Springfield is leveling half their city for a hospital parking lot. In a city with numerous brownfield and vacant sites (some even closer to downtown), this cannot be the best alternative. It's like they're taking cues from Cleveland Clinic.

 

 

Sorry these pictures are lousy (it was raining), but they perfectly reflect my attitude toward the situation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

:x

Umm, have they ever heard of a city called "Columbus"? They might want to visit, as they're a few decades behind us.

Umm, have they ever heard of a city called "Columbus"? They might want to visit, as they're a few decades behind us.

 

Have you ever heard of being POOR?

Go to Franklinton or the Hill Top. Those people aren't just suddenly enlightened and given the means to rehab their house/prevent themselves from foreclosure by simply visiting Victorian Village.

 

Edit: didnt see the first pic with the site plan.

 

Springfield needs whatever development they can get. Parking garages are expensive. I doubt they could afford subsidies with a declining tax base.

Many of the houses are not all that rundown; a decent amount had new siding or paint. They look worse now that the residents have been kicked out and the windows are boarded.

Are these houses on the site in the area of phase 1,2,and 3?

^All but two are in Phase 1 and 2.

Vouchers?

 

Would be a shame to see 'em go. Most of them look like great houses.  :x

Sure Springfield needs development. But parking lots are not development. Parking lots are urban blight. I assume people lived in most of those houses. Where will they go? probably outside of town to some new sprawling apartment complex.

Sure Springfield needs development. But parking lots are not development. Parking lots are urban blight. I assume people lived in most of those houses. Where will they go? probably outside of town to some new sprawling apartment complex.

 

Parking lots are CHEAP. I think Springfield is one case where economic development should override aesthetics. Even if they had a garage, wouldn't they still have to bulldoze? Then you still have a lot of blighted housing.

Wow. That's really a shame. Those are some beautiful buildings.

Sure Springfield needs development. But parking lots are not development. Parking lots are urban blight. I assume people lived in most of those houses. Where will they go? probably outside of town to some new sprawling apartment complex.

 

Parking lots are CHEAP. I think Springfield is one case where economic development should override aesthetics. Even if they had a garage, wouldn't they still have to bulldoze? Then you still have a lot of blighted housing.

 

Cheap in the short run. This is a mind-less short-term gain. It just isn't worth it. More car dependency in a poor city=stupid.  I am I being too subtle?

"Urban Renewal"?  :-o The seventies were thirty years ago. Somebody please buy these folks a new calendar!

aww man this is such a a shame. what an impressive and unreplaceable variety of housing.

 

whats worse is i bet there is a lot available somewhere around there just a few blocks away. but of course no one should have to park and walk a block or three should they?  :|

Ugh, what a serious downer.  I'm sure the city is real psyched to see all those houses come off the tax rolls.

This is worse than Williamsport... These houses were actually in good shape. In Williamsport, the hospital acquired and bulldozed three or four blocks of older, but historical housing for their new "campus." They displaced families and built them new homes on the outskirts of the city, and they even threatened eminent domain to families who wouldn't leave. I haven't been in that neighborhood for a while so, the other day, my friend and I were driving around and we went there to check it out. Low and behold, parking lots. :-( This whole thing is so sad. Urban Renewal?? Bullsh!t. This kind of stuff really makes tears well up in my eyes, and they are right now. :cry:

 

This was one of the houses before it's destruction. The whole area looked like this when the people were forced to leave.

Oh yeah.. that is a parking lot now.

Sure Springfield needs development. But parking lots are not development. Parking lots are urban blight. I assume people lived in most of those houses. Where will they go? probably outside of town to some new sprawling apartment complex.

 

Parking lots are CHEAP. I think Springfield is one case where economic development should override aesthetics. Even if they had a garage, wouldn't they still have to bulldoze? Then you still have a lot of blighted housing.

 

Cheap in the short run. This is a mind-less short-term gain. It just isn't worth it. More car dependency in a poor city=stupid.  I am I being too subtle?

 

Everyone here is correct on a certain level. 

 

David's right about this being a cheap way to promote economic development.  Everyone else is correct that this is not sound urban redevelopment practice.  And I guess you have to understand Springfield's redevelopment history to understand why they are restorting to this "development by demolition" strategy. 

 

Springfield has tried numerous good urban redevelopment strategies that have gone nowhere.  However, its not the fault of the strategies, but Springfield's underlaying economic weakness that caused the previous failures.  Unfortunately, Springfield is a classic case of a wonderful urban architectural past and a current and future economic basket case that can't support it.  It's kind of a smaller version of Detroit or Youngstown. 

 

It really is sad that they've been driven by economic desperation to think this "development by demolition" strategy is their best bet for the future.  Time after time cities have demolished quality neighborhoods to clear way for future development that never arrives.  And then they're left with vacant lots or empty parking lots instead of a salvageable neighborhood.

:-(  :x

I don't know how property taxes work in Ohio, but I suspect the system is similar to Indiana's; the bulk of the assessment lies on improvements, mainly structures, with about 20 - 25 percent lying on land. Remove the structures, and the assessment drops sharply.

 

If the hospital is a non-profit entity under the tax codes, as soon as they acquired those properties all the property tax revenues were lost to the city. The increased runoff from paved surface lots will go into the storm sewers, often contaminated with oil and other automotive fluids, placing additonal burden on the city's infrastructure -infrastructure that is maintained with property tax revenue - and creating problems for the city under federal and/or state clean-water regulations that the city will have to spend money to address.

 

Increased parking draws increased automobile traffic, placing additonal burdens on tax-supported infrastructure and requiring additional expenditure on traffic-control systems and public safety.

 

Even if the hospital pays property tax, the assesment for a given parcel of land is usually much less when used for parking lots than when the use is residential or commercial.

 

I realize that Springfield is in a desperate place economically. It looks like they're faced with a no-win situation.

Just think... if the people who worked at the hospital lived in those houses, there would be no need for the parking lot.

Why don't they just build it on one of the many empty parcels in the municipality?

^Well duh, it's not "urban development" unless you tear stuff down. You know, like Cuyahoga County's previous admin center plan.

Sure Springfield needs development. But parking lots are not development. Parking lots are urban blight. I assume people lived in most of those houses. Where will they go? probably outside of town to some new sprawling apartment complex.

 

Parking lots are CHEAP. I think Springfield is one case where economic development should override aesthetics. Even if they had a garage, wouldn't they still have to bulldoze? Then you still have a lot of blighted housing.

 

Development is putting in something of greater value than what is there now. Yes, the hospital is important to downtown Springfield. But you can't tell me that temporary space for cars is of greater value than homes for people. You would have to bulldoze for a garage, but you would bulldoze a fraction of what Springfield is losing. And Springfield has a history of tearing down great buildings for parking lots and other less-valuable uses.

Does that sign seriously say "Urban Renewal"?  Sad...

oy.

Wow ... a horribly large footprint for no more than 2,000 parking spaces.

Its cool to be a member of a website were folks actually appreciate this old housing and lament its loss.

 

This reminds me I took a bunch of pix of mostly the same neighborhood...back in 2006.  I could post them and you could see this area, inhabited.  I might just go ahead & do that.

 

This area is or was probably the last collection of older working class housing left, outside of Irish Hill (which is also seeing a lot of demo).  The thing about this area is that it is just across Buck Creek from Wittenberg, fairly close, so one could see it as a potential student or academics neighborhood. This area was pretty rought in  spots, but the street many of these are on was not.  In fact there was some examples of people having done restoration work..

 

And its too bad to see so much go.  One can tell there was a certain local vernacular with those hip roofs and the way the built doubles.

 

This is pretty sad.  I remember these two, and they were not in bad shape.

 

 

And this dollhouse/hobbit hole was sweet

 

 

 

 

Springfield has lost a lot...there is no Oregon or German Village or OTR there...collection of very old mid-19th century things.   

 

 

This disgusts me.  There is so much amazing architecture here.  To throw it all away for a PARKING LOT is horrid. 

 

Please, someone tell me how people still seem to think that the automobile is the future.  It's most certainly the past.  Gas prices are NEVER going down. 

Maybe you guys could all pitch in 20 million each for them to have a streetcar. Or use the money to restore each of those houses and make them good enough for the professionals to uproot and move next to where they work. Shouldn't be a problem :roll:

I'm not in the medical field, but I would love the chance to restore many of those houses pictured.

 

All this demolition for parking lots makes me think of selling one's soul to the devil.  Sure, you get something that's useful right now, but your soul is gone forever...

Good analogy.  And those houses don't look to be in that bad of shape.  It's not like there was an ultimatum on the table that either these houses get rehabbed or torn down immediately, and then the hospital came to save the day by giving the land a use again.  The fact is that every neighborhood goes through rough times, but you have to hold on because they'll get better.  (Unless you completely obliterate them for a parking lot.)

Maybe you guys could all pitch in 20 million each for them to have a streetcar. Or use the money to restore each of those houses and make them good enough for the professionals to uproot and move next to where they work. Shouldn't be a problem :roll:

 

These people have a choice. Hospitals don't need to be built in sprawling form, let alone where a neighborhood used to be. They apparently have enough money to subsidize parking and expect everyone to own a car or two. So we should turn all poorer neighborhoods into non-residential suburban-sprawl to promote economic development and help out residents by kicking them all out and slapping a layer of asphalt on top of some one-of-a-kind houses ensuring that there will never even be the slightest chance of gentrification. Then for those low-income residents we can stick them all in futuristic towers. Urban renewal was a colossal failure everywhere else. Springfield is no exception.

I like the greenways that are winding through the parking.

 

I imagine these are belts of trees planted in the islands between cars, so eventually there would be these "forest" belts winding through the parking. 

 

It could be a cool design concept.  Or it could be just a magic marker diagram.

 

 

^Where are those pictures you promised us? :-)

I thought I'd update this...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I think the white one is still occupied, there were three cars out front.

 

 

 

:-(

This is the most despicable photo I've seen in a long time.  The fact that it's in front of such a beautiful house is the saddest form of irony.

 

What the hell?

 

Good @#$%ing grief. This isn't urban renewal. This is wholesale clearance that we did in the 1960s.

I read yesterday that Springfield has lost 46% of its manufacturing jobs since 2000, the highest rate among Ohio metros. Unbelieveable.

community mercy, eh? wow. it just piles on thicker and sadder.

The neighborhood is now gone...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Wow, powerful photos! I hope this new hopital is worth all this destruction! =-0(

That's really sad.

 

I've seen situations where hospitals located in poorer areas have bought up the neighborhood and have instead renovated the homes and provided them for young professionals and doctors working at the hospital.  Some houses are quite large like a few pictured above, so the hospital hires a management company to maintain the properties since doctors are obviously busy. 

 

Shame this didn't go the same route.

This is similar to Children's Hospital over in Driving Park which tore down numerous homes, the most recent expansion tore down several for a new building, even though there's plenty of surface parking which could have been used instead.

 

Then you have Mount Carmel West which sprawls over Franklinton. Both are in neighborhoods without sufficient economic clout, so residents get ignored. Both have tons of parking, encouraging employees to commute by car instead of investing in the surrounding areas.

 

Springfield is already a poor, shrinking city from what I gather, so why encourage more car-dependency, especially in this day and age with ever-less gasoline and a more volatile economy? Springfield has no excuse, as there are examples all over the country of what a bone-headed, idiotic project this is.

I am seriously about to cry right now. That first photo hit me so hard I could feel my throat choke up. OMFG. That is the most depressing, and angering thing I have seen in a long time. :cry:

This hits me hard because Williamsport did the same thing. I wrote about it way up thread. But this blows billtown's destruction out of the water. This is insane. I really hope they use that effing land for something that's useful. That hospital better live up to what they say. Or else it was a big, greedy waste. I'm sorry, things like these really irk me.

This really sucks, and what's worse is that I work indirectly for the company behind this destruction (CHP), but in a different region than Springfield.  I wonder about the site selection process, and what alternatives there were.  To add insult to injury, that new building is fugly looking and might have been better off next to a highway offramp on the fringe of town.

Yeah, talk about insult to a community when you tear down their whole entire neighborhood and the build an ugly-ass building in it's place.

Ughh.

It's a good idea, poorly executed. Originally, the hospital envisioned a suburban, greenfield site. But an interesting mix of urbanists and farmland preservationists were among those calling for a hospital in the city -- both to revitalize the city and to preserve farmland and open space. Great. unfortunately, as is too often the case, the reality was a horrible hybrid: A suburban building plopped down on the bulldozed remnants of an urban setting.

 

Mostly likely, the rest of the neighborhood is at risk, too. (Note comments above about Childrens and Mt. Carmel in Columbus.) Hospitals, universities and churches are among the biggest destroyers of urban neighborhoods, endlessly hacking away, house-by-house, at their surroundings, usually for parking.

So when the new place opens, the existing hospital will be vacant?  That's not exactly revitalizing the city...

 

That old hospital is a cool building.  It probably will be demolished?

 

Per Inks request up thread:  The Zone of Destruction in 2006.

 

What's interesting about this is we all get a taste of the old urban renewal era.  This was just a a few square blocks.  Back in the 1950s and 1960s they clearcut hundreds of blocks, entire neighborhoods, for urban renewal and interstate construction.  One can imagine the impact of that on people, both the residents and people familiar with the removed neighborhoods.

 

 

 

 

What's interesting about this is we all get a taste of the old urban renewal era. This was just a a few square blocks. Back in the 1950s and 1960s they clearcut hundreds of blocks, entire neighborhoods, for urban renewal and interstate construction. One can imagine the impact of that on people, both the residents and people familiar with the removed neighborhoods.

 

 

I don't think I would've survived the urban renewal era.  These few blocks make me incredibly angry.  If I saw this happening to thousands of blocks all across the country, I'll bet you anything I'd try to murder someone in charge and end up in jail.