Salem Schools Looking For a Home—and Accessibility

As reported by the Salem News, the new charter school, Salem Community Charter School is looking for space.  Museum Place is one possibility they’re looking at;  the former Saint Joseph’s Rectory is another.

As well, the Saltonstall School is being renovated and Salem is scrambling to find space for their students, and for a special-needs program at the Collins.

The rectory will need a year’s worth of work before it is useable as a school.  The Boston diocese did not offer their other properties such as St. John’s School and one official has speculated it is due to ADA issues.

A regular member of the commentariat at the Salem News weighed in on both stories with a refrain I am too familiar with as a member of the disability community in Salem.  To paraphrase:  “Why do we have to serve a small minority of students.  Forget that touchy-feely stuff of [disabled kids].  It’s an emergency—use the parochial schools!”

(It’s an emergency;  does that mean emergency no-bid contracting?  The member of the commentariat is a Tea Partier and I presume for less government and taxation and against the charming “emergency” measures that have often concealed thefts of the public purse.  I’m getting off the point here.)

Here’s a scenario the hardest-bitten conservative can relate to:

John Jones is a decorated veteran.  A wounded veteran who came home from Afghanistan or perhaps Iraq.  There’s no way he’s gonna get up and down stairs unless he rolls.  Downhill, possibly not under his own control.

He has kids.  He has a daughter, a true daddy’s girl that goes to the Saltonstall, or perhaps the new charter school or the Academy charter school.

His girl isn’t one of these special-needs snowflakes;  she’s a normal active girl.  Except that she’s an athlete and a ball player and there was that unseen posthole in the outfield one day when she was running out a grounder.

She’ll be hopping around for some time.

Now, Dad is deciding on schools, perhaps his family’s moved to Salem or his girl is making a change.  Remember choice?  That’s what the charter schools were supposed to be about.  Choice, choice, choice!

You will tell Dad the vet, wounded for our sins (“freedom isn’t free”, mind?), that he and his daughter cannot participate as parent and child in their own school system?

Good luck with that.

While many people use patriotism to worship respect our soldiers, few of them realize something I’ve thought of.

If you count all the veterans still living from all wars, and those that are wounded and disabled, I suspect they don’t make up a large number.

In Salem, I have heard estimates that 20% of Salemmites have a disability.  Not all of them are of school age, of course.

I am certain that the 20% is not all made up of veterans.

Yet if I suggested that  veterans should not get help because their numbers are so few, I’m certain I would be assaulted in an alleyway.  (Freedom isn’t free…)

I have no animosity towards veterans—I’m too young to have ever spat upon a Vietnam veteran, and have never said a word of disrespect to them (perhaps, I have done this to the politicians who task them, but…)   Salem’s veteran groups are natural allies of the Commission on Disabilities and always will be.

I have to wonder why the diocese of Boston is not aggressive with its surplus properties.  Despite what Rand Paul would have you believe, in Massachusetts, any given building does not have to be made ADA accessible to current codes merely as if the authorities waved a pixie wand and made it so.

The requirement to make a building ADA compliant per current code very much depends on the use of the building, the age of the building and the intended use of the building.  There were several revisions to Massachusetts building codes for handicapped access and by the current law, a building constructed say, in 1978, only has to meet accessibility requirements for 1978.  I have several large (and large-print) binders with all the laws to date.

If a building is used for general business purposes, it may or may not need to be brought up to ADA access.  Often in Salem, buildings have been repurposed and have never been made accessible because there were very few if any renovations performed.

A benchmark the Commission often discusses is the “one-third rule” or “30% rule” or “hitting 30%”.  That refers  to the current value of the building.  If any proposed renovations exceed 30% of this value, the building must be brought fully up to ADA and Massachusetts code.

Even then, developers and architects have considerable wiggle room.  The law does not say absolute accommodations, merely reasonable accommodations.  The Mass. Architectural Access Board (MAAB) will grant variances if the regulations are burdensome or do not benefit.

A few years ago, the state renovated a home in North Salem to use as a group home.  By the letter of the law it would have needed an expensive elevator.  The developer convinced the MAAB that the only space that the public would access was the ground floor.  The ground floor of the building was brought up to code with HP parking and no steps, but there didn’t need to be an elevator.  

I’ve been in St. John’s School before, and is not so much a charming old fashioned parochial school as it is a dump, no disrespect to Catholics meant.  There are stairs everywhere.  It could be impossible to get variances for this or any of the other school buildings involved.

Don’t forget, too, that the staff and teachers have to use the space as well.  People get old and infirm, or have a negative encounter with an icy front step.  If you think there’s controversy over accommodating students, just wait until it’s a teacher with a grievance!

I have to wonder if the diocese fears that the values of their properties have fallen so much that any renovations at all to them would require them to be fully up to code.  After all, it isn’t only handicapped access at stake but also electrical, plumbing, fire safety and communications cabling that need to be upgraded as well.

Whatever the case, this is something you can’t blame on the special-needs snowflakes, “those people” or the ADA activists.  Salem schools are indeed in a pickle.  But they would be anyway even if you deported all the disabled to Lynn.

Back after an absence

Essex Street Mall 2011-05-26 007, originally uploaded by dmoisan.

Via Flickr:
Nature finally turned a switch to "Summer" today, as these folks are realizing.

And I've turned a switch, too.

I haven’t posted in almost six months.  I’m dispirited.

Last winter, my building had the bedbug hysteria that has affected many households in recent years.  Dealing with bedbugs has combined the worst aspects of moving and losing your house to fire or flood.  The Salem News covered the story in my building and it brought out the worst aspect of pest infestations—the moral opprobrium that comes when your betters can look down on you for being “dirty” and “unclean”, even though bedbugs, roaches and mice are blissfully unaware of class distinctions.  

In a building with a shared laundry space, like I have, I’ll never know how I got bedbugs and I just don’t care who or what “gave” them to me.  I just know that pest infestations don’t make me or my neighbors “immoral” or “unclean” or “lazy”, but that was on the minds of many of the Salem News commentariat.

There’s more, too.  Last spring I had quite a screaming match with my ward councilor Mike Sosnowski over a parking proposal at the Jail.

What I learned from that affair is that it doesn’t matter what neighborhood I live in, or what stake I have in anything, if someone more important than me thinks different.  At that meeting, a person from the Northfields neighborhood association asserted that me and my neighbors did not want commercial use at the Jail no matter what.

It doesn’t matter that that Northfields guy probably doesn’t even have a view of the Jail from his house.  And he never cared before about the apartment complex I live in.

As far as I can see, Mike Sosnowski has more or less aided and abetted groups like Northfields.  If you live in cheap rental housing, you will not get representation in Salem.

You will not get it.

Better that you show Mike your mortgage statement—or proof of McIntyre architecture—before coming to him with a problem.

I was at a meeting this past Saturday of the Alliance of Salem Neighborhood Associations.  It was held at the function room of Beverly Cooperative Bank, which is where the Downtown group meets.

I had my own problems with that group, and didn’t want to attend this meeting, except that I made a verbal commitment on recorded video and had to go. 

(I know the camera is on during our Commission meetings.  If I make a gaffe or a curse, then I do.  I don’t try to walk back what I said.  I said it and it’s on tape and that is that.)

Several people in the Alliance complained about being “outsiders”.  I wanted to say to them:  “Where’s Lucy [Corchado, head of  the Point association]?  Where are they?  The Point is a neighborhood, isn’t it?”

Those people have their own advisory board at the highest level of city government.  They have Jason Silva’s [Mayor Driscoll’s chief-of-staff] private number on speed-dial.  I have no doubt that someone like Michael Coleman can have Mike Sosnowski swing into action at 3 AM on a Sunday if he so commands it.  If Teasie Goggin wanted to repeat Mike Bencal’s Al Haig moment (“I’m in control here”, after the attempted assassination of President Reagan in 1981) when he tried to take charge of City Hall when the mayor was away a few years ago, she has more than enough social capital to do so!

They have that advisory commission in addition to the Alliance!  Tell me they are outsiders again?

As it happened, the meeting was a waste of time for me and and my colleagues on the Commission on Disabilities, since it was supposed to pertain to the MBTA parking garage, but was instead an unfocused rambling about pedestrian access and getting traffic usage stats, only to find out the state had already done that but nobody from the Alliance even read the report.  The Commission probably could have used that, but the person presenting that report didn’t bother to tell us where we could find the data from the state website.

(I’d filmed video of the meeting.  It would have been nice of them to tell us when the MBTA part of the meeting would get under way so I wouldn’t have to guess how long the batteries in my camera would last.  Not long enough as it turned out.)

If I can’t be involved in the workings of my own city, the one that I have spent 47 years in, I think, why am I bothering to blog?

I’ve asked myself that question over and over during the past six months.

The only thing keeping me going is the Commission—whose purpose I believe in with all my heart and soul—and Salem Access Television, where I have been applying my IT talents for 11 years.

I’m very proud, in fact, that SATV now has much of its local programming available over the Net.  Public meetings—including the Commission’s—are now available through our Government page.

I worked very hard with Sal Russo and the staff over the past year to make this possible and I am inordinately prideful.  I’ve been delighted to flip the figurative “bird” to a few former board members who thought this was a “fad” or “something for Dave and Sal to spend money on”.  (In fact, video-on-demand has been a roaring success at SATV.)

There are many other thoughts, ideas and initiatives at SATV and the Commission to make fodder for many more years of blog posts, which is why I’m continuing to blog.

But I will never, ever, let myself believe that I have a stake and a say with what happens in Salem.

I don’t.  And I won’t.

Restaurant at Jail to open next week

Reported at Salem Patch, the restaurant at the Jail, The Great Escape, will open Monday.

When I saw this in the open house, I had wondered if this would be the restaurant.  I seem to have guessed right.

Despite the guy from Northfields and the associated controversy over the green space, a restaurant operator came through after all. 

I’m not sure how they’ll do long-term, and I don’t know if I’ll afford to eat there myself, but I wish them luck.  Hats off to New Boston for their tenacity in seeing this through.

Barbed Wire is Gone at the Salem Jail!

 

As promised, the barbed-wire fencing around the Salem Jail has finally been removed!  (A second, inner wall, was partially dismantled when the Jail was closed and demolished when the renovation began.)

In other news, the new courthouse is now easily seen from the same corner:

Salem Jail’s Open House

There was never a time during the Salem Jail’s existence that people would be waiting to get in to the Jail, but it happened yesterday during a scheduled open house.

There were about 30-50 people in line at any one moment and about an equal number of people in the Jail itself.  Several hundred people likely went through.  (Relatively few people visited the other buildings in the open house, the jailer’s building and the (reconstructed) carriage house.)

There wasn’t much overlap between the areas we were allowed to visit in the open house, and the parts of the Jail that Dan Stanwood took me through two years ago.  The open house took us through the eastern side of the building facing the parking lot;  the tour was mostly on the west side.  (Dan offered to take my party through more of the facility but we were short on time and I had had enough video to make the show out of anyway.)

The front entrance hasn’t changed much from then:

Now:

The pay phone pedestal is still there!  If you’re observant, you may have noted the white metal wheelchair lift in the old photo.  Inmates with disabilities were brought in with the lift (and stayed on the first floor as the rest of the building was not accessible.)

Today, there’s a ramp, or what appears to be one.

Inside, one of the old cells near the entrance has been preserved:

This will be part of a small museum.

The new Jail has an elevator:

Reportedly, the hook on the ceiling of the dining area upon which people were hanged, is still there in one of the units:

One of the units:

In a few months this could be someone’s home.

My Flickr stream of the old Salem Jail.

My Flickr stream of the Salem Jail renovation, including the open house.

Final Thoughts on Jail Parking and the Greenspace

Final followup, I hope, to the ongoing Salem Jail Parking drama.  The Salem News gave an account of last Tuesday’s meeting, and talked about it some more.

Any time the neighborhood associations get involved in discussions like this, I’m unhappy.

I say this even though I was in substantial agreement with those opposed to the parking plan. 

Had New Boston Ventures came to the meeting with their original 39-space plan, I would have opposed it as well.

But NBV proposed what I thought was a very interesting compromise:  12 spaces and an access road.  The access road is required by the fire department in any event.

During the day, NBV suggested that the new spaces could be used by the elderly housing complex in which I live next door.  We have a serious parking problem.  Whatever my views are on over-dependence on the automobile in downtown, there’s an undeniable need for visitor spaces in my building and the adjoining building next door.  You can’t expect an oxygen delivery van to park in Museum Place.

I’d hoped that the committee would take that under consideration and table NBV’s compromise proposal until the next meeting.  The neighbors would vent and rant a bit but that’d be fine.

I had wanted it to work out—having green space, parking and the restaurant all at once.  Maybe it wasn’t possible but no harm in wanting it!

But that did not happen.  Mike Sosnowski had come into the meeting against the idea and went out against it.  The neighborhood groups were a big reason why.

I’d expected the meeting to have fewer attendees than I expected.  I had thought this was a matter for my immediate neighborhood, the Bridge St. Neck association, and perhaps the few urban planning experts amongst us.

Over 100 people showed up, most all from various neighborhood groups around the city.   They all spoke out against the proposal, whether they lived nearby or not. Despite what the News reported, there was no turn of opinion there.  All came in against, all left against.

Low point—angriest point for me—is when a gentleman from the Northfields spoke out against the proposal.

That’s not what I was angry about;  he had expressed many of the concerns I had had as well.  If he had a view of the Jail from across the river, he may have even had a point.  One point I’ve come back to is the great vista of the Jail from both northbound and southbound Bridge St.  It is beautiful!  I can only imagine what it looks like from the river and am looking forward to finding out when spring finally arrives.

But this guy started talking about how my building (and the building next door) didn’t want the restaurant and any commercial development. 

He didn’t ask us.  I know I didn’t coordinate my talking points with others from my building, but I wouldn’t pretend to speak for them.

He of Northfields, likely of a mortgage with five or six zeros in it, dictating to me and my neighbors what we think.

I was livid!

And he’s wrong about commercial development.  Next door to me is 10 Federal.

10 Federal has been a commercial property for the 60 years it existed;  at first for New England Telephone, then NYNEX, Bell Atlantic, Verizon and now a renovated private office building.

Ironically, it’s very visible coming down the Veteran’s Riverway from the north.

The associations are all of a piece, they all think like this man.

And my councilor has no choice but to go along.  I’m very frustrated with him but ultimately I’m sympathetic—he has an impossible position to govern from.

He answers to the Downtown, Salem Common, Bridge St. Neck and Federal St. Associations.  I’m certain that once the Jail is occupied, there will be the Salem Jail Neighborhood Association. 

My greatest fear is that they can and will all speak for me, without actually needing or appreciating my input.  It isn’t as though people in public housing have an “investment” in Downtown.

And that Mike is just going along, out of necessity.

[Note:  I had posted an earlier draft online that was a bit too vituperative overall and particularly unfair to my councilor Mike.  My frustrations with him have been long pent up because I have never been able to have that hard, though productive, conversation that clears the air.  Perhaps we’ll have one sometime. 

PS:   Despite speculation on Salemweb, I doubt that Mr. Treadwell was the guy who spoke—Mr. Treadwell is an expert who would have well known the exact makeup of my neighborhood and that it was once all commercial.]

Salem Jail Parking Proposal Apparently Dead

The City Council met tonight to discuss New Boston Venture’s proposal to reconfigure the greenspace triangle at St. Peter, Bridge and Howard Sts for additional restaurant parking.

The proposal is apparently dead.

Rather than give my opinions again, here are my notes.  No doubt the Salem News will report this tomorrow;  there was already a letter in today’s News opposing the proposal.

I couldn’t hear everybody who spoke—nearly everyone from the neighborhood groups showed up, but the important points are here as best as I could hear and write down.

The original proposal brought by New Boston Ventures (NPV) was for 37 parking spaces carved out of the greenspace near the Jail wall.

NPV came back with a compromise proposal of 13 parking spaces and a turnaround that would be on a new access road from Bridge St.

There are two restaurants currently interested in the space.  They have indicated that additional parking is a prerequisite for their interests.

NPV talked a little about the sidewalk that bisects the current greenspace and will intersect the access road.  Some thought was given to a crushed stone sidewalk recycled from the original granite blocks from the Jail.

NPV expressed great appreciation for the effort that the city, the Council, and the SRA have put in to make the Salem Jail project work.  Everyone agrees it has become a beautiful building and NPV is happy with their efforts so far.

The head of the Planning Dept. (Lynn Duncan, IIRC) has been inside the restaurant space.  It is on a second level with a river view.  She believes the parking plan is much improved.

If there is no restaurant, the space will be made into housing, 3 units.

But the City would much prefer the restaurant;  she is concerned that if the Jail becomes all private housing, that will threaten or make non-viable the small Jail museum that is in the current plans.

One member of the committee (couldn’t make out whom) talked bout the spaces lost from Morency Manor use.  [For a long while, while the Jail property was vacant, visitors to Morency Manor were allowed short term parking in the Jail lot.  These were used by VNA’s, relatives, and other visitors who needed to stop by briefly.]

NPV proposed their lot to be used by Morency Manor visitors during the daytime hours (2 hr. parking.)

Councilor O’Keefe:  The access road must be there on Bridge St. due to fire regulations.  That is not negotiable.

Counicilor Pelletier: Are there condos [in the Jail]?

NPV:  No.  Apartments for now but if phase 2 is approved, the new building will be condos.  Because of a complicated arrangment involving tax breaks for historic properties, this was necessary for the project to go through.

Question from the committee regarding National Grid’s transformer—why did that take three months to settle?

Transformer siting--National Grid changed their mind on NBV’s placement of the distribution transformer on site.   National Parks Service rejected this placement, due to the sensitive granite wall around the Jail.  National Grid then wanted to place their vault with other utilities, water, sewer, etc. and NBV thought that was infeasible.  This went on for some time.  The morning of this meeting [tonight],  National Grid agreed to a compromise placement suitable to NBV, NG and NPS.

A committee member had a question:  Is the road considered a private access road on what is public land.

Rules were suspended so that the public comment period would take place.  Nearly half the room took their place to speak [including my colleague Charlie Reardon, and myself] so I didn’t get everyone and couldn’t.

The public comment was unanimous—No parking!  The points came down to three.

1) Green space is very very important to Salemmites.  No one wanted to lose any.  People were very concerned over the original  37-space proposal, and very few people, if any, were mollified by the compromise, although people appreciated that NBV tried to change it.  The quote of the night came from one woman:  With the recent reconstruction of Bridge St., and the Leslie’s Retreat park space along the North River to the south, Salem has its own “Emerald Necklace”, like the famous green space of parks, rivers and walks in Boston writ small.

2) Why does a restaurant need additional spaces when there are already spaces available during the evening hours?  Moreover, many thriving restaurants manage to survive without storefront parking.  One committee member put it:  “Salem doesn’t have a parking problem, it has a walking problem.”

3) If the restaurant can give up 13 spaces during the day to Morency Manor, spaces that it would use for delivery trucks and etc., perhaps it didn’t need the spaces after all.

Mike Sosnowski had the closing words before the vote.  He had been present during the long planning process for the Bypass Road, some 35 years of effort, and the word [a new word to many of us at the time] was mitigation.  That green space was mitigation for the road, amongst many other compromises that needed to be made.

Mike, continuing:  I respect NBV very much for what they have done so far.  But it is not worth losing that green space to keep the restaurant.

NBV:  Offered and requested to withdraw their proposal.

The committee voted to give a negative recommendation to the full Council. 

MBTA Meeting on Salem Depot

First, I want to apologize for not blogging much recently.  I’ve had a big computer project at SATV that we just finished.  The Commission hasn’t met since December—our February meeting this past Tuesday was cancelled due to the weather, which was at its worst at 4 PM when we meet.

And I’ve been burned out:  Politics have been very unpleasant recently;  there’s an ugly undertone to civic affairs these days.  And that doesn’t make blogging fun.

The MBTA will hold another public meeting on Salem Depot next Tuesday the 23rd, at the Carlton School.  As promised last fall, this meeting is called at the 30% design point.  The full plans are on the MBTA web site.  Here is the current site plan:

I note that the covered pedestrian walkway that was in the original plans is not seen in this revision.  Pedestrian access from Bridge St. is critical to this project since it will serve the new courthouse complex as well.  I also note the architects went with Option 1 for the busway;  I would have much preferred the busway be closer to Bridge St.  So much for that.

I’ve recommended that the Commission on Disabilities take these points to the meeting:

1. We must have a full-height platform for the whole length of the platform;  the T has favored a half-full-height/half-low platform.
2. The plans show partial canopies over the platforms, much like the existing station.  There should be a full canopy over the entire platform.
3. There must be good pedestrian access from Bridge St.  There is going to be a vehicular entrance ramp where the current stairs are now, and features like the ramp can be pedestrian-hostile.

It’s important, though, to keep this project in perspective.  We’ve needed a garage and added parking at Salem Depot from the day it opened over 20 years ago.  I’ve hated the appearance of the station, the platform at the end of nowhere, and most of all the stairs.

Some people in Salem want the perfect.  John Ronan, the newly-elected Ward 5 councilor, filed some good comments that I quote in part:

First, I’m glad this project is funded and going forward. The station is in true need of additional
parking. Salem is extremely fortunate not only to have a train stop but to have one in the
downtown area walking-distance from many of our shops, offices and attractions.
Often, Salem planning issues get bogged down in search for a fanciful perfect solution. I saw
seeds of this taking root in the statements of a few attendees advocating a mixed use or an air-rights platform in lieu of a garage. Without any commitments or even any prospects for the private development aspect of such mixed uses, they simply aren’t viable. Even if the City agreed (as would be necessary) to couple its lot with the MBTA lot it may never find
a developer willing to build on top of an air rights-platform on conditions favorable to the City. All these components certainly would not come together by the December 31, 2011 deadline.
Therefore, I believe Salem is correctly positioning itself for the future by keeping its crescent
shaped lot separate from the MBTA lot. The garage project should proceed as a garage project.

If the idea of an air-rights project had been proposed in the early 2000’s, I would have supported it.  Unfortunately, projects like that are subject to the vagaries of funding.  We can ask the Columbus Place developers how well that is going. As it is, until the governor gave a commitment to Salem Depot, the project would have been a dream project, 5 or 10 years in the future.  And it always would have been.

Because of the land situation, the MBTA probably won’t get to resolve all of the issues that were brought up at the earlier meeting.  In particular, pedestrian access from North Street is a difficult and ugly problem that I fear won’t get resolved.

This is probably the best we’re going to get.  The three points I outlined are the most important.  If they can be resolved to my satisfaction, I’ll be happy with the result.  As will most Salemmites.

Tom Rovero is the MBTA contact person for this project and he can be emailed at trovero@mbta.com.  

Salem Jail Progress—and Parking?

The Salem Jail project is progressing with coverage in the Salem Gazette, “Old Salem Jail Moves Towards Reopening”, and the Salem News, which is reporting on the developers’ recent proposal to reconfigure the greenspace at the Veterans’ Riverway for parking

This is the area:

At a recent community meeting (that I wasn’t at), the developers want to reconfigure at least part of this space for parking.  Otherwise, they say, the restaurant long proposed and long desired, won’t happen.

Quote from the News:

"The way we'd envision it is to retain a large percentage of the green space and have it landscaped in such a way that it's attractive," said David Goldman, a principal at New Boston Ventures.

Goldman said the parking lot would be an important selling point to lure in a restaurant for the first floor, a requirement the city imposed to keep the historic building publicly accessible.

New Boston Ventures has wanted this from the start.  They had wanted to configure this space in July 2008, when the bypass road was nearing completion and had gone to high-level officials in MassHighway (now MassDOT.)

The neighbors will be involved;  my colleague Charlie Reardon was at that meeting and suggested parking for the senior housing (45 St. Peter/109 Bridge) across from the Jail.

People in my building have long wanted more parking, and one neighbor of mine even proposed the greenspace as parking lot well before Charlie did.

This is nuts. 

That greenspace changes everything about the new road, moderating its influence and making a natural anchor and focal point for the immediate St. Peter St. neighborhood.  It won’t be long before New Boston looks at the plans again and decides they want the whole area for parking.  Who could be against parking?

But despite what the Salem News thinks in its editorial, this will happen anyway.  No one wants to lose the restaurant, or incur anger from senior citizens.  (And if they did lose the restaurant we can count on the Salem News to blame the city anyway.)

Sidewalk Access Flares Up

For a number of years now, the Commission on Disabilities has been frustrated with the obstacles often present on downtown sidewalks. Many restaurants have established outdoor seating; Tavern in the Square is constructing its outdoor seating in the photo above.

Many other businesses have sandwich signs. Many sidewalks, particularly the Essex St. pedestrian mall between Liberty & Washington Sts., are cobblestoned.

These are frustrating obstacles for people with mobility and visual impairments. Last Thursday night at the Council chambers, our frustration finally boiled over.

Jack Harris, Charlie Reardon, Andy LaPointe and myself were there. Only Jack was quoted in the Salem News article, but he said everything that was on the back of all our minds.

As best as I can paraphrase, this is what I said:

To me, it isn't about Tavern in the Square in particular. They have the right to want and try for outdoor seating. I understand and accept the reasoning behind roping off the dining area [to fullfill state liquor laws.]

It's the fact that the SRA did not let us know this was coming down the pike. We at the Commission on Disabilities only found out about it in September, and I posted the blueprint and sidewalk closings diagram on my blog just a few weeks ago.

If only we saw this in July!

We on the Commission would have said our piece and come to an understanding before earth was ever turned on the site.

We knew the Courthouse and Salem Depot projects were coming down the pike, as were the North St. and Bridge St projects. We could engage with their project managers and at least know what was coming.

The SRA? Absolutely nothing from them before the fact.

If this meeting were only about Tavern in the Square, I think we were invited here in bad faith for a matter that we can't advise on until after the fact.

Why did they start building now? Why didn't they line up the permitting over the fall and winter? They could have done that, started construction after the spring thaw and have been done very quickly without any animosity.

By itself, Tavern in the Square’s outdoor seating doesn’t bother me, but when you have it and the multitudes of other restaurants and shopowners that put out chairs and tables and sandwich signs all around Washington, Front and Essex Sts, the totality of this is that even able bodied people won't be able to move around on a moderately busy Saturday, never mind October.

[End of remarks to the Council.]

The News article got a good number of comments; I’m going to address “youasked”. He or she was somewhat critical:

DMoisan....Are you kidding? Picking on one of TWO sidewalks being blocked in one small sectin of Salem when there are entire areas without sidewalks or usable access at all? You of all people should know better.
Just want to get your Commissions mission statement out there? Great, more power to you.
But come on, be a little more proactive instead of reactive grand standing.

How about a sidewalk along Loring Ave around dead mans curve? South campus area, make the state pay for it.

Route 107 Highland Ave....
15-20 years ago when Washington Street Rotary was there it was SO safe and accessible...
Do I need to go on?

The sad part of this is that all of those items he or she listed have been on our agenda recently. I was hoping for some new items in that post that we could work on. We do have to work with other city departments and elected officials (in the case of Loring Ave. where’s Joe O’Keefe again?!) not to mention the state.

And I am all too aware of the problems on Bridge and Washington and have been for fifteen years. At least we have one small victory: the pedestrian signals at WalMart were done over last month, in case that’s what the commenter was referring to.

It’s like saying if we can’t fix all the sidewalks around town, we can’t fix any of them!

And what is this business of being “proactive”? If we don’t find out about things like Tavern in the Square until after everything else is permitted, then we are reactive and what’s the point? We get complaints from constituents about access problems and we are expected to help get these to the right people to be resolved. So we’re reactive. What was the point again?

Unless and until the Planning Department and the SRA gives the Commission, and the public, access (via the city’s web site) to the same exhibits they use to make decisions on outdoor seating or anything else, we’re just going to do this over and over again.

And we’ll be “reactive”. Sorry.

Tavern on the Square Proposed Sidewalk Changes

As discussed in the September Commission meeting, Tavern In The Square wants to have outdoor seating.  To do this and comply with state law, they need to take over the stretch of sidewalk in front of their business on Washington St.

This is the handout we were given at the meeting.  I’ve added the color notations.  The green lines are the paths of travel for pedestrians, wheelchair users and cane users down Washington St. from Front St. to New Derby St.  The red area is the section of sidewalk that will be blocked to the public when the restaurant is open.

As I explained at the meeting, I wouldn’t be concerned if it were the only outdoor seating in downtown. 

It isn’t. 

That stretch of Washington St. is congested with light poles, planters, sandwich signs and numerous other obstacles.  The restaurant on the north end of the block also has outdoor seating, though it’s set off to the side of Front St.

The area at Washington and Front St. is particularly congested, as is the sidewalk in front of Tavern in the Square where it branches off to the crosswalk (the circular area in the lower left of the map.)

Halloween is coming up and it is a worst-case situation for sidewalk passage around downtown.  I’m going to try to imagine it when Tavern in the Square gets its seating.  Up the street, Rockafellas has had outdoor seating for some time, and it’s been a problem on a crowded day, even though they have the widest sidewalk available anywhere downtown, much wider than the space Tavern on the Square has available.

Downtown Salem Parking Insanity

The Salem News is reporting on something I have known ever since I’ve lived downtown:  Parking Bleeps.

The owner of Marketplace Quilts on Front St. has complained:

Clark blamed the city for allowing a restaurant that big to open without planning for parking. In a letter, she said her nighttime business has declined "because parking is nowhere to be found."

While sympathetic, city officials disagree. Halloween aside, they contend there is plenty of parking within a short walking distance of stores and restaurants.

The two city garages have not filled up once this whole tourist season, according to Parking Director Jim Hacker.

"We are busy, but we have not had an overflow crowd," he said last week.

In my building, we have our own frustrations about parking.  In a meeting with several of my neighbors to discuss building renovations, there were several wacky ideas proposed for parking.

One idea was to build a deck, or two, above the existing parking lot.  The other was to pave over the small triangular park that was formed when Bridge St. was realigned to the new bypass road.

Unfortunately, the deck idea isn’t the most practical:  There’s too little space on the site to accommodate the ramps to each level, which take up space below as well as above.

And paving the small park…not so much.  The Jail developers would have a fit.  That park is our compensation for tolerating the new road.  It’s a necessary—and welcome—buffer, particularly for  Howard St. residents. 

The article goes on:

Last fall, the Urban Land Institute, a research and educational group, came to Salem to consider the long-discussed prospect of building a parking garage on the Church Street lot behind District Court to handle future growth.

It rejected the idea.

"Residential development of the site would better promote the vibrant, sustainable growth of downtown Salem," the Institute concluded.

It also pointed to the paradox of downtown Salem: "Though the city appears to have adequate parking supply, parking in downtown is a real issue."

At the time, I had understood that the group did not want to have a 2nd parking structure so close to the existing Museum Place garage. 

I’m not so sure about residential development.

People living downtown, particularly newer residents, have expectations that are very difficult to fulfill here.

A few months ago, our executive director, Carol MacGown, came to a tenant’s meeting.  For the better part of two hours, the only subject on the agenda was parking.

My neighbors were screaming at her!

Ms. MacGown has very little control over the overall situation downtown;  she inherited a building that was not designed to have all its residents parking at once. 

Over at Derby Lofts, people there are asking the city to pay for their parking at South Harbor Garage.

Meanwhile, whenever people like myself advocate  public transit, the response is always “I’m not subsidizing your transit!  Get a car! Let the Free Market work!”

But the city is subsidizing parking, to an extent that’s virtually unrealized by most Salemmites.  Public transit may not come for free but neither do roads and parking spaces! 

If we promise every downtown resident two parking spaces, we are screwed.  Salem can’t do it.  We can’t.

We need every bit of our roads and parking spaces for the many that pass through via 1A and 114, and for those who deliver, shop and visit here.

I shouldn’t hold out hope for this belief, but if new downtown residents are to have a good life in Salem, they have to live without a car.  Or at most one car.  Or a bike, or a moped or a scooter (why I don’t see more of those around is beyond me.) 

They can’t have the suburban life here.  They’re better off screaming at the MBTA, than at Mayor Driscoll or our own MacGown. 

Seniors have changed from my mom’s generation, the one that was more used to trolleys, streetcars, or even horses.  The baby boomers grew up around cars and they’re determined to head for their sunset with their cars.

They just can’t do it in downtown Salem.

Outside Dining and Sidewalk Access

 

Tavern in the Square, the new restaurant that opened on the site of the old Salem News, wants to have outdoor dining at the corner of New Derby & Washington St. near the bus stop. 

This draws our interest at the Commission on Disabilities, since we are concerned about sidewalk access and what we call “path of travel”.

We’ll notice this come October.

I have no position on whether Tavern in the Square should be permitted outside seating, but I’ve been concerned about other outside seating.  Most notably, Rockafellas takes up a good chunk of Washington St., and I have had trouble getting by there in crowds.

Another serious bottleneck in the past has been Cilantro, which at one time had a seating area on Liberty St. (the “Haunted Alley”) which was virtually impassable anytime in October.  (The seating is no longer there.)

The Front Street Coffeehouse has a small seating area;  unfortunately, Front St. has a small sidewalk.

Tavern in the Square was already mentioned at one of our meetings.  Jack Harris heard from one person who claimed their entrance was poorly lit and marked for the visually impaired.  I’ll probably have lunch there sometime to see, or not see, for myself.

No doubt we’ll be bringing this up at the next meeting.

Salem Jail Renovation—Finally!

After three years, after many delays, I was wondering if the Salem Jail project would actually happen.  Three years ago, I got a notice in my building, which uses the Jail for overflow parking, that the lot would be closed.  Obviously not, as this picture in late March shows:

We got another notice:

When I attended the last meeting of the Planning Board in March, people were optimistic that the deal would close.  Was it for real this time?

Apparently, yes!

As also reported by Globe North, New Boston Ventures has finally closed on the Salem Jail.  There will be apartments, which could be converted to condos after five years, a restaurant (one restaurant, not multiple as the Globe implies) and a museum.

I’ve posted about the Jail before, with very much mixed feelings ("Salem Jail developer switching from condos to apartments", "Salem Jail Visit" and "Salem Jail Update".)

I even filmed the inside of the Jail!

(By the way, I have asked Dave Gauthier to reschedule the full documentary I did for air on SATV.  Since it is evergreen programming for Salem, I gave SATV perpetual permission to rerun it at various times, including Halloween, and now.)

I’m expecting and fearing my future neighbors may be insecure and obsessed with historical value;  some wise-ass on the Salem News discussion boards already explained that the Jail residents would see the bypass road, apartment buildings, and my own elderly apartment complex.

Thanks.  I’m proud to have lowered property values in Salem since 1963, the Common since 1985 and downtown since 1995!

Despite that, I have no animosity towards the developers.  I’m glad the building is being preserved;  it became one of my favorite places when I filmed it last spring, despite its sad history.  We’ve seen so many promising projects die in Salem because we had to have them perfect when we could not possibly get that, that I’m glad to see one project go forward in this economy (which is not over the hump by any measure.)

I had a nice chat with the developers after the planning board meeting, and an invitation to stop by the construction trailer to get permission for pictures.  I’m planning on recording the project as it unfolds, and scheduling a site visit with the Salem Commission on Disabilities when the project progresses to completion.

Pedestrians and the new Senior Center

As reported a while ago by both the Salem News and the Gazette, the City Council has approved the Boston & Bridge St. location for the new senior center.

It’s a familiar place:  I lived in this neighborhood, on nearby Varney St, for 9 years from 1973 to 1982, and spent most of that time walking, to the old Crosby’s on Essex St., to downtown Salem, downtown Peabody or to the North Shore Shopping Center via the old Michaud bus (now the 465). 

I knew this neighborhood well.  Except for the empty lot of the former Sylvania, and the Walgreens that replaced Ideal Finishing, the intersection in the photo hasn’t changed a bit.

And that’s the real problem in the neighborhood.

Bridge St., and the one-way Proctor St. directly opposite it, effectively splits Boston St. in two.  There are no pedestrian signals, and only faded crosswalks between the side of Boston St. east of Bridge, and the west end of Boston St. past Dunkin Donuts.

There are only two places in the area to cross Boston St. itself:  Pope St., which you can just see in the photo above at the triple-decker (the old Witches’ Brew), and at Proctor & Grove St.:

Except for having modern (1990’s) pedestrian signals, this too is as it was when I lived here.

There is bus service still:

And a bus stop at the future senior center:

Some seniors think there’s nothing there for them in this neighborhood and it’s dangerous, so why should the center be here?

But, the AOH is here, familiar to many seniors:

And the Moose on Grove St., deep in the heart of Blubber Hollow:

I do know why Boston St. has been the way it is for years:

The Bypass Road.

The road was originally going to proceed parallel to Bridge St. past the B&M yard (now Salem Depot) and go down Harmony Grove Road.

My dear friend Leo Jodoin put his hopes on that, as did many in the neighborhood, including the Gallows Hill Neighborhood Association.

As long as the bypass road was to go down that way, the thinking went at the time, all the traffic will go off Boston St. (as it has gone off Bridge St. with the new road.)  As if by magic, pedestrian traffic never has to be considered!  (Back in the day, the state highway department never thought of pedestrians, either.)

Except for new pedestrian signals at Grove & Pope Sts., the signals at Boston and Bridge St. are virtually unchanged from the late-seventies, the last time signals were put in at that intersection.

If the bypass road is going in, why bother improving the intersection?

But of course it didn’t go in.  Leo intones on his show at every opportunity, “It’s NOT a bypass road!”

But that won’t change things.

He can say that on his show ad infinitum.  It’s his show.

I can’t.  Salem can’t.  Pining over the bypass road will not help the pedestrians on Boston St.  When the senior center comes in, this area will have to change.  It would have had to change anyway;  Sylvania is gone and Flynntan has long been a ruin. 

This is the last major intersection in Salem that’s unimproved.  That there haven’t been plans to redesign it is nothing short of negligence.

I wish Leo would want it changed;  it’s his neighborhood.  But there’s still hope.

A few months ago, I talked with Jerry Ryan about the pedestrian problems on Highland Ave.  He was very willing and able to get involved with the redesign that MassHighway is doing on that street.

Jerry, I know you lost the debate on the senior center.  I know I disagreed with you on that.  And I know I’m not your constituent.  But I know you read my blog.

I will ask you to please do what you can to see that Boston St. is improved for traffic and pedestrian access.  When the senior center and associated development comes in, there will be more pedestrian traffic. 

Help us get talking pedestrian signals like there are on North St.

Last of all, don’t take Boston St. for granted.  Toward the end of my stay in that neighborhood, I saw it go downhill when the factories closed and Flynntan burned.  Over the years we’ve taken that for granted.  The neighborhood looks terrible, but that’s the way it always looks, the way it always is, so don’t change it, goes the feeling.

Don’t do that.

Boston St. needs rebuilding.  It needs restitching at Boston and Bridge.  Your neighborhood, the city and I are counting on it.

Update:  The Salem News praises Bridge St. redevelopment but doesn’t mention Boston St.

Salem’s Last Road: How Salem Changed with the Road

Even after only four months, it is very apparent that Salem’s Last Road has changed traffic patterns in Salem.  It has also changed neighborhoods.

The road, centered on the new triangular parkland at St. Peter’s St., has divided the Bridge St. area into three distinct neighborhoods.

The first neighborhood is my own, the section of St. Peter’s St. and Bridge going southeast towards Federal and Church Sts.  It includes Ash St., the steep street between my building and the Unitarian church, and extends out to Washington St.

This has changed the least out of the three.  It’s more or less the same neighborhood I found when I moved into my current apartment in 1995.  Parker Brothers was demolished around the same time I moved in, and the Jail was long closed.

I have the same traffic noise I always have, and the train noise to let me know when I oversleep and miss the 7:05 to Boston.  Bridge St. is no longer the intimate and very congested street it was when I came, but is a full 4-1/2 lane highway.  I have mixed feelings about that. 

The sidewalk along Bridge St. was very dangerous to traverse in 1995, with the steep drop and broken fence at the old Harley-Davidson dealership at 234 Bridge St.  It is much safer now, even if it lacks character.  Despite what I first feared when the road opened, I have no trouble getting to Salem Depot on time for my bus or train with a crosswalk just steps from the door.

The second neighborhood created by the bypass road is really two neighborhoods.  The first one goes from St. Peter St. northeast, away from downtown, out to Winter St. where Route 1A curves south from Bridge St. to Salem Common and Hawthorne Boulevard. 

This area between 1A and 107 is very quiet with the new roadway.  Standing at the Howard St. Cemetery above the Salem Jail, you would hardly know there is a busy road.  The triangular park is a very effective buffer against road noise.  If the Jail is developed, its residents will find it a nice refuge virtually in downtown.

The second part of this neighborhood extends from Winter St. northeastwards to the bridge.  This hasn’t changed a lot, but it has subtly changed as most of the heavy truck traffic is now off Bridge St.  This is for the better.

Of course, all of the neighborhoods I’ve talked about are connected by a very nice bikepath which has gotten rave reviews by most who have walked it, myself included.

The third and last neighborhood, unfortunately, is not really a neighborhood at all.  It is the saddest example of development anywhere in the city.

It is the Jefferson, stretching north from Salem Depot, along the old Parker Brothers property out to Howard St. on the southbound lane of Bridge St.  It is nine apartment buildings cut neatly in half by the bypass road.  For all intents and purposes, the Jefferson is almost completely isolated from the rest of the city by Bridge St. and the bypass road, especially buildings 5 through 9 on the Howard St. side which make a tight triangle isolated from every other neighboring street.

The fault is entirely on former mayor Stan Usovicz’s shoulders.

As much as I opposed the routing of the road, I can forgive that and I can probably even accept it now. 

But the process that led to a fly-by-night developer erecting cheap and probably dangerous buildings was one of the worst things to happen to Salem since the old Depot was demolished.

There were many many possibilities for development, even with the routing of the road that was selected.  It was rumored a hotel chain was interested—the bypass road would have been a boon for them!  There was talk about building the courthouse complex there.  Imagine no over-sensitive neighbors to complain (I certainly wouldn’t have!)  Imagine reusing part of the Parker Brothers complex for offices or even an inn!

But no, Stan did what was cheapest and quickest.  People in the Jefferson are cursing;  I have already had comments in my blog about the noise that Jefferson dwellers experience from the road.  Someday, some child trying to get to his friend’s house across the road will be killed.  One hopes there won’t be a fire as there was at the complex in Peabody.

That poor decision to develop is responsible for all the ills that the road has caused in Salem.   The road could have been better, but it hasn’t turned out to be the nightmare I feared it would be.  The Jefferson, on the other hand, is different.

Stan Usovicz needs to admit to his culpability.  If more retired officials thought about what their decisions meant to Salem, 10, 20 years down the road or longer, they might have made better decisions.  Perhaps we would demand—and have—better officials.

Who knows, the Old Salem Depot and Leslie’s Retreat Bridge might be still with us.  And we might have had a great development on Bridge St. making money for the city.

Instead of crapbox apartments hemmed in by a highway.

Downtown Salem named A Top Ten Neighborhood: Last Gasp of Gentrification?

As has been widely reported in the News, and the Gazette, the American Planning Association has named Downtown Salem as one of its Top Ten Neighborhoods:

One of colonial America's most storied towns, downtown Salem, Massachusetts, blends 17th century history and architecture with a 21st century pace and liveliness. The neighborhood's picturesque Common, eccentric street grid, and profusion of archetypal old houses belie a humming, mixed-use district with dozens of retail stores, more than 50 restaurants, and 400 newly built residences.

Given the neighborhood's success in retaining its historic character while incorporating modern-day changes to make the area economically vibrant, compact, and sustainable, downtown Salem has been named one of 10 APA Great Neighborhoods in America for 2008.

To be fair, this is a great victory for Kim Driscoll.  Three years ago, Mrs. Driscoll was the assistant city manager in Chelsea, the once-troubled small city just north of downtown Boston.  In the 1980’s, Chelsea was in state receivership, but starting in the 90’s, the city gentrified at a fierce pace.

Driscoll had to have wanted that for her city of Salem. 

Indeed, during one mayoral debate, Driscoll bragged about the steep rise in property values in Chelsea, at the time the city was listed as the 2nd highest increase in values for a town in the Commonwealth.  Her opponent, Kevin Harvey, was less positive about this fact, saying that it was a list he didn’t want Salem to be on.

And now Kim has it.  She has the steep rise in property values in downtown.  She has, in her city, $300K condos named after Hawthorne.   Even my ward councilor is caught up in the gentrification wave with his support of the Salem Jail redevelopment.

We make our money downtown from “history”, tourists and ever elevating property values, rather than the industry and business of years past.

Salem celebrated this honor in a ceremony this past Wednesday with our state rep Keenan, state senator Berry and Congressman Tierney.

I wasn’t invited.

I’ve lived downtown for 13 years.

People at the ceremony were given T-shirts (“Downtown Salem/I Live Here!”)

I don’t have one.

I’m slighted.  Snubbed.

This Top Ten Neighborhood honor is not for the long-time citizens who have quietly worked for Salem’s benefit, but more for the up-and-coming dynamic individuals who can pull down $500K mortgages for tiny condos. 

Kim, the Council and the administration got their wish.  So too did the condo owners.

But what will happen to them in an economic collapse?  What will happen to us, when we can’t make money out of churning property values and Halloween visitors?

If your condo is foreclosed upon, will the same city officials who feted you, return your calls?

One last quote:

Other signs that downtown Salem no longer is just a draw for tourists, says former city planning director Bill Luster, who has lived downtown for several years, are the neighbors he sees when walking his dog, going to the drugstore, or doing other everyday errands. "There's definitely a neighborhood feel to downtown now," he said.

I’ve been around, Mr. Luster. 

Where were you?

Salem’s Last Road: Moving on

I’ve gotten a flurry of comments on the bypass road, all of them critical of the road and its impact.  I don’t usually respond to comments in the comments, figuring it’s a place for the readers  (and also that it’s hard to have a good dialogue in the comments, the way most blogs are set up.)

But one person (anonymous) assured me I had “no idea” of the traffic noise of the new bypass road at their residence.

Try me.

I took this video at the corner of St. Peter and Bridge, outside my apartment.  You can see it in the image that starts this post;  it is the pinkish-red building in the foreground.

I definitely hear traffic.  I hear trains.   I hear the “jake brakes” of large trucks as they go up and down the incline over the train tunnel.

I’ve said before I don’t like having a five lane road between me and the train station.  The Howard St. side of the Jefferson apartment complex is a cruel joke, locked in by roads on three sides.   The $16 million spent on the road looms large considering that the new train station will cost $30 million which could have paid for completely by the state, instead of having to seek private investment.

There’s a reason I called it Salem’s Last Road, because the cost (financial, municipal and emotional) of any more new roadways is far beyond any benefit we can get from them now. 

The bypass road is Salem’s counterpart to Boston’s Inner Belt Project, the proposed Rt. 695 spur off 95 that would have taken 7,000 homes and irreparably changed huge parts of Boston and Cambridge.

The difference is that the Inner Belt was stopped.  It turned out to be the beginning of the end for highways in Boston (heralding the Big Dig’s last hurrah.)

The Bypass Road wasn’t.

We can argue over which Bypass Road resident is most deserving of pity. 

That won’t change what happened.

Remember, too, that the northern side of Bridge St. was never “waterfront property”.  The Boston and Maine railroad property was there even before current residents of Bridge St. were born.

It was a transportation corridor to begin with.  No surprise that the state wanted to do something more with that right-of-way, and in those days that meant car traffic.

All of those years that politicians lobbied for new roads to solve our problems have come back to bite us.  I hope the next time I advocate for better pedestrian access and public transportation, that the bypass road critics will take note.

In the meantime, don’t blame me.  I only documented the project.  It’s not like the News or the Gazette would have spent time on letting citizens know what was being paid for in their name.  Talk to some of the dear old cronies out there sitting on their butts, the old Representative or Councilor or Mayor Whoosis’ who let this happen.

I’m not interested in tallying bypass road pity points.  I’m moving on.

P.S.  I’ve forwarded the comment about the motorcycle races to Mike Sosnowski.

Salem’s Last Road: Kim Driscoll’s Remarks

Kim Driscoll speaks on August 18th, 2008 at the opening of the bypass road.

It was a windy day, and a little dangerous to get to the ceremony on the south end of the Veteran’s Memorial Bridge, as others have pointed out.

Remembering the original Bridge St. Overpass and Salem Station

[Old plaque commemorating the original overpass project.  It’s gone now, removed when the Bridge @ Washington St. intersection was renovated in 2006.]

Whenever a new construction project is proposed or underway, such as the bypass road and the courthouse project, many Salemmites recoil.  We think, why change things like “The Overpass”?  We look at things downtown and assume they were there forever.

Jim McAllister, local historian, reminds us otherwise in a recent Salem News column,  Jim McAllister- Road and bridge work a constant in Salem.  The overpass project of 1948-1952, and the new rail tunnel and demolition of the old Salem Station in 1958 were both more momentous—and traumatic—than any road project in the past few years, including the bypass road.

McAllister:

The overpass was the second part of a three-stage project to eliminate dangerous and congestion-causing railroad grade crossings in downtown Salem. The first stage saw the Washington Street railroad tunnel extended all the way to Bridge Street. That project got underway in November 1949 and took 29 months to complete.

The second piece of the project set out to rid the city of one of its worst traffic bottlenecks — the grade crossing at the intersection of Bridge and North streets. Traffic routinely backed up a half mile on North Street during heavy travel times or when a train was crossing the intersection on the Bridge Street tracks. On more than one occasion, congestion was so bad at the intersection that fire trucks heading for North Salem from downtown were rerouted through Beverly.

“The more things change,” etc.

It was traumatic for downtown, too:

The building of the North Street overpass necessitated the razing of the historic bridge that was the site of Leslie's Retreat in 1775 and the taking of 43 buildings located on North, Federal, Franklin, and Bridge Streets, and on Odell Square. Approximately 125 people were displaced.

[…]

Of all the buildings that were demolished for the overpass, none would be missed more than the North Street Arena. The rambling wooden structure sat in the middle of a block on the western side of North Street between Federal and Bridge streets, and had been an important venue for sports and civic events for 65 years.

 

No buildings were taken for the bypass road project.    A dozen homes were taken for the bypass road.  Three houses were taken for the courthouse project.  People are complaining bitterly, Bridge St. residents with good reason, but this seems to pale next to what the overpass project involved, and to what happened next.

A few years later, Salem would go forth with what many say was its most traumatic demolition, the destruction of the old Salem Depot:

SALEM — Fifty years ago today, 10,000 onlookers gathered near Washington and Bridge streets to watch the first train roll through the new Salem train tunnel.

It marked the end of a years-long construction project, referred to as the Big Dig of its time. The project involved the demolition of the Salem Depot, through which trains would roll down Washington Street and through the massive granite archway framed by two medieval-looking towers.

A half-century later, the memories of the project and the old Salem Depot are still fresh in many longtime residents' minds.

"Part of Salem died when they did that," said Tony Salvo, 80, a former mayor who remembers the old train station fondly. "It was a big mistake tearing that building down. The old train station was like a castle. It was a landmark."

As with the overpass, the project was needed to accommodate increasing road traffic;  the train tunnel was extended completely under downtown, from Bridge St. to Margin St.  People on Washington St. (and City Hall!) are well familiar with the rumble of underground trains.

The tunnel project had three phases that were carried out over the better part of a decade. It cost more than $8 million, and more than 40 landowners were forced to move their homes and businesses to make way for new overpasses, the tunnel, parking lots and the new train station, according to Salem Evening News articles from the time.

[…]

The prolonged construction throughout the 1950s dealt a heavy blow to downtown businesses, and the upheaval also frustrated residents.

"This was in the works for years and years and years. It was kind of like the Big Dig," McAllister said, "and people got so fed up with going to Salem that they just didn't."

The merchants never fully bounced back, but the completion of the tunnel coincided with the construction of the North Shore Shopping Center (the present-day Northshore Mall), McAllister said, which changed the way people shopped.

This can’t be understated:  The tunnel project doomed Salem’s downtown.  When I mourned the loss of Almy’s 25 years later, little did I realize that this had been set in motion even before I’d been born.

We are dealing with the decisions made 50 years ago, when the car was ascendant, the roads seemed to keep going forever, and trains were old fashioned and outmoded.

I hate loss.  I would have mourned the Salem Depot, the old North St. Arena, the Flatiron Building and all the other buildings no less deeply than others had I been around at the time.

But part of me is glad the Salem Depot is gone, as much as the rest of me misses it.  Had the Depot still been there (the tunnel project would have had to happen anyway), we would have seen no end of opportunistic developers, exploiting the Depot for condos, to make a quick cheap buck on History!

A few years ago, Mike Sosnowski had suggested building a parking garage on one of the old Riley Plaza lots.  No problem there.  But he suggested making it in the style of the old Depot.

I ripped him one.  On live TV too.

I have the deepest resentment for manufactured history, such as we see too much of in Salem.  I have even more resentment to making a fake train depot out of a parking garage, which would have been a bitter insult to people remembering the original structure.

Still want to complain about the courthouse?  Or the bypass road?  Remember, whatever I may think of the project, no houses were taken for it.  And those that could have taken the three houses off the state, would not or could not.