DOWNTOWN MALL WALL-GREEN

The drawing on the First Amendment Community Chalk Board by Pete O’Shea represents the 'Muzzle' awards presented today by the Thomas Jefferson Center for the Protection of Free Expression. (Muzzles: A dirty dozen by The Daily Progress staff, Published April 7, 2009.) The free expression monument designed by architects Peter O’Shea and Robert Winstead is winning awards as well. It has been nominated and is in the final-five running for the 2009 Rudy Bruner Award, which recognizes excellent urban places around the country. Among the other nominees is Millennium Park in Chicago.

A Democratic Republican joint Muzzle award was given citing their complete indifference and their lack of speaking out regarding protests and protesters at both 2008 conventions. 'Free speech zones' were created in fenced compounds far from the convention delegates upon whom the protests were to affect. 800 arrests (including journalists with permits there merely to cover the protests) with very few prosecutions indicate an over-zealous reaction by the state.


The Charlottesville downtown mall wall is located directly in front of Charlottesville’s City Hall, next to the city’s amphitheater. The monument consists primarily of a two-sided wall of Buckingham slate, approximately 54 feet long (108’ of writing space) by 7.5 feet high. In addition, the monument’s design includes a podium intended to serve as a contemporary soapbox from which individuals may address public gatherings. It received the 2008 Tucker Architectural Award for best use of natural stone. Now that's Greenstone!

In a feature that sponsors believe is unique, visitors to the site will be able to erase or alter others’ messages. Some like Kevin Cox believe the feature is a weakness in the design of both the slate and the online chalkboards. “It’s not sending an accurate message about what free speech is,” said Cox; “Free speech isn’t about silencing someone who you don’t like what they said...Americans look at free expression as something that embodies tolerance.”