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Has the HPC gotten too heavy handed lately?


GRDadof3

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In Heritage Hill a perfectly restored 4100 SF house on a lot this size would probably appraise (barely) at $400,000-500,000.00.  On Cherry?  No way.  Still, it would take far, far more than that to get there considering the acquisition costs.  My guess is that it would take a minimum of $600,000.00 to fix this thing since it has been so mangled.  The available renderings all show them leaving it along, and going around it.  It looks ridiculous. 

 

There's another project coming on the trashed mess on Wealthy across from the bakery.  The renderings are horrible.  The additions look stupid. 

 

Part of the problem is what I hinted at before.  There is a struggle in the preservation movement being led by classical architects to promote good looking structures. They are winning the fight, but very slowly.  For decades NPS heaviliy promoted the idea that structures should contrast so as not to "detract" from the historic structure and district, so we would up with absurd looking junk that was out of place.  Even 7-10 years ago this was fairly current thinking.  This struggle on Eastern and (presumably) Wealthy are products of that.  The architects haven't all gotten the memo that strange looking, incompatible junk should not be designed, and Boards have not always gotten the memo that it should not be approved. 

 

Steven Semes is a classical architect/prof at Notre Dame responsible for a lot of the refreshing thought here--that historic districts ought to look good, and like we expect them to look.  He has won about half the battle with NPS emphasizing the "needs to be compatible and not absurdist" aspect.  I suspect he will finally win all of it with ".. and can look seamless to the untrained eye."  If GR wants to get ahead of the curve, we would let people replace entire buildings (if necessary and justifiable) or seamlessly add on and install a permanent plaque out front memorializing the history of the site.  We would all be better for it, and money ahead.

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In Heritage Hill a perfectly restored 4100 SF house on a lot this size would probably appraise (barely) at $400,000-500,000.00.  On Cherry?  No way.  Still, it would take far, far more than that to get there considering the acquisition costs.  My guess is that it would take a minimum of $600,000.00 to fix this thing since it has been so mangled.  The available renderings all show them leaving it along, and going around it.  It looks ridiculous. 

 

There's another project coming on the trashed mess on Wealthy across from the bakery.  The renderings are horrible.  The additions look stupid. 

 

Part of the problem is what I hinted at before.  There is a struggle in the preservation movement being led by classical architects to promote good looking structures. They are winning the fight, but very slowly.  For decades NPS heaviliy promoted the idea that structures should contrast so as not to "detract" from the historic structure and district, so we would up with absurd looking junk that was out of place.  Even 7-10 years ago this was fairly current thinking.  This struggle on Eastern and (presumably) Wealthy are products of that.  The architects haven't all gotten the memo that strange looking, incompatible junk should not be designed, and Boards have not always gotten the memo that it should not be approved. 

 

Steven Semes is a classical architect/prof at Notre Dame responsible for a lot of the refreshing thought here--that historic districts ought to look good, and like we expect them to look.  He has won about half the battle with NPS emphasizing the "needs to be compatible and not absurdist" aspect.  I suspect he will finally win all of it with ".. and can look seamless to the untrained eye."  If GR wants to get ahead of the curve, we would let people replace entire buildings (if necessary and justifiable) or seamlessly add on and install a permanent plaque out front memorializing the history of the site.  We would all be better for it, and money ahead.

 

 

Someone at the city said to me that neighborhoods are becoming very "twitchy" about widespread demolition of homes to make way for large multi-family projects. It's just called growing pains, and frankly, the homes being demolished are/were outdated and the only people who wanted to live in them HAD to live in them because they basically couldn't afford anything else. Even the LINC, Habitat and ICCF guys will tell you that some of the current housing stock has reached the end of its life, even in historic districts. They're just not worth fixing up and don't give homebuyers any of the things that people want these days (open floorplan, walk-in closets, etc), electrical is outdated, no real charm or character. People can rip on the burbs all they want but the homes sell for far more $/sf than anything in the city of GR, and builders can't even keep up with demand.

 

So one measly non-historic home stands in the way of possibly 40 - 50 new residents in East Hills: market-rate, higher than median income household residents with off-street parking. Nope, not good enough. Yet one street away an income restricted project gets tacked onto an old church with no problem.

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