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North Main St.

Lova

By Lova
in Providence

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Lova Whistle-Stop

Lova

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North Main should be the Mass Ave of Providence. 5+ story buildings all the way to the lot lines, commercial on first, apts above. The pseudo suburb shopping strip is dead, but must be plowed with salt like Carthage via zoning (cant believe I just wrote that) or one good project to seed the concept for other developers.

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Garris Town

Garris

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There's a post on the SNA Weblog about what happened at the meeting:

http://sna.providence.ri.us/blog/?p=57

Thanks for the link. So all that Sears intrique and wondering, and it's just going to be a Walgreens, huh? Are they required there to build to the sidewalk line? I hope to be there at the April 27th meeting. You should enter that meeting on the UP-Providence Calendar!

- Garris

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JimmyGreaves Hamlet

JimmyGreaves

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Thanks for the link. So all that Sears intrique and wondering, and it's just going to be a Walgreens, huh? Are they required there to build to the sidewalk line? I hope to be there at the April 27th meeting. You should enter that meeting on the UP-Providence Calendar!

- Garris

According to the City Planner that was at the meeting, Walgreens will build to the property line in exchange for the city removing a section of the center island for left hand turns off of N Main St.

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brick Burg

brick

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i forget...are there trees planted up that far in the center median?

Can i go and take them to plant in front of my house if so?

blegh. Walgreen's. whoop-de-doo.

Are drugstores trying to compete with donut shops in this state?

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Cotuit Megalopolis

Cotuit

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According to the City Planner that was at the meeting, Walgreens will build to the property line in exchange for the city removing a section of the center island for left hand turns off of N Main St.

This desire on the part of Walgreens to get a curb cut was the only tool that the city had to force them to build to the street. Under current zoning, they are allowed to be set back, with parking out front. And it's not the city that is allowing the cut, the state is. The state could have simply allowed it and the city's leverage would have been gone. The state agreed at the urging of the city to deny the curb cut until Walgreens agreed to build to the street.

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Thom Unincorporated Area

Thom

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That's the next battle. Under the present zoning we have no controls but by using our contacts at RIDOT we got the building to the street line with a door on the street. I'm afraid we'vve used about all the leverage we have to get these changes. We will struggle with desing. The developer contact DPD today and we expect that the plans will be on the next Plan Commission meeting.

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Dan Hamlet

Dan

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Hopefully we'll see an atypical Walgreens on North Main. Their standard design is hideous with dryvit galore and a totally suburban look.

I doubt it. The one near Warwick city hall built in '99 took the place of a crumbling strip mall so everyone loved the idea at first. Then half way through the project, they changed the design to eliminate the tall windows - the spaces were each filled with a small tinted window in the top 1/4 and the bottom 3/4 gray paint. Pink and gray with concrete windows. I don't think I've ever seen a cool Walgreens.

They're an Illinois company, maybe Downtown Chicago has a nice urban store the North Main location can mimick. :unsure: [Dream On...]

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brick Burg

brick

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I doubt it. The one near Warwick city hall built in '99 took the place of a crumbling strip mall so everyone loved the idea at first. Then half way through the project, they changed the design to eliminate the tall windows - the spaces were each filled with a small tinted window in the top 1/4 and the bottom 3/4 gray paint. Pink and gray with concrete windows. I don't think I've ever seen a cool Walgreens.

They're an Illinois company, maybe Downtown Chicago has a nice urban store the North Main location can mimick. :unsure: [Dream On...]

My guess is that we get the exact replica of the CVS in Hope Village and that's the best we could hope for. actually, maybe a better comparison is the Walgreen's (or is it a Brooks) at the intersection of Charles and Branch. both abut the street without really being part of the streetscape, although the Hope Village CVS at least has the other retail storefront in it.

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CtownMikey Burg

CtownMikey

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Walgreens usually differs in every region. I work there and we see photos of new store openings all the time. per esempio: many California WAG have those clay roofs like all those McMansions over there do. I think the Hollywood walgreens has a facade dedicated completely to hollywood, as does the one in las vegas.

They usually try to blend in with the area they are building, some ugly and some nice. :( I don't know why some are so ugly though :( I'd much rather have a Walgreens here for Downcity.

http://www.johnnyburrito.com/images/picayune/walgreens.JPG

http://www.lvrj.com/lvrj_home/1999/Mar-29-...s/walgreens.jpg

http://www.continental-fire.com/images/Pho...greens180th.gif

http://www.wieland-davco.com/images/projec...l/walgreens.jpg

http://www.adkins-architects.com/images/front090601.jpg

I think CVS is more visually attractive with lighting, colors, and store layout, but I soooo wish that CVS were in Illinois and Walgreens were in R.I. They are much more financially stable and ethical in my opinion, and I hear CVS is terrible to work for.

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damus Burg

damus

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I think CVS is more visually attractive with lighting, colors, and store layout, but I soooo wish that CVS were in Illinois and Walgreens were in R.I. They are much more financially stable and ethical in my opinion, and I hear CVS is terrible to work for.

heh... got that right. They posted a technical help desk position, I applied for it, then was called by a recruiter who I told that I was interested. Since it was a "temp to hire" position I shrugged off the advertized $12/hr pay and went for it. By the end of the day the parameters of the job had changed several times, but I was still being led to believe that this was a technical position. I asked questions like "what are the requirements for this position" and "what would a normal day working this position be like" but got vague answers in return. I'm a semi-recent graduate, and I took some time off to attend to family issues, which I know probably doesn't cut it with a lot of recruiters who only see the long gap on the resume since I've graduated. With this in mind, I took the job at CVS even though it seemed kinda sketchy.

Lo and behold, by the time I show up to work (today), it's a non-technical human resource helpdesk position. Mind-numbing is a good way to describe my experience. I'd have thought from the pointless 6 hour powerpoint they showed us that they thought of us as idiots if it hadn't been for the immense stupidity of the trainers presenting it. I talked another guy during a break and found out he had been misled too. Truely terrible recruitment, did they actually think that they could trick us and then we'd stay? Or was our recruiter so incompetant that she didn't realize what she signed us up for? I turned down several interviews because I had this "job" at a Fortune 100 company. Right now I'm lucky enough to be interviewing with one of the companies I turned down for CVS on Friday. Stupid CVS, I'll never shop there again

Sorry for once again taking a thread waaayyyyyy off topic, but that comment and my experience today made for quite the coincidence.

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Liamlunchtray Burg

Liamlunchtray

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My guess is that we get the exact replica of the CVS in Hope Village and that's the best we could hope for. actually, maybe a better comparison is the Walgreen's (or is it a Brooks) at the intersection of Charles and Branch. both abut the street without really being part of the streetscape, although the Hope Village CVS at least has the other retail storefront in it.

I assume we would get the Branch/Charles design.

I started to type that I thought the only reason the Hope Village CVS was built to the street was that it was a retrofit of an older building, but then I found a picture of the Cinerama and realized that it is not in fact the same building that CVS is in currently, it just has the same footprint.

ctprovidence.jpg

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Cotuit Megalopolis

Cotuit

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My guess is that we get the exact replica of the CVS in Hope Village and that's the best we could hope for. actually, maybe a better comparison is the Walgreen's (or is it a Brooks) at the intersection of Charles and Branch. both abut the street without really being part of the streetscape, although the Hope Village CVS at least has the other retail storefront in it.

Thom said the city is still trying to get Walgreens to be more urban, and asking them to consider apartments above the store. But there isn't much they can do to force them. They've thrown photos at them of places where they've done it before, and pointed out that they plan to move into 333 Atwells on Federal Hill which is a building that will include a residential component, so there is precedent for them to do so right here in Providence (well, future precedence anyway).

Letters from concerned citizens on the matter wouldn't hurt. I don't know if SNA has formally made a recommendation to Walgreens on the matter or not.

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jencoleslaw Town

jencoleslaw

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oh yuck! walgreens is going on the first floor of 333 atwells? i actually hadn't heard that. I was hoping it would be some fun boutique or a pet supply store or something. I acknowledge the need for a full serve pharmacy however.

in other North Main St news, it looks a bunch of trees are going in up there. I've seen a lot of new tree wells in the last few days.

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Cotuit Megalopolis

Cotuit

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oh yuck! walgreens is going on the first floor of 333 atwells? i actually hadn't heard that. I was hoping it would be some fun boutique or a pet supply store or something. I acknowledge the need for a full serve pharmacy however.

Doesn't Atwells Ave. have enough fun boutiques already? :blink: Wouldn't it be nice not to have to go to Kennedy Plaza or Eagle Square for pharmacy needs? :blink:

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jencoleslaw Town

jencoleslaw

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Doesn't Atwells Ave. have enough fun boutiques already? :blink: Wouldn't it be nice not to have to go to Kennedy Plaza or Eagle Square for pharmacy needs? :blink:

dude, there is no such thing as "enough" fun boutiques. :) and yes, a full serve pharmacy (with drugs and everything, unlike the one at K-plaza) is definately needed. It is just that those walgreens are so seedy so quickly. It seems even the ones in nice neighborhoods get grubby and crappy instantly--they seem to have no PRIDE. Do we know if its going to be a real pharmacy?

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