Here's What Architects Think Of Trump's 250-Foot Triumphal Arch
President Donald Trump has focused so much of his second term on large-scale building projects that it's often hard to keep track of each proposal. Now his planned 250-foot triumphal arch near Arlington National Cemetery is back in the spotlight after the Commission of Fine Arts ― made up of Trump appointees ― voted last month to approve designs for the project.
Critics of the arch, estimated to cost at least $100 million, have called it a "vanity project" aimed at serving the president's ego. The gargantuan gilded design has also elicited comparisons to North Korea's 197-foot Arch of Triumph and the 246-foot golden monument in Turkmenistan featuring a statue of dictator Saparmurat Niyazov.
Following the vote on Trump's arch, House Democrats introduced a bill to block its construction and the use of any federal funds to pay for it.
Like many of Trump's architectural endeavors, the triumphal arch is giving more Cheesecake Factory than civic monument. But to further underscore why the proposal is so controversial, it helps to understand what a triumphal arch actually is and what it has always meant.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/politics/articles/heres-architects-think-trumps-250-110018703.html