Environmental conservation: The new Museum is subterranean, and seared into the earth the way the Holocaust is seared into the modern world. Therefore, exposure to environmental fluctuations such as wind and rain are eliminated since the building is insulated by its placement in the earth. The bio-effective, insulated roof is green-landscaped park ground that features native, drought-tolerant plants. It is made of concrete integrated with fly ash mixture, an eco-friendly material, to reduce its carbon foot-print. The building defers to the park’s beauty
and enhances it. Self-effacingly in its placement below ground, it increases the park’s green space. It places needed public bathrooms on the park’s western edge, and increases public parking spaces at peak use times. It also invigorates an under-used corner. In this way the new Museum is truly a museum of the city and for the city. Museum visitors explore the Holocaust’s historic world of despair, and then emerge from it into the world of joy, delight, and re-creation flourishing in Pan Pacific Park. Its location in the park, a neutral zone shared by multiple communities, enables The Museum to be a crossroads for all. Its accessibility therefore amplifies its function communicating the importance of personal and civic responsibility.