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[Cotuit]

Long, but very good article on Pawtucket from this week's Phoenix

Pawtucket makes its move
Redevelopment and an influx of artists are adding vitality, but Rhode Island’s newest renaissance city still faces its share of challenges
BY ROBIN AMER | February 18, 2005

A FEW BLOCKS from Pawtucket’s Depression-era City Hall sits a veritable graveyard of decrepit old mill buildings, neglected leftovers from the days of industry. Nearby, downtown remains largely bereft of foot traffic and commercial activity. But right across the river behind City Hall is the biggest and most expensive jewel in Pawtucket’s new crown. Riverfront Lofts is a $15 million, 60-unit condominium redevelopment project undertaken by veteran Boston developer Ranne Warner. Ten years ago, the idea of selling condominiums in the $200,000-to-$600,000 range would have provoked laughter from even the most optimistic Pawtucket resident. They’re not laughing now. The project garnered the largest loan ever from the Bank of Rhode Island, as well as the first loan in the state from JP Morgan Chase Manhattan Bank, and Warner has sold nearly 50 units, mostly by word of mouth.

Although Pawtucket stakes its claim as the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, Rhode Islanders have affectionately (or not so affectionately) called it "the Bucket" for much of its recent history. The city has long been seen as something of a second-class citizen, living in the shadow of Providence.

Now, though, Pawtucket is getting a makeover, trying to revitalize and reinvent itself by championing the arts, importing artists, and promoting the redevelopment of its old mills. The architects of this rebirth tell a very Hans Christian Andersen-like story of a "gritty" or "hardscrabble" mill town being magically remade as a beautiful swan. Word of this transformation has spread, thanks to the buzz sparked by a series of high-profile articles in the Boston Globe, New York Times, and Christian Science Monitor.

The change is exemplified by a slate of artistic newcomers who have purchased old industrial or commercial buildings to use as their homes and studios. For example, Luke Mandle, the son of Rhode Island School of Design president Roger Mandle, purchased a one-story motorcycle repair shop on Montgomery Street, and converted it into use for his architecture and furniture design company, Two Ton. Graphic artist Kristen Murphy and architect Joe Haskett bought the 3500-square-foot Schaffer’s Furniture building on Broad Street, making the upstairs into living space and the downstairs into gallery space that the couple hopes to lease. And painters Gretchen Dow Simpson (whose work has been featured on the cover of the New Yorker) and Mimo Gordon Riley plan to gut two Montgomery Street properties to create studio space.

Several Providence-based arts groups have also relocated to Pawtucket. Right across from Riverfront Lofts on Exchange Street is the Sandra Feinstein-Gamm Theatre, a repertory company formerly located in Providence’s Jewelry District. The Gamm is based in a newly renovated building, formerly a garage used to store stolen cars. Next door is the Pawtucket Armory, which hosts the Foundry Artists’ sale every December, and which is slated to become the home of the Jacqueline M. Walsh School for the Performing and Visual Arts, the state’s first arts high school.

The pioneering spirit can be seen in people like Mike Maxon, co-owner of Narragansett-based Crazy Burger, which plans to open a location later this year in the old Newport Creamery portion of the Apex building. Maxon says he was approached last year by Pawtucket officials, who told him "about the plans with the condos and trying to build an arts community," and asked if he might be interested in being a part of it. "We kind of thought of it as [being] the first in a new market," Maxon says. "We picture Pawtucket as maybe being the new renaissance city, similar to what’s been going on in Providence."

All these factors suggest that Pawtucket is indeed undergoing a remarkable transformation, one that is all the more interesting given how much of American history can be seen in this small city of nine square miles and 73,000 people. Yet the official version of this transformation may obscure some of its more inconvenient parts.

Although Pawtucket has a lot going on in terms of development and new arts-related activity, it still faces the same socioeconomic challenges as other Rhode Island cities. Only 14 percent of residents have a college education, for example, compared to a statewide average of 31 percent, and the local jobless rate of 6.3 percent has held steady in recent years, according to the Rhode Island Public Expenditure Council (RIPEC). And while officials say arts-related development is good for everyone’s quality of life, it remains unclear whether importing artists and upwardly mobile types will impact the basics — good jobs, affordable housing, and quality education — that make cities better and more livable. In fact, with statewide housing prices having doubled in the last five years, the affordability that attracted some newcomers to Pawtucket is becoming more elusive.

IF YOU TALK to anyone in Pawtucket about the arts or new development, it will likely be Herb Weiss, the city’s economic and cultural affairs officer. Part PR cheerleader, part real estate connector, Weiss has become the unlikely leading man in the city’s redevelopment efforts. His job in the planning department started the week in 1999 when Pawtucket’s arts & entertainment district came into effect. With that, Weiss had a mandate — one he carried out with the tenacity of a really friendly pit bull.

Weiss’s hand is evident in all of the previously mentioned projects, and he makes it his business to bend over backward to help artists and arts organizations. "It’s all about customer service," he says. "What we try to do is ratchet up the quality of customer service that an artist or an art group should get. When other communities start rolling out the red carpet too, we’ll just make our carpet plusher." When the performance café Stone Soup relocated to Pawtucket from Providence, for example, Weiss sent a DPW crew to move 200 chairs from the old location. When a team of filmmakers wanted to shoot a zombie flick downtown, Weiss helped clear the streets, reroute traffic, and arranged for one of the city’s fire trucks to appear in the film. He did so much that the film crew made him their production manager. He’s just that type of guy.

When newcomers talk about what drew them to Pawtucket, Weiss and the city’s outgoing approach usually tops the list. Architect Joe Haskett (whose new home and studio were featured in an arts section-front piece in the New York Times last summer) is one of many who will testify to Weiss’s accessibility and willingness to lend a hand. "Anytime we have a problem," Haskett says, "we call Herb, or we call [planning director] Mike Cassidy." And the city is ready to help. About Pawtucket, Haskett says, "There’s this buzz going on."

Of course, price is an equally important consideration, and Pawtucket has proved a cheap and attractive option for many artists and business owners. Rick Roth moved his silk-screening business, Mirror Image, from Cambridge five years ago, and he says his mortgage on a building in Pawtucket is about the same as rent for a 10,000-square-foot space in Cambridge, which quadrupled when he left. "It was ridiculous," Roth says. "I couldn’t buy a parking space [in Boston] for what I bought a building for. Boston is all turning into lawyers’ offices or lofts."

But as Cassidy, director of Pawtucket’s Department of Planning & Redevelopment, put it, "It only took us 20 years to be an overnight success." The Parkin Yarn building on the western end of downtown is a good example of how long it can take things to come together. Over the course of 40 years, city planners raised several possibilities for the five-story, 39,000-square-foot mill building — all of which went nowhere because of financing problems or a lack of parking. Finally, in the ’90s the Pawtucket Redevelopment Agency acquired land surrounding the building and rerouted two adjacent streets to provide parking before putting the building up for sale for a dollar. A team consisting of architect Peter Gill Case and construction magnate George Potsidis purchased it, and is remaking the structure as Bayley Lofts. Five of the project’s 25 units are being subsidized through federal HOME funds, and the majority will sell for under $200,000.

But Pawtucket is still working out the kinks of attracting development. The question of what carrots should be offered to developers, and how generous they should be, has become more important with growing interest in the city. One part of the debate is over tax stabilization, and whether the city should adopt consistent criteria, rather than its current case-by-case approach, when offering the oft-used incentive to developers and rehabbers.

In January, the City Council voted, five to four, to award Bayley Street Lofts a three-year property tax stabilization. But the city awarded a 10-year tax stabilization to the Riverfront Lofts project, and there was some indication the council may have regretted its generosity. After consulting with city officials on application plan, Bayley’s Peter Case says Cassidy advised him, " ‘Look, if you go for the 10-year plan that Ranne [Warner] asked for, you’re not going to get it.’ So I submitted a five-year plan, and lo and behold, the mayor submits a three-year plan."

In a letter submitted to Council President Don Grebien the night of the tax stabilization hearings, Rich Davis of the Pawtucket Foundation urged the council to "develop a clear policy to encourage development of the so-called ‘live/work spaces’ which are a key element of an economic development strategy for our city." Grebien says he plans to set up a task force to study the issue.

The fate of Pawtucket’s historic early 20th century train station, located on the Central Falls line and closed since the late ’50s, also has important implications for the city’s future. In an attempt to plug Pawtucket into a transit network that could strengthen the city’s place in the regional economy, the Pawtucket Foundation is leading efforts to renovate and reopen the station, connecting it with the MBTA in the north, and T.F. Green Airport to the south. Last year, a study commissioned by the foundation found that a Pawtucket MBTA stop would bring 1000 daily riders into the Boston metro area.

Efforts to revive the train station, however, could be scrapped by SMPO Properties, a Memphis developer, which has an agreement with property owner Jean Vitali to purchase and redevelop the site. According to the Times of Pawtucket, plans call for demolishing the train station, doing new commercial and residential development, and reestablishing rail service later on. The Pawtucket Foundation has advised Pawtucket to seize the train station by eminent domain, saying, "The city should acquire the site, to determine what happens, how it happens, what the timeline is. You see how hard cities our size or smaller get positioned to get hooked up to this. You only get a shot like this every century or so. This is our shot."

(Continued...)

[Cotuit]

IN 1789, JOHN SLATER, an Englishman with industry connections and technical know-how, broke the British ban on exporting technology to the colonies by sneaking through customs while disguised as a farmer. Thanks to Moses Brown, Slater ended up in Rhode Island, and in 1793, the duo built a cotton-processing mill on the banks of the Blackstone River, at the site where the falls stop the tidewater coming in from the ocean.

Development spread rapidly along the Blackstone. By 1844, there were 94 cotton factories lining the 50 miles of riverfront between Pawtucket and Worcester. According to one account, it became "the best harnessed river in the US." Textiles, described by Rick Greenwood of the Rhode Island Historical Preservation & Heritage Commission as "a whole ecosystem," were at the center of the industry. There were mills that made thread and others that fashioned spools to wind it on. There were mills that dyed, bleached, and finished, and mills that braided, knitted, and stitched. All this industry meant that the city was somewhat of a business incubator, and a center of technological development. "You could find people who could do things," says Greenwood. "It was a magnet for mechanically minded people, because there were jobs there."

Unlike Providence, which also had banking and mercantile interests, Greenwood says Pawtucket "gave itself over almost entirely to industry." The mills remain right in the downtown, spreading outward from the city center. A photo taken of downtown Pawtucket in 1904 shows an area densely developed right up to the riverfront, with factories, churches, and multi-story houses. The steeple of Pawtucket’s First Baptist Church is visible towering over the city, along with the smokestacks of several mill buildings.

If you go to downtown Pawtucket today, things look very different. The economic and physical landscape changed most dramatically in the last 50 years of the 20th century, a time when, as Greenwood puts it, "dense urban industrial centers were not favored," and industry took a beating. Two national trends implemented in response to the real and imagined problems of American cities had the most severe impact on the local landscape. The first was the construction of Interstate 95, which came through Rhode Island in the early ’60s and was completed in Pawtucket in June 1963. The second was the federally funded policy of urban renewal, which encouraged cities to bulldoze entire 19th century neighborhoods in favor of a "modernized vision" of the American city.

The results are most visible in the area near exit 28, where the Apex building now stands. Instead of an urban industrial landscape densely packed with factories, houses, and smokestacks, there are asphalt parking lots and the Apex shopping center with I-95 running through it all. As it did in countless East Coast cities, the interstate cut Pawtucket in half. (Lobbying from influential city residents convinced the city to alter the highway’s path to protect some of the social clubs and 19th century houses that can still be seen teetering over the edge of highway.) The result was the now infamous Pawtucket "S-curve," which some people call the most dangerous stretch of 95.

After urban renewal, the city unsuccessfully tried to inject economic activity back into the downtown, which suffered when manufacturing jobs moved elsewhere and retailers followed the highway into the suburbs. These efforts included a $1 million plan in 1976 to turn Main Street into a pedestrian mall, and reopening Main Street to traffic in 1982, in hopes that new bus lines would bring shoppers back into the downtown. But by then, it was already too late. Downtown was as good as a ghost town.

THINGS BEGAN TO turn around with a scattering of individual redevelopment projects.

One of the first was Morris and Phyllis Nathanson’s. In 1985, the couple purchased a 20,000-square-foot-mill, formerly the Rhode Island Cardboard Company, just across from the Armory on Exchange Street, creating Blackstone Studios, 12 live-work studios and condos. Although the Nathansons were basically the only game in town at the time, they pushed the Pawtucket City Council to allow live-work zoning for mill buildings. The measure passed, and other projects followed suite.

If how to fix Pawtucket was a question, the answer that slowly emerged from the city was "the arts." In 1998, Mayor James Doyle set up a commission to plan for the city’s future. Out of that grew Pawtucket’s arts & entertainment district, a 307-acre tax free zone downtown. (Pawtucket’s is one of six such districts in the state, and was second behind Providence in establishing one.) The city also brought in Northeastern University researcher Ann Galligan as an arts consultant.

When Galligan talks about using art to revitalize cities, it sounds both visionary and the most common sense thing in the world. She is currently writing a proposal on how Pawtucket can best continue its arts and revitalization efforts, and having worked in both Providence and Pawtucket, Galligan can assess each city’s assets and aspirations. "Providence’s main goal was to bring people back into downtown," she says. "Spruce up PPAC [the Providence Performing Arts Center], spruce up Trinity, get people downtown in the skating rink, get people downtown to the mall, get the restaurants up and running." Pawtucket, Galligan says, had very different goals, stemming from a different set of problems. Pawtucket lacked theaters and restaurants and other arts institutions, so there was nothing to be spruced up to get going again. What Pawtucket needed, Galligan says, "was to have people come in and fill all those empty buildings. And commerce was not going to do that any more."

The arts — described by Galligan as the second biggest industry in New England — were quickly identified as a solution. According to data from New England Council, a business trade group, there are more than 245,000 creative sector jobs in the region — more than in software and medical technology combined, and just slightly fewer than in the financial sector. Rhode Island in particular has more than its share of artists, and has one of fastest growing populations of artists in the region. This is due in part to the design community and the presence of RISD, recently ranked by U.S. News & World Report as the best graduate design school in the country.

Considering its proximity to Providence and its abundance of the kind of old industrial buildings favored by artists, Pawtucket seemed well positioned to take advantage of this trend. In that sense, Galligan says, "We’re like in Texas. We’re sitting on gold, on oil." Not harnessing this potential, she says, is like "telling the Beverly Hillbillies to sit on that gold, and go plant alfalfa."

Pawtucket also benefited from a squeeze on artists in Providence and dramatic increases in statewide housing prices, which made the city a home-buying destination for people from Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and elsewhere. And like Avis, Pawtucket’s approach of trying harder won fresh converts. As Jason Thompson, the founder of the bookbindery Rag & Bone told the development watchdog site www.artinruins.com, "The City of Providence wouldn’t return our phone calls [when he was looking for new space after the I-195 relocation forced a move in 2002]. We couldn’t get a meeting with anyone from the Providence Economic Development offices. After a point, however, we stopped looking at Providence." Pawtucket "courted our business by providing information on available spaces. In the end, we wouldn’t have found the space we have without [Herb Weiss]. He was also an advocate for our company when it came time to ask Pawtucket to assist financially with our relocation."

Tony Estrella, artistic director of the Gamm Theatre, echoes this story. In Providence, he says, "we were just one of many." In Pawtucket, the group is "much higher up the ladder. Here we can carve out an identity, which was harder to do in Providence." The Gamm is "completely transformed" in its new home, Estrella says, describing how the number of subscribers has gone from 94 to 1000 in the course of 18 months.

The way in which activity breeds more activity is seen in a string of more recently announced projects. The American Insulated Wire Building now houses former Red Sox pitcher Ken Ryan’s KR Baseball Academy, and parts of the complex are being targeted for live-work space. Elsewhere, Los Angeles-based Artiste Lofts LLC/Urban Smart Growth plans to redevelop Hope Webbing, a 550,000-square foot mill on Main Street, into "an artistic mixed use facility," with different types of live, work, live-work, and retail space, and possibly a performance space.

AS PIECES LIKE this fall into place, city officials feel more and more confident about Pawtucket’s future. "As people came into Rhode Island looking for places, we got dressed up for the ball," says planning director Mike Cassidy. "When the date came knocking and said, ‘Hey, do you want to go out tonight?’ We were all ready." But is Pawtucket really ready for the big time? Will the arts and new real estate activity be enough to solve Pawtucket’s problems, especially in the downtown?

Even with the scheduled arrival in June of Crazy Burger — the first new restaurant to come to the area in recent memory — and the potential for more activity, downtown has a long way to go. Most of the storefronts along Main Street, just a few blocks from City Hall and the Slater Mill historic site, are empty, save for a few churches and a diner. There is almost no foot traffic, and hardly any retail or services. Gail Ahlers, president of the Foundry Artists Association, says in a statement, "The arts scene in Pawtucket is thriving and growing. The SoHo of tomorrow." But Ann Galligan seems more grounded. "I walk around the downtown," she says, "and it looks like they’ve just had a nuclear scare."

Pawtucket lost two major downtown employers in recent years. After a cold snap caused its pipes to freeze and burst, the Registry of Motor Vehicles moved its central offices from 286 Main St. to the Apex building. Then Pawtucket Mutual Insurance went out of business. Cassidy says losing these employers was a big blow. "There were 400 people working downtown a year and a half ago; they’re not there now," he says. "We’re still working on how to fill those spaces." The loss also had a big impact on the few remaining businesses, Cassidy says. The Registry employees working in the Apex "only get half an hour for lunch, and they don’t come downtown. They used to walk across the street to the little restaurants that were there. Those restaurants died. One went out of business, the other one is really struggling."

Others can view the evidence of economic blight with their own eyes. Matt Kierstead, who recently purchased a space in the new Bayley Lofts project, says, "I see, literally in the 180 degrees that I can take in from looking out my window, vacant and underutilized historic buildings." Referring to the China Inn, he says, "You can get any kind of food you want downtown, as long as it’s Chinese. A big office supply store, Hill’s Office Supply, just went out of business. I could have walked out of my building and walked three minutes to buy stuff. I could have thrown a rock from my window and hit that building. Now I have to drive to North Attleboro to go to OfficeMax."

Rich Davis of the Pawtucket Foundation says the city’s arts initiative has opened up a lot of possibility, "but there is still a good chunk of downtown properties in transition between former use and new use." Some people think it might just take more residential development like the type the city is beginning to see before the downtown can attract commercial and retail services. With more residents, Cassidy says, "They’re going to be looking for book stores, coffee shops, interesting places . . . I’m waiting for my Starbucks!" Cassidy says, smiling and banging on a conference room table for emphasis. "Woonsocket got a Starbucks. I want a Starbucks! You need people with disposable income, and that’s what these [new redevelopment] projects are doing." Still, he acknowledges, downtown will never be what it was during its long-gone commercial heyday.

Pawtucket might attract more business and residents if it can sink its hooks into the regional economy, especially the Boston residential market (a story in the Boston Globe last year tabbed northern Rhode Island as "the new New Hampshire.") Could Pawtucket’s real estate market support a dozen more condo projects like Riverfront Lofts? "No, not right now, unfortunately," says Galligan, "[but] the answer is yes, if it gets that train to Boston."

The concerns of Henry Shelton, director of the George Wiley Center social agency, are a reminder that the city still faces a lot of problems that get much less attention than the arts. "Housing is number one," Shelton says. "And utilities are number two. Shut-offs are at an all-time high. It’s a major problem." Shelton says he has also been pushing the city to build a new homeless shelter for men and single women, but found an underwhelming response.

Meanwhile, the influx of people from other places, especially Boston, inflates housing prices and makes it harder for people who are already struggling. "I had a lady just come in here, her rent just jumped from $500 to $800," says Shelton. With the city pushing for new residents, the problem of rising rents isn’t likely to improve. "You have Rhode Island politicians in [an] unreal world, fantasy land, if they think things are getting better," Shelton says. "And if they know things are getting worse, the question is, what are they doing about it?"

When I visit Luke Mandle, he hands me a copy of the Times of Pawtucket featuring an article about his new downtown studio. The same page also featured two other stories — about the one-year anniversary of the Greenhalgh Mill fire, which destroyed the mill and 11 neighboring houses, and the lack of a homeless shelter in Pawtucket — that illuminate Pawtucket’s less attractive realities.

Fighting decades of American history and changes in the urban landscape, clearly, is no small task. Pawtucket is not the only city asking these questions, or going through the process of seeking urban improvement. Many cities would relish Pawtucket’s sense of momentum, proximity to Providence and Boston, and assets ranging from a growing arts community to the presence of the top minor league team of the Boston Red Sox. Those optimistic about the city’s rebirth say its growing pains are at least a sign of growth, and that the related debates show how people are talking. When it comes to revitalizing Pawtucket, though, this city very much remains a work in progress.

From The Providence Phoenix

[Cotuit]

Article about the Riverfront Lofts in Pawtucket at ProJo.

[Soren]

The former Pawtucket Elks Club is on the market.

What a cool property to develop for someone interested in Pawtucket. Looks like a lot of work has happened to it already.

[Cotuit]

Wow, that's sweet! Pawtucket has a restaurant problem. State law doesn't allow for a liquor license to be issued within so many feet of a church. But downtown Pawtucket is chock-a-block with storefront chapels. Restauranteurs that want to be in Pawtucket can't because they can't get a liquor license. I bring this up because that looks like a sweet location for an upscale restaurant.

[Frankie811]

Cotuit, on Mar 16 2005, 05:40 PM, said:

Wow, that's sweet! Pawtucket has a restaurant problem. State law doesn't allow for a liquor license to be issued within so many feet of a church. But downtown Pawtucket is chock-a-block with storefront chapels. Restauranteurs that want to be in Pawtucket can't because they can't get a liquor license. I bring this up because that looks like a sweet location for an upscale restaurant.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

http://www.pawtucket..._id=24491&rfi=8

[Cotuit]

Frankie811, on Mar 16 2005, 07:54 PM, said:

http://www.pawtucket..._id=24491&rfi=8

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Great article, I saved it. We could do an entire Projects thread just for Pawtucket.

[Herbs]

Here's an article about redevelopment of Pawtucket, using the arts -- Herb Weiss, Economic and Cultural Affairs Officer.

Pawtucket’s Arts & Entertainment Initiative: An Economic Engine Bringing New Life, Vitality to the City

In 1793, Samuel Slater constructed and operated the first cotton-spinning machine in America at the Slater Mill site in Pawtucket, igniting America’s Industrial Revolution.  The City of Pawtucket was the nation’s first industrial site and today has one of the largest manufacturing bases in Rhode Island.

More than 70 mill properties and complexes, housing manufacturing firms, offices, life/work lofts and artist studios are located with the City.  Pawtucket’s growing artist community was accelerated in 1999 when the City’s Arts & Entertainment District came into being.

Pawtucket’s art policy initiative to attract artists to unused and underutilized mill spaces is gradually transforming these properties.  Mayor James E. Doyle has received recognition for these efforts by the U.S. Conference of Mayors and most recently by the Providence-based Arts & Business Council of Rhode Island.  Moreover, newspaper articles have appeared across the nation noting Pawtucket’s efforts to save its old mill properties.

While the City’s arts policy initiative was economically driven, it had a preservation goal of saving used and underutilized historic buildings throughout the City’s struggling downtown.

In just the last few years, preservation of Pawtucket’s mills and historic commercial properties, in the City’s Arts & Entertainment District that encompasses 60 streets and 23 mill sites, has also occurred in dozens of properties.  Many of these properties were once vacant, but now are being renovated by artists and creative sector companies.

This is a sampling of Pawtucket’s historic properties preserved and now seeing new uses as a result of the City’s ongoing arts policy initiative.

Internationally-recognized restaurant designer Morris Nathanson and his wife, Phyllis, have breathed new life into the former Rhode Island Cardboard Company by transforming the 25,000 sf of space into 13 live/work spaces and studios in 1986.  Blackstone Studios, at 163 Exchange Street, was the first legal live/work loft sites in the City.  Over the years, artists and creative sector companies have enjoyed their spaces because of high ceilings, hardwood floors, open spaces and large windows.

As a result of the City’s six year arts initiative, the Nathansons are moving ahead to convert the remaining 25,000 sf adjoining mill into an additional 12 studios.

Next to the Nathanson’s mill, new tenants will move into Riverfront Lofts, a new live/work loft conversion at the former Lebanon Mill, at 10 Exchange Court.  The $15 million 110,000 sf mill rehabilitation project will create 59 live/work style condos (50 are under contract)..  This is one of the few remaining mill buildings sited on the Blackstone River.  Funding for this project is provided by BankRI with participation from JP Morgan-Chase Manhattan Bank and Bank of Newport.

Across the street, The Sandra Feinstein Gamm Theatre has moved into the vacant annex of the Pawtucket Armory.  The Pawtucket Armory Association, overseeing the rehabilitation of the historic armory will ultimately turn the site into 40,000 sf regional performing arts center. Next September, the new state-wide arts high school will open, with offices and class rooms in the front portion of Gothic-looking armory building that has been formerly the home of the Rhode Island National Guard.

Next to the Pawtucket Armory, the John W. Little Company became the home of Mirror Image, a textile printing company.  Owner Rick Roth brought 25 jobs to this 26,000 sf unused mill.  Originally labels and tags were printed in this mill.  Now Mr. Roth’s company silkscreen prints more than one million t-shirts annually, including the recent official National Football League’s Patriot Super Bowl shirts and Red Sox shirts in stores everywhere.

Michael Cronin, of Classic Display, purchased the R.B. Gage Company mill, at 80 Fountain Street, to operate his company which fabricates displays and signage.  Twelve artists are operating studios in 22,000 sf out of the 100,000 sf mill, that originally was used to manufacture cotton yarn.

Meanwhile, the Providence-based developer, Seven Stone Building Group, will shortly purchase the former Parkin Yarn mill from the limited partnership that owns it.  The developers plan to create 25 live/work condos in the 39,000 square foot five-story flat roofed mill brick building, located at 32 Commerce Street (20 condos are now under contract).  The historic mill property has been vacant for over 10 years after being the home of a host of manufacturers.

As part of the Parkin Yarn project, the City is providing $300,000 in federal HOME funds to create six affordable units and undertaking parking and roadway improvements for this section of downtown.  Along with this revitalization effort, the Pawtucket Redevelopment Agency (PRA) has purchased the former Old Colony Bank Building.  PRA will shortly offer the property for purchase and rehabilitation. This 16,152 sf property has also been vacant for ten years.

Since the beginning of Pawtucket’s arts initiative a number of vacant commercial properties have been transformed into live/work lofts and studios.

Richard Kazarian, an antique dealer and designer, purchased the former U-Pick Shoe Store at 9 Montgomery and converted the 2,190 sf space to a home/studio.  This historic property formerly housed the Pawtucket Progressive Spiritualist Lyccum.  The property had been vacant for years.

Meanwhile, Mr. Kazarian is also purchasing the underutilized Elks Club, on 27 Exchange Street, to bring it back to its former luster.  This commercial property was specifically designed to be an Elks Club.  Built in a Mediterranean style, the 20,000 sf well-recognized Pawtucket landmark, located in the City’s Time Square, plans to turn the historic building into artist studios, restaurants, and offer artistic venues.

Finally, Mr. Keith Sousa has purchased the 6,500 Gorman Furniture Company building at 400 Main Street.  The oldest part of this structure, dating back to the 1830s, sits next to one of the oldest City fire stations.  This property has been vacant for several years before being purchased to be rehabbed into a recording studio, live-work lofts and studios.

Architect Joe Haskett and Kirsten Murphy, a graphic artist, recently brought new life to the 3,537 former Schaffer’s Furniture Company building at 163 Broad Street.  Built in 1926, the couple purchased the property and created a live/work loft and studios.

Artist Scott Roop has also purchased the long-vacant former Hospital Trust Building with a later addition building built in 1946 at 216 Main Street, turning over 8,000 sf commercial bank building into artist studios.

Two Ton, Inc., an architectural firm formerly based in San Francisco, CA, also came to Pawtucket because of the City’s arts initiatives.  The company recently purchased the 3,500 sf former motorcycle repair shop at 49/51 Montgomery Street, across the Pawtucket Post Office.

Artists Gretchen Dow Simpson, Mimo Riley and Ray Warner, an architect, have jointly  purchased 75-81 Montgomery Street a 6,000 sf building that formerly housed a vending company, into artist studios and an architectural office.

Zaev Nienberg and Naomi Subsanik have recently purchased the historic 1892 Tool Building on 228 Main Street.  The five story, 22,700 sf historic building will be turned into live-work lofts, artist studios and galleries.

Right next door, a Washington, DC-based antiques dealer will close on Friday t purchase the 6,500 square foot domed building at 238 Main St., the former Morse Shoe store.  David Bell will renovate the property for an antique shop and artist gallery.

In addition, the Pawtucket Boys & Girls Club, created a 7,000 sf arts center in the former Fleet Bank building at 210 Main Street.  Among its uses is an educational teaching center.  This Pawtucket landmark now serves as the permanent performance space for Stone Soup Coffee House.

Finally, at 151 Front Street, a Boston-based graphic designer and website designer have signed a purchase and sale agreement to purchase a 2,200 square foot building, for use as live-work space and their offices.

Even outside the boundaries of Pawtucket’s 307 acre Arts & Entertainment District, the largest in the state, the City is seeking the arts initiative bring in developers to preserve old mill buildings, transforming them into live/work lofts and studios.

Central Industry Properties, LLC, a Warren-based developer, has recently purchased the 300.000 sf former American Insulated Wire complex, at 36 Freeman Street.  The developers will create mixed uses for this mill.  Targeting Pawtucket’s growing arts community, the first phase of this project, now called the Phillips Wire Company Lofts, will develop 28 live/work lofts and 48 studios, totaling 200,000 sf.  

A developer by the name of 545 P. Associates has reused the 145,000 sf former Chernack Manufacturing Company mill at 545 Pawtucket Avenue, and the 95,000 sf American Textile Company Mill, at 250 Esten Avenue, into studios for more than 100 artists.

Nearby, Rag and Bones Bindery creates handcrafted books at 1088 Main Street, in a 7,600 sf mill built in 1920.  In addition to purchasing and rehabilitating this property, the former Providence-based company came to Pawtucket with 15 jobs.

560 Mineral Spring Avenue, LLC, converted some of its 300,000 sf textile mill in the Lorraine Mills Complex at 560 Mineral Spring Avenue into space for artists.  Currently 50 artists operate studios in the mill with an additional 40 studios planned for future development.  These studios will take up approximately 93,000 sf of space in this mill.

Also, in the former Lorraine Mills Complex, a Pawtucket manufacturer is planning to convert 38,000 sf of mill space to lease live-work or studios.  The plans call for developing eight affordable live-work lofts, from 700 to 1,200 sf (from $600 to $1,200 per month).  Also, seven studios from 450 sf to 5,000 sf will be available soon.    

Finally, a California-based developer has signed a purchase and sale agreement to purchase the 500,000 sf Hope Webbing Company Mills located on 1005 Main Street.  The developer plans mixed use of the 1889 mill.  One portion of this historic mill will be dedicated to light industry.  About 200,000 sf of space house live-work lofts, studios, and performance space.  

While many urban industrial cities are losing young adults because of reduced employment opportunities, Pawtucket’s arts development policies are bringing the creative artists and entrepreneurs back into its old mills to live or operate a business or studio.

Pawtucket’s Arts & Entertainment policy has brought new life to the Pawtucket’s historic downtown core and throughout the 8.9 square mile radius of the City.  Over one million sf of space in historic mills and commercial properties have been saved, restored and are seeing new uses as artist live/work, studios, or housing artistic venues.

An Arts & Entertainment initiative can bring innovative and creativity into a community. Additionally, it can enhance the quality of life in a community.  As an economic engine the growing number of artist studios and live/work lofts can bring restaurants, create jobs, and attract tourist dollars.  

For more information about Pawtucket’s Arts & Entertainment initiatives, call Herb Weiss, Pawtucket’s Economic & Cultural Affairs Officer, at 401/724-5200; or e-mail to: hweissri@aol.com.

[Herbs]

Frankie811, on Mar 16 2005, 06:54 PM, said:

http://www.pawtucket..._id=24491&rfi=8

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

We are working hard in Pawtucket to bring in restaurants.  A state law was enacted that allows liquor to be served in restaurants located 300 feet from a church.  This law is in effect also in Newport and Providence.  The Pawtucket City Council will consider issuing licenses to restaurants in the Cityi's Arts and Entertainment District.  Crazy Burger, located in Narragansett, will open a second site at the Apex building in Pawtucket (at the former Newport Creamery.) It will be called Madhouse Cafe.  The expected opening date is June 2005.

[eltron]

Herbs, on Mar 18 2005, 06:06 PM, said:

We are working hard in Pawtucket to bring in restaurants.  A state law was enacted that allows liquor to be served in restaurants located 300 feet from a church.  This law is in effect also in Newport and Providence.  The Pawtucket City Council will consider issuing licenses to restaurants in the Cityi's Arts and Entertainment District.  Crazy Burger, located in Narragansett, will open a second site at the Apex building in Pawtucket (at the former Newport Creamery.) It will be called Madhouse Cafe.  The expected opening date is June 2005.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Welcome Herbs, and thanks for joining the discussion!

Some exciting things are happening in Pawtucket. Lets keep up the good work!

[Cotuit]

I took some photos in Downtown Pawtucket last year, they can be found here.

[Frankie811]

http://rhodeisland.c...rticleId=914717

[Frankie811]

http://www.projo.com...ts.26d0a16.html

[MikeR]

bloodyrocker, on Oct 27 2005, 08:11 AM, said:

Downtown Pawtucket needs something like this badly.   It would be great to see a quality bakery or restaurant go in down there,  even better if its a culinary school.

A friend of mine just bought a building downtown and is putting in a full recording studio and performance space/gallery  and talking about a cafe as well..

Has anyone heard any thing lately about the Pawtucket - Central Falls train station debacle?  Last I heard the people living right near it were all for a cvs in that area. Shortsighted sprawl lovers are everywhere.

For Pawtucket and Central Falls to have a true renaissance the train station MUST be put back into use.  My wife and her family hails from Central Falls, so I spent a lot of time up there.  When my wife and I would go to Boston on the weekends we would actually DRIVE RIGHT PAST the abandoned train station on our way to the Providence station!  I cannot believe that this urban area would not want to see that station back in use.  It sits right between downtown Central Falls and Pawtucket; a perfect location.  A CVS there, are they kidding?

[Recchia]

MikeR, on Oct 31 2005, 03:11 PM, said:

For Pawtucket and Central Falls to have a true renaissance the train station MUST be put back into use.  My wife and her family hails from Central Falls, so I spent a lot of time up there.  When my wife and I would go to Boston on the weekends we would actually DRIVE RIGHT PAST the abandoned train station on our way to the Providence station!  I cannot believe that this urban area would not want to see that station back in use.  It sits right between downtown Central Falls and Pawtucket; a perfect location.  A CVS there, are they kidding?

I know, if they need a CVS then put it on the ground floor of a possible new station/parking garage.

[eltron]

Recchia, on Oct 31 2005, 03:27 PM, said:

I know, if they need a CVS then put it on the ground floor of a possible new station/parking garage.

Screw the CVS...

there's a walgreen's two blocks away.

SAVE THE TRAIN STATION!

[Cotuit]

eltron, on Oct 31 2005, 03:55 PM, said:

Screw the CVS...

there's a walgreen's two blocks away.

And didn't they tear down half the town to build that?

[MikeR]

Cotuit, on Oct 31 2005, 03:02 PM, said:

And didn't they tear down half the town to build that?

They tore down Leroy's theatre to build the Walgreens.

It might be kinda hard for Pawtucket/Central Falls to have the renaissance Prividence enjoyed without some of the amenities Providence has, like a theatre and a train station.  Providence already took the Children's Museum from Pawtucket!

[Frankie811]

MikeR, on Nov 1 2005, 01:40 PM, said:

Providence already took the Children's Museum from Pawtucket!

In exchange you stole a theatre company from us and we gave you the DMV  

Edited by Frankie811, 01 November 2005 - 03:08 PM.

[Frankie811]

http://www.projo.com...x.177bc980.html