic they create due to increased leeway in rural development. They contribute a lot in taxes and without them, a small

town may not be able to provide the same amenities and services. These dynamics create divisions in their perception by the wider public and adjacent residents, because much of the benefits reaped may be invisible. These rural sites should not be exempt from critical planning and design. The processes and dynamics that shape these sites deserve attention and beautiful design that embraces the culture and memory of its industries and livelihood.

Current landscape architecture research surrounding extraction focuses on a large scale framework, studying their logistical organization and territories, as well as their political position in often contested landscapes. Extraction is broken down into material, form, and process; it is rarely seen as having any benefit outside of economic value. “Logistical and infrastructural connections of the city to its hinterland effectively expand the urban territory, connecting sites of extraction, conveyance, and consumption.” 1 These studies are helpful in understanding the global forms,

1

Carlisle, Stephanie, and Nicholas Pevzner (editors).

“Scenario 05: Extraction.”

Scenario Journal, http:// scenariojournal.com/journal/ scenario-05-extraction

2

Vigano, Paola. “Territorialism I.” New Geographies, no. 6 (2014): 132-39.

3

Bhatia, Neeraj. “Forward.” In The Petropolis of Tomorrow, edited by Neeraj Bhatia and Mary Casper: Actar, 2013.

processes, and materials, as they tend to use the concept of metabolism – things as organic and everchanging. They have limitations in connecting the larger framework to the smaller scale. “What we perceive as a territory, or as our territory, is above all a mental construction inside which abstract and concrete appropriations meet the material nature of the site.” 2 I find the metaphor of metabolism compelling because it indicates shifts and dynamics. My position is that these territories are constructed not only through logistical and extraction operations, but also through the creation of a layered narrative of social processes and infrastructures connecting individuals to extraction sites and operations. One main process and dynamic difficult to represent in landscape architecture is the incorporation of social systems and structures. The inclusion of social frameworks into the conception of physical infrastructures and processes is always a secondary focus in extraction landscapes. My design thesis will pull from the premise of industry

and urbanism and aim to add further productive layers of a new potential economy and public engagement. I find the analysis of individual actors and social narratives to an important component of studying extraction sites, however, it is out of the scope of this project.

Another large theoretical framework is extraction as urbanism; a relationship exists between industrial operations and the development of cities. The approach of “infrastructural geometries [becoming] a skeleton for urbanization” has been well-accepted by designers and urbanists.3 These theories discuss ideas of permanence and fixed and non-fixed boundaries and how processes with soft or hard boundaries come into contact with each other. “Like ecological territories, operational or manufactured territories need to adapt to changing forces. [They] respond to the emergent delineations and logics of each of these territorial types. The softer boundaries common to the operational and ecological territories are particularly interesting

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as they come into contact with the more rigid boundaries of the political.” 4 This is especially seen in the mapping and analysis of settlement patterns based on extraction infrastructure, suggesting a hybrid of industry and development. My project positions itself by taking these ideas of fixed and non-fixed boundaries and using them to frame processes and dynamics that are relevant locally for the Cayuga Salt Mine. Finding the moments where boundaries clash or mix might provide an insight or “offer hotspots for potential strategic intervention.” 5 Existing literature on materials consider the nuances of what constitutes a site, beyond the imaginary boundaries created by regulations and mental constructions. They look into their origins and character, in the people and places associated with their production. Materials shifting on the ground and its displacement relate to larger environmental dynamics of ecological change and social dynamics of labor relations and human

relationships.6 Once a material leaves a site and inhabits another, a new narrative is created.

Similarly, this thesis project further engages with extended processes of space and time, through the analysis of geologic processes and materials and thinking of the temporality of design interventions.

The materials also have their own agency and interact with other actors in the landscape.

Materials have the capacity to inform physical, spatial, and social processes and patterns. The existing literature on agency and actors looks into the notions of autonomy and the premise that things in the landscape do not lie motionless.

Looking at landscapes as assemblages and sets of materialities is helpful in understand how things relate to one another, and how “they make demands upon, impeded, and enable human agency.” 7 My position through this work is that these relationships between sets of materialities and ecologies, provide a way into outlining a territory of intervention. Where things collide

4

Przybylski, Maya. “ReRigging.” In The Petropolis of Tomorrow, edited by Neeraj Bhatia and Mary Casper: Actar, 2013, 259.

5

Przybylski, 263.

6

Hutton, Jane. “Reciprocal Landscapes: Material Portraits in New York City and Elsewhere.” Journal of Landscape Architecture 8, no. 1 (2013): 40-47.

7

Bennett, Jane. “Vibrant Matter, Zero Landscapes.”

By Klaus K. Loenhart (19 Oct 2011).

8

Corner, James.

“Representation and Landscape (1992).” In Theory in Landscape Architecture, a Reader, edited by Simon Swaffield, 144-65.

Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2002.

provides opportunity. These relationships speak to the process and dynamics that are large and small, visible and invisible. Finding these relationships will allow specific design interventions that can highlight or exaggerate existing conditions to achieve a certain outcome. It will capitalize upon actual conditions, materials, and processes onsite.

Finally, representation plays a role in developing and pushing design forward. James Corner said “drawing is perhaps all and everything that landscape architects do.” 8 This project will pull from a variety of tools of drawing and making.

Corner states that the act of drawing is generative.

Making representations are disclosing, in that they are opening and seeing new things and discovering possibilities. I will use representation as a tool of inquiry in this project. Using different drawing types and modes of working will enable me to study and show different processes and dynamics.

Specifically, drawing deep sections will be beneficial in capturing the vast scale of the geologic

subsurface. Also, making physical models and their installation could help with understanding the relationship of the surface with the subsurface and also the dispersion and distribution of salt when it reaches the surface.

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APPR OAC H & M E TH OD S I N RE S E A RCH & D E S I GN

AP P R OACH

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The approach to this design thesis was to develop a model that acknowledged spatial and temporal conditions, as well as materials sensitive to those conditions. I wanted to call attention to the ephemerality of landscape processes and design that engages people. The design concept was to use inspiration from geologic processes and site materials to create a new productive landscape of cultivating salt-tolerant vegetation, while encourage runoff infiltration and collection while developing public waterfront at Cayuga Lake’s edge.

This project is another take on postreclamation design, which is currently popular in the field of landscape architecture. It incorporates the choreography of an industry tapering off and takes into consideration what is deconstructed and when. It proposes a new landscape-based industry through the use of an industrial byproduct and the retrofitting of existing infrastructure in a

productive way. It also highlights the potential for shared public and industrial use.

I find it important to integrate current industrial processes and site conditions. Examining site conditions will reveal area where materials and processes are colliding; they can indicate where and when the moment of intervention is most appropriate for a desired effect. Mapping out the materials of salt, rock, and water will indicate their movement.

ME T H ODS Through the Clarence S. Stein Institute for Urban and Landscape Studies, I was funded to undertake a regional study of the salt industry in New York State. During the summer of 2015, I visited four sites of salt production in upstate New York: Onondaga Lake and adjacent lands in Syracuse, Retsof Mine and town of Geneseo,

mines of US Salt and Cargill in Watkins Glen, and finally the Cayuga Salt Mine in Lansing. I utilized methods of transect walking and driving during these visits. The Syracuse visit entailed a more historical view, as the salt industry ceased in the early 1900’s. The visit to the Retsof mine and the Town of Geneseo was to examine signs of disaster from the mine collapse in 1994. The visits to mines in Watkins Glen and Lansing were to look into the relationships between rural towns and the politics of subterranean space, as a current issue of storing gas underground sparked controversy among residents, activists, and mine officials.

In addition to site visits, I also conducted interviews with various individuals. I met with Joe Heath (the General Counsel for the Onondaga Nation), Jeffrey Freedman (Chair of Community Participation Working Group of Onondaga Lake Cleanup), Richard Young (Professor of Geology at SUNY- Geneseo, Citizen Representative to committee dealing with Retsof Mine aftermath),

Eileen Stout (owner of the Rogues’ Harbor Inn), David Plumeau (Senior Engineer at Cargill Cayuga Salt Mine), and Mike Koplinka-Loehr (former Tompkins County legislator, worked with Cargill on a number of projects and conducted their 2015 Economic Impact Statement). Since the Cayuga Salt Mine and Lansing was my focus, I was in regular communication with Dave Plumeau and Mike Koplinka-Loehr to learn about their work and update them on my activities. The interviewees represented a small part of the multiplicity of perspectives regarding the salt industry in New York State. Meeting these individuals was invaluable to the research and also revealed the limitations of this project. It showed how necessary the analysis and cataloging of individual actors and social influences is in the dynamics of salt production and extraction sites.

Methods of representation aided in pushing this project along. Specifically through making physical models, I was able to grasp the scale of

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the mine and imagine the subterranean spaces. I used paper models to think about the processes and forms of the Cayuga Salt Mine and salt as a material. Though abstract, they created imagination in envisioning volumes and voids of spaces and materials. Other physical models examined the spatial relationships of the surface and subsurface.

Thinking of how salt operates with other materials onsite and in general and how it’s deployed was also examined through drawings and diagrams, as well as used with water, watercolor and ink to test how it behaved.

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Figure 5. Syracuse site visit (L to R) (1) Trace overlay map of visit (2) Sketch of debris piles adjacent to Onondaga Lake (3) Recently developed Inner Harbor Creekwalk (4) Salt Museum in Liverpool is one of few infrastructural remnants of salt industry (5) Salt spring adjacent to Onondaga Lake Parkway

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Figure 6. Geneseo site visit (L to R) (1) Trace overlay map of visit (2) Subsidence map of Retsof mine collapse in 1994 (3) Existing drainage conditions on agricultural field (4) Newest salt mine in New York State, American Rock Salt, opened in 1997

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Figure 7. Watkins Glen site visit (L to R) (1) Trace overlay map of visit (2) Cargill buildings for solution salt mining (3) Cargill right at the edge of Seneca Lake (4) Railroad serves the distribution of both Cargill and US Salt (5) Panoramic view of the west shore of Seneca Lake where US Salt is located

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Figure 8. Lansing site visit (L to R) (1) Trace overlay map of visit (2) Sketch of Salt Point and Myers Point (3) Sketch of portable salt conveyor and stockpile (4) Rogues’ Harbor Inn in Lansing town center (5) Headframe of the main production shaft (6) Railroad truss and Salmon Creek north of Cayuga mine site (7) Stockpiles covered with tarp during summer off season

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Figure 9. Representation studies (L to R) (1) Using salt, india ink, and water (2) Abstract model closeup (3) Paper model study of salt crystal and showing how salt formed (4) Paper model study of layers depositing and folding over (5) Abstract model of voids and caverns of mine in subterranen space

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Figure 10. Material framework Considering the salt’s physiology and the way it interacts with other materials

material framework salt ecologies water dissolving in removing ice light purifies vegetation creates competition concrete, asphalt decomposition maintenance

Cargill Diamond CrystalÂŽ Winter MeltÂŽ Ice Melter

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Figure 11. Material application The way that salt manifests on surfaces, sidewalks, and roads relates to the technology and methods of application

SALT SPINNER

APPLICATION PATTERN

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Figure 12. Salt surface interaction The variations of microtopography on surfaces of materials isolate and collect salt in particular areas leaving salt remnant patterns when water evaporates

VARIABLE SURFACE

POOLING* *exaggerated section (not to scale)

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Figure 13. Pattern and form making Salt has subtractive qualities, as it transforms snow and ice into a liquid, creating marks and patterns of erasure

SUBTRACTIVE FORM MAKING

DRAINAGE RINGS

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DES I GN

USE & PRODUCTION CAYUGA MINE GROWTH

SALT PRODUCTION IN US (THOUSAND TONS)

20000

1930

1980

2015

15000

ROAD DEICING 10000

2014 $4.5 MILLION TO LANSING, NY JOBS TAXES CONTRACTS DONATIONS

5000

PRESERVATION 1940

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REFRIGERATION

1960

YEAR

1980

2000

Figure 14. Graph of road salt production The road deicing market has exploded since the 1970’s, because of this, the subsurface footprint of Cayuga Salt Mine has grown to over 18000 acres under Cayuga Lake and adjacent lands

SALTY LOCATIONS INLAND SALT MARSH CLOSED SALT MINE ACTIVE SALT MINE

NY

MI

IL

VA

VEGETATION INVASIVE

INLAND SALT MARSH

salty plants manifest on surface due to either geologic or human-intervened forces

Lythrum salicaria Purple Loosestrife

Cayuga mine site

SE RA CU SY

ON

Skaneateles Lake Otisco Lake 315’ depth 60’ depth

ON

OR AV I

A

DA GA

Solidago sempervirens Juncus gerardii Seaside goldenrod Saltmeadow rush

M

Cayuga Lake 303’ depth

LA N

+2000’ +1000’ +250’ sea level

SI N

G

Phragmites australis Common reed

Onondaga Lake 60’ depth

historic mine site

-2000’

-4000’

-6000’

3 0 5x vertical exaggeration

6 miles

Figure 15. Spectrum of spatial salt and vegetation Syracuse, a famous example of a historically significant salt economy, has types of vegetation characteristic of the rare inland salt marsh because of its closer-to-surface salt seam, whereas in Lansing and current and closed salt mine sites are full of invasive species

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CAYUGA SALT MINE

Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge

Seneca & Geneva Country Clubs Sampson State Park

OVER 75% OF TOMPKINS COUNTY CAYUGA WATERFRONT PRIVATE

Long Point State Park

Keuka Lake State Park Myers Point Taughannock Falls State Park

CAYUGA SALT MINE

Catherine Creek Wildlife Management Area

CORNELL UNIVERSITY

0

29

2500

Figure 16. Site location The site’s location on the lake edge also has potential to increase limited public access to the lake, as it can become a uniquely extended recreation space to existing parks in the area. ). Though the mine currently has no plans to close, I aim to make the argument that, as the location of this surface mine decreases in economic value because of its distance and working logistics of salt distribution, it should cease its underground operations and develop a related industry of brine production for growing inland salt marsh and other valuable salt tolerant vegetation. This site is uniquely positioned for this because of its spatial relationship to the lake, experience with solution salt mining, close proximity to research at Cornell University, and available water.

5000 ft

LAKE 0 YE

12,80 CA ~ ITHA ARS AGO

Bedrock Limestone, sandstone, shale Lacustrine sand Associated with large body of water Kame Deposits Coarse to fine gravel/sand

CAYUGA SALT MINE

Bedrock Stipple Variable rock debris and glacial till

0

Till Variable texture

700

1400 ft

+0’

BEDROCK

-1000’

FOSSILS

UPLIFT

LIMESTONE

WEST RIVER SHALE TULLY LIMESTONE

MOSCOW FORMATION

LUDLOWVILLE FORMATION

EVAPORATE

-2000’

SALT

HALITE

SALT

ABSORB -3000’

LIME MUD + MAGNESIUM

DOLOSTONE

-4000’

COMPACT

-5000’

FINE MUDS

SHALE

ERODE -6000’

-7000’

reef

SEA

Figure 17. Geologic profile of site The materials and processes manifesting on the surface site shows a connection to the vast geologic context. Salt patterns on asphalt and simple pooling on the surface is a small example of the timescale of salt forming through water submersion and evaporation

DEPOSIT

SPREAD FLOOD SUBMERGE

BEACH SAND

SANDSTONE

30

500-600 SEMI-TRUCKS/DAY DURING WINTER

10

31

10

Figure 18. Site section and distribution data Salt is transported through railcars and semi-trucks

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26 RAIL CARS/DAY DURING SUMMER

100

100

100

100

100

100

0

100

200 ft

TRUCK DISTRIBUTION

overflow storage

AFT PRODUCTION SH

+0’

-500’

IL

RA DI

depth of shaft = 7+ Statue of Liberties

SALT HOISTED

ON

TI

-1000’

BU

RI

ST

mixing loading storing conveying pooling

-1500’

-2000’

-2500’

Figure 19. Site diagram The surface site operates after salt is hoisted from the main production shaft and moved by conveyors and storage tanks to various areas of loading or bagging salt for transport. Salt is also stored on 3 monumental concrete pads

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UNINTENDED POOLING

DRAINAGE FALLS

GLACIAL LAKE

1.3 mi wide

PHRAGMITES FIELD

SLOPING FOREST

~20% slope

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Figure 20. Fluid materials onsite (L to R) (1) Unintended pooling - drainage and maintenance result in water collecting in certain pockets (2) Drainage falls - existing drainage swales flow into the site causing little mini waterfalls where it drops off (3) Glacial lake - the relationship to Cayuga Lake and its view is quite drastic (4) Phragmites field - the majority of vegetation onsite is Phragmites australis (5) Sloping forest - the eastern slope of the mine site has many evergreen trees

40 mi long

SALT STOCKPILE

FOSSIL PIT

SHALE BERMS

32 angle of repose 40 ft tall

Figure 21. Geologic materials onsite (L to R) (1) Salt stockpile - salt is crushed and hoisted underground and piles are stored on concrete pads on the surface, creating monumental sense of scale (2) Fossil pit - shale material is excavated from pits, creating these depressions and visible layers of rock (3) Shale berms - berms are piled by mine workers leaving raised barriers to delineate boundaries and direct water. The material interaction of them with salt also leaves these compelling and temporal patterns

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MATERIAL OF ERASURE VESSEL OF COLLECTION inverted pile = pool

CONSIDERATIONS

PROTOTYPE

10’

COLLECT WATER

drainage connection

bench/wall geologic wall

outcrop spillway GATHERING SPACE sloped edge

bottom of pool VOLUME - SIZE/DEPTH public space at grade

100’ depth 6’

FUNCTIONAL EDGE

EVENT

GEOLOGIC CONDITIONS

MATERIAL MAKEUP

shale

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surficial geologic limestone

PRODUCTION SHAFT

INTAKE AIRWAY & SERVICE SHAFT

AIRWAY & ESCAPE SHAFT

emphasize limestone

Figure 22. Translation of form and bird’s eye view In thinking towards design, I aimed to combine these fluid and geologic elements of the comingling of salt and water for a productive purpose but also to capture this poetry of material and process assembly. An inverted pile of salt becomes a depression where water and salty runoff could be collected, treated and used for a productive purpose. Some considerations that differentiate each pool are its capacity to collect water (sizing and volume), the different materials that make up the pool, and potential occupation by the public.

NURSERY BUILDING

FOREST MOUND

PARKING

NON-SALTY TERRACES

WATERFRONT TRAIL

FRESHWATER POOLS SALTY MOUNDS

PIER 23

BRINE POOL

TRAIL NETWORK

CONTROLLED WETLAND SWIMMING HOLE 0

Figure 23. Site plan of design and terrain section The main design consists of a series of large habitable pools with geologic walls and spillways where runoff can be collected. The current headframes, tanks, conveyors onsite can be retrofitted to become water tanks and pipes to move brine to vegetation plots and mounds. Another way brine moves through the site are through trenches. These mounds are angled so the vegetation can be planted on the slopes facing the trenches allowing the plants to get water treatment.

150

300 ft

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1 / DISCONTINUE OPERATIONS store salt in overflow pads make room for excavation

2 / CEASE STOCKPILING

3 / DEMO BUILDINGS

develop accessible waterfront test brine pools and plots create excavation mound

accentuate drainage retrofit infrastructure manipulate surface

EARTHWORK FOR DIFFERENT VEGETATIVE AND HYDROLOGIC CONDITIONS

4 / ESTABLISH FLOW

5 / SHIFT USE

create trail network vegetate plots of different conditions

PUBLIC EXPERIENCE THROUGH POOL FLUCTUATING WATER LEVELS

expand public use adapt for changing factors

DRAINAGE & FOREBAY FILTER SEASONAL CHANGES

LAND LEVELED 0

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Figure 24. Phasing plan diagrams and collapsed section As soon as the plant becomes economically less valuable, it would start tapering off its operations where the plant will first discontinue its stockpiling of salt on the storage pads and transport the salt out. The rail schedule would be discontinued and the infrastructure would serve as a base for a waterfront trail. The salt remaining onsite would be used in test brine pools constructed adjacent to the existing tanks so the excess salt could be used right there. The land would be leveled and topographically manipulated to create the vegetation plots as material is excavated and becomes available. The excess would be piled where the old salt stockpiles stood and could be reforested to extend this forest community; it would become a tree stockpile instead of a salt stockpile, creating a similar visual connection to what existing previously. The pools would also provide some benefit throughout construction of plots as they are dealing with fluctuating water levels throughout the season. The availability of salt will determine how long this site cultivates salt tolerant vegetation, making the conditions of the site impermanent.

20

40 ft

detects salinity

RESPONSIVE LIGHT FIXTURE tank brine pump

WATER INFRASTRUCTURE pipe

terrace - raised

VEGETATION PLOTS

mound - varied wetland - depressed

collection pool

WATER FLOW irrigation trench recreation pool

extended trail event

path through pools

CIRCULATION beach trail

SITE

Figure 25. Design axon This is a breakdown of the different design components of the site

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Figure 26. Geologic pool experience The design engages public users through a path that goes through the pools; this is where the character of the geology of the site can be experienced and how their assembly with building materials and the relationship with water can be observed

Figure 27. Pier experience A floating pier that is as long as the mine shaft is deep will be adjacent to the location of the main production shaft, exploring the phenomenological quality of the mine scale and its relationship to the lake and subsurface geology

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Figure 28. Vegetation and light experience Light fixtures installed in the trench and mound areas will run of osmotic power, creating a shifting light condition based on salinity of the water

PUMP & TANK IN BRINE POOL STORAGE TANK

SALINITY RESPONSIVE LIGHTS TRENCH

GRADIENT OF BRIGHTNESS SALT CONTENT LIGHT SALT + WATER = ELECTROLYTE 0

12

24 ft

GRADIENT OF SALT SATURATION IN SOIL

Figure 29. Osmotic power light fixtures This unique salty condition can also test renewable energy in the form of osmotic power. How this works is that pressure is created when freshwater passes through a membrane to meet saltwater. This pressure can drive a turbine that creates energy. This technology has been tested in laboratory conditions and is currently being developed for commercial use in Norway and the Netherlands. Onsite this technology can be embedded in the irrigation trenches and mounds where the water and salt conditions are changing, creating an immediate experience of that shift. Brine would travel from the pool and storage tanks to the trench; freshwater would travel from the pool on this side and where they meet a light can illustrate this gradient. A public user can see these changes occur and become aware of the shifting conditions in the trenches.

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S

S

GH PR T A TO Y LE TR RA E NT E S

RU B

Solidago sempervirens Seaside goldenrod Juncus gerardii Saltmeadow rush 10’ 8’ 6’ 4’ 2’

OU

SA DR LT

N

TO E L G SA ERARA NT SS W LT ES ET Y TO S O LE I RA L NT SH

ET

SA LI W

Baccharis halimifolia Groundseltree Hippophae rhamnoides Sea buckthorn

Syringa reticulata Japanese tree lilac Caragana arborescens Siberian pea tree Betula papyrifera Paper birch

shale slabs

clay

shale aggregate

0

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Figure 30. Intended design conditions The idea of impermanence relates to the temporal element of material expression and experience. It is best seen in the vegetation communities in the mounds, where the design intends to create a gradient of rare inland salt marsh plants to salt spray tolerant based on how high the water levels are. The slopes on the mounds angled toward the trench are planted so that salt marsh grasses are mostly inundated closest to the trench, salty soil tolerant are in the middle, and then salt spray tolerant are at the top of the slope.

10

20 ft

WET

EXPANDED SALINE VEGETATION

10’ 8’ 6’ 4’ 2’

DRY

LATERAL INFILTRATION

DROUGHT TOLERANT DOMINATES

10’ 8’ 6’ 4’ 2’

NO SALT

SALINE VEGETATION DISAPPEARS

10’ 8’ 6’ 4’ 2’

NO MAINTENANCE

10’ 8’ 6’ 4’ 2’

COLLISIONS AND BREAKAGES IN ZONES

POSSIBLE INVASIVE PENETRATION

Figure 31. Changing scenarios In various future conditions, the vegetation will respond to how much water is available to deploy salt in its brine; in wet conditions, the salt marsh plants may thrive; when salt is no longer available, the saline plants will disappear and riparian vegetation can take over). This impermanence allows this site to become a testing ground during a unique salty moment for how to capitalize upon brine as a byproduct.

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LANSING TEST SITES

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Figure 32. Lansing test sites Though this site may operate under this unique salty moment, the roadside ditches of Lansing and New York State will remain salty in the winter and spring for the foreseeable future. The design calls attention to these shifts of salinity in the drainage network. Salt marsh and riparian vegetation growing onsite can provide value outside the site and Lansing has plenty of testing grounds where they can be transplanted.

REPLACE INVASIVE SPECIES

BECOME VISIBLE RESOURCE

ENRICH LOCAL PROPERTIES

residential remediate areas dominated by invasive Lansing Community Center plant tiers of tolerant vegetation helps with erosion

“demonstration ditch�

bring design to engineered highways

remove culvert

Figure 33. Lansing legacy Swales on local properties, where many driveways and streets are culverted, are examples where this could be implemented. Vegetation grown onsite planted here can help with erosion and tolerant the salty conditions of winter roads. Another testing site could be the roadside ditches adjacent to many roads and highways where invasive salt tolerant species dominate. Transplanting non-invasive and higher value salt-tolerant plants in Lansing would provide a spatial connection to the site, rethinking the use of an industrial byproduct and expressing the material identity of salt through related geologic materials and the fluid dynamics in which it moves. Considering the interaction of these materials and processes and creating the ability to experience them has the potential to enrich the community culturally, ecologically, and economically.

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C ON C LU S I ON

KEY F I ND I NGS & P E RS I S T E NT QU E S T I ON S

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As with any design study, many problems persist and the design proposal only opens doors to more questions and directions to consider. The idea of an experimental nursery with the use of brine is one of them. The temporal component is important to consider. How long does it last? Is it dependent on the availability of salt? Where can they get salt from if it runs out? What kind of landscape does it become if there is no salt? What is temporary and what is permanent is up for grabs.

Another aspect of this project that is missing is a comprehensive study of other salty landscapes and precedent studies of existing and functioning landscapes where salt is an important element.

There are international examples of salt production and domestically, in the United States, much of this exists in the western part of the country. The Great Salt Lake and salt ponds in the San Francisco Bay Area provide good examples of how a salt economy has developed spatially and socially from a naturally occurring formation. Especially in these cases, slope

is an important factor. A comprehensive grading study is missing from this design thesis and it would push the design further if more studies on slope and how it affects the salty and hydrologic conditions were engaged.

Another limitation of this design thesis was the lack of available information and spatial data from the subterranean spaces in the mine, which dictated how little focus was put into the subsurface.

However, the design of the surface would have been more compelling with more consideration into the subterranean space. However, that was just the nature of the circumstances, as Cargill did not allow for further inquiry into the mine’s underground footprint.

A final question that remains, which relates to everything discussed, is who the client is.

Who is this design serving and how would it get implemented? Who would the people or actors who are advocating for this? The political and social structure of the implementation of the design

is unclear and pushing this forward through by defining a specific audience and why will make this project stronger. This design thesis shows one possibility in considering the closure of industrial sites and finding ways to incorporate an exchange of byproducts to create a related landscape-based industry that enables further engagement with the materials and processes of salt mining. This project speaks to how landscape architects can have a voice in dictating how sites of industry or soonbe-decommissioned can be designed and planned more critically.

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