Victor Tine presents a Ken Burnsian chronicling of these various battles as part of the Daily News' Port in Progress series. Here is Part One. Here is Part Two.
Coming back to Newburyport after a decade away, it appeared to me that the front-line has shifted away from developing the waterfront. Now the trenches had been dug on either side of the question, "How much Park. How much Parking?"
The idea of developing the parcels, to me, was dead. It's clear that lawyers were the only ones making money on development proposals.
But Shanley doesn't see it that way, and he says he's not alone. (Judging by the initial comments and emails generated by my first introductory post, I'd say he's correct.)
In our talk, Shanley noted that the NRA didn't seize those lots through eminent domain to be park or parking lots. Indeed, they were suppose to be part of the larger redevelopment going on downtown, a commercial connection between the river and Market Square.
I could go on recalling the meeting, but Shanley, in response to an email that Bruce Menin sent to both of us after the first post, lays out his position nicely. Why don't I just let him take it from there.
I was a very vocal advocate for the City spending CPA funds to purchase open space on the outskirts of town. This makes sense for many reasons, ecological and quality of life being the most prominent. But to save what must be saved, you need to build what must be built. Density is the other side of the open space coin. We have been kidding ourselves into believing otherwise.
Bruce is correct in his assertion that historically the waterfront was heavily developed. Its spelled out nicely in the study of Newburyport called Port and Marketplace (sic. I later learned its called Port and Market). Even though we are not shipping goods out of the waterfront, it still is a major economic driver for Newburyport. The trouble is that we have been viewing it through the lens of July and August. The rest of the year, much of what could be generating tax revenue, economic activity, and equally important, daily human interaction lies fallow. Car and dock storage is a very poor use of land that could be helping us meet our challenges.
What challenges? Well, money. The city is strapped for cash. Shanley says the city must maximize the value of the holdings we have, and the waterfront property is extremely valuable. A parking lot certainly doesn't do this, even if we ever did adopt a paid parking system.
As for creating a larger park, Shanley says the city doesn't have the cash on hand to maintain a park of this size. We have enough trouble maintaining the parks and playgrounds we do have. (I was surprised to learn that most of the playgrounds in town were built with private funds. Yet another reason to love this community.)
Shanley makes a great deal of sense. Yet, I was surprised this opinion still exists in our polarized political landscape, a rare third point-of-view in a city where you're either progressive or conservative; pro- or anti-override, or favor putting parking or park along the waterfront.
Shanley says many in town want a third option. He may be right. Perhaps that's why the city has had trouble reaching a consensus all these years. "There are many others (who support this idea,)" he wrote. "But they have been worn down by the issue. I intend to keep speaking out, so that maybe those who are at least willing to have a conversation about the waterfront being something other than a park or parking will feel safe to do so."
Next post: Is he right?
Also, you know we're going to have to have a poll on this thing. Warm up the browsers and dust off the mouse pad. Check in on Monday.
2 comments:
Tom and Readers-
I'm with James Shanley 100% on this particular issue; I am encouraged that this particular "third way" (again, evidence of what I consider to be pragmatism) can be brought back onto the table for a discussion; even if it takes a third party facilitator to break the idealogical hardening of the arteries we seem to have had.
I took those surveys, both times, with a skeptical eye towards the way the questions were phrased. Frankly, they never passed the smell test with me. They were clearly designed to limit the discussion to a simple binary solution, cars or parks; and I never trust up, down, yes, no framing of issues. Hell, buying breakfast cereal is ridiculously complicated; how can a City strapped for cash resolve how to appropriately use a valuable piece of property by suggesting that there are only two options- park or parking.
Give me a crack at writing survey questions that raise the relevant issues at stake- funding a park, the inability of the schools to find enough revenue to meet core curriculum needs; and whether some multi-use development of the parcels might alleviate these problems. When you remove the questions from the abstraction they were suspended in, and hose them down with the chilled waters of reality, I think you might find the community humming a different tune.
Mr. Shanley will not find himself alone in pressing for a real pragmatic community dialogue about this. To lay off another teacher, to cut another high school elective to create another downtown park, when you can already walk to three of them within fifteen minutes from Green Street; actually four, when you consider that no plan calls for the removal of the current park behind the Firehouse seems irresponsible to me.
Amen to that Mr Menin. More density downtown is a good healthy sustainable solution. Cities are more efficient than suburban or rural communities RE:energy use. We should think of Newburyport as somewhat 'undersized' By that I mean that our fixed costs can support a larger amount of variable costs, thus lowering cost/unit of service delivered. A number 'over 55 'residences on newly allowed extra floors downtown would be a net revenue plus for the City with very little incremental cost.
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