Should police power require the restoration of the
material, or just the appearance?
c,
In answer to your question, I don't know. I can see a movie in it.
Peter Fonda in 'Twelve Angry Preservationists.'
I am intrigued when histo presto becomes the sacrificial element in a
political scenario. In our local Long Island semi-suburban burb the
'oldest' building, which may not actually be the oldest building, is a
little timber frame structure along the commercial strip and on the
butt end of an always expanding shopping mall. Some folks were upset
that the developer was expanding the mall (it is a thriving strip mall
fully occupied and offering a whole host of business services and
employment to the community) and so they formed an historic
preservation committee to save the hut. The developer was willing to do
whatever the NY SHPO asked of them, could have been a minimalist
intervention in the interest of saving money, but the anti-sprawl
historic patriotic people kept at it and the whole thing ended in court
with the expansion of the mall held up for nearly a year. In the end
the developer prevailed, they went in with the guidance of a 'local
conservator' and pretty much ripped out 90% of the structure and power
nailed it all back together again, wrapped it, boarded over the
windows, cleaned up the lawn, put in a nice modern wood fence, and
essentially relegated the otherwise authentic historic building to a
career of social irrelevance. The histo presto group then melted away.
I suppose there is nothing else worth saving around here. Now, the
developer may have been set on doing that plasti-fabrication from the
get go, but I am curious to what extent they went over the mark in an
attempt to eliminate the irritating political problem once and for all.
Recently I see that the developer is tearing out a whole assortment of
non-distinct cheesy mini-mall buildings.
][<en
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