Bloodless Coup

Albany - Architectural Schizophrenia?

Early on in the amazing classic cartoon "Duck Amuck" Daffy Duck walks, skis, etc. through a series of settings that are right next to each other - yet seem to have no conceivable connection to one another. Each frame is hopelessly out of place when compared to the setting he had just passed through, and Daffy finds this most irksome. I suppose one can get the same feeling going through downtown Albany. After all it features the neo-gothic Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception near the modern (in the most thrilling and dated senses of the term) Gov. Nelson A. Rockefeller Empire State Plaza, at the end of which is the state capital. And the capital is, of course, itself a grand mishmash of Italianate and Romanesque styles. Some find this an unsightly combination, and some loathe some of these buildings. But I disagree. I think it's a really convenient way to check out a lot of interesting architecture at once.