wmrharris

That stretch (Sylvan to Plymouth) is scheduled for a major repair this summer. But for now? the road is just awful.

There are several spaces around the Breton and 28th that suggest a use (just west of Pfieffer dealership, and around back of Pietros).

Same place my in-laws went. But for HS, they went to Creston; it was in walking distance.

That's the old Baldwin Christian School. The school migrated to Mayfield, then to Creston (now Wellspring Academy).

Last week's issue of The Economist (July 25) features Grand Rapids in an article "America's Mittelstand," part of their special report on The Midwest. GR is held up as a model, citing Tim Bartik from the Upjohn, "the most successful intensive manufacturing city in America." The article goes to explain the region's German connection where Birgit Klohs gets a great quote: We're still a manufacturing centre, like the Mittelstand. The bulk of our success is in advanced manufacturing in family-owned, mid-sized firms in their third or forurth generation of ownership, just like in Germany." (Germany? well that's one reason for our beer, I suppose. )

Steeple belonged to Coldbrook CRC, a Dutch language congregation. The English-speaking younger families left Coldbrook to found Creston CRC. Coldbrook eventually up and moved east and is now known as Beckwith Hills CRC. I believe that for a while Schaafsma Heating may have used the building.

There's a little bit of it in EGR behind Grace Episcopal. The creekbed served as the path of the rail to East. There's still a bump in the road on Colorado, just south of Adams for the long-gone roadbed.

River City was at the corner of Goodrich and Jefferson. The building got torn down I believe for the parking lot for the Orthodox church just to the west. I spent many an hour in those studios recording commercials.

That Janet Jackson wedding would have been when the building was occupied by Bethel Pentecostal.

Formally, the job description is this: The City Manager is the Chief Executive that supervises all departments, offices, and agencies. One can think of the city Manager has covering three different vectors: internally, the task is to have the City government meet its respective goals, particularly the budgetary; second, the office overseas the interaction of the city government with the citizens of the City. Not only is the City one of the larger employers in the region, its various programs touch so many lives. Stated most positively, the Manager then helps the build the City's social capital; or looked at from another angle, the job is to make sure that citizens are harassing the elected about missing services. Third, the City Manager will be in active conversation with the many stakeholders in the City and region. these would include businesses, non-profits and other governments. Equity, accountability, transparency, integrity -- these are all leading qualities for a successful manager. In his interview this afternoon, Mark Washington showed himself to be rather strong on the actual management of city business; he also demonstrated a fair amount of emotional intelligence (as one might expect from some one who came up from human resources). He looks like a solid choice. The internal candidate, Tom Alamonte brought many of these same soft resources coupled with a record of management within the City. The Commission went with the outside voice, but both were well equipped for the larger task of city governance.

Does that mean that their "downtown" project on 28th will actually get built out? One can only hope.

App has been quite invovled in the old City Water building, curating shows for the last two APs. I haven't checked lately with him, but at the time, it sounded as if this was to be his new space.

This weekend also saw the announcement of a Kickstarter campaign to reopen Gaia Cafe in Creston. Address is not mentioned, though there is a building in mind; closing is January 15. From the campaign, they've got bigger things in mind than just restoring the vibe: "With this amount, we will be able to transform the building space with an open kitchen, up to code bathrooms, outdoor seating, and proper parking spaces. We will also be creating a 'grab and go' station with a full juice and self serve coffee bar. " The ask is an initial $30k.

The Rite-Aid is part of the de-malling of Breton Village. It's not a new pharmacy, but the shifting of the existing one that once was inside the mall. Probably should try for a photo of the actual de-malling: they've ripped out a lot.

I don't know if this building has been referenced, but it's a nice infill just east of Lyon Street Cafe.