The building blocks for the future of Main Street in Downtown Worcester rely on its past.
Vacant spaces cluttered a one-mile strip from the old courthouse to the Hanover Theater, but their historic nature attracted investors.
The old courthouse, the commerce building at 340 Main St., and the former YMCA on Chatham Street each offered unique layouts for architects to infuse modern amenities with historic character.
The three projects combined will bring nearly 350 market-rate housing units into the corridor but are far from the full view of the city’s resurrection of Main Street.
Public art, retail spaces, a renovated parking garage and even the COVID-19 vaccine are all pieces that city officials hope will anchor the long-delayed goal of sparking 18-hours of activity downtown.
“You think about Main Street, Main Street, USA, it is kind of your front door,” City Manager Edward Augustus Jr. said. “City Hall sits on Main Street for a reason. Main Street didn’t look or feel like we wanted it to feel.”
While the Canal District and Shrewsbury Street are bustling with activity and foot traffic - even amid a pandemic - Main Street remains empty.
A sign outside Maker to Main welcomes foot traffic on Main Street in Worcester. The coronavirus pandemic decreased the amount of pedestrians downtown.
Some of it is due to the shut down of the Hanover Theatre, the DCU Center, Mechanics Hall and the Palladium during the pandemic. However, city officials envision Main Street as more than a hub dedicated to the weekend concert or midweek broadway shot.
They want activity to exist in the neighborhood regardless of events occurring at the surrounding performance venues.
“In some ways, it’s really going back to the future,” President and CEO of the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce Tim Murray said. “Because when you see pictures, before the automobile and before the Worcester Galleria was there and 290, they had a lot of apartment buildings as well as office buildings.”
Augustus envisions transforming the stretch of Main Street into an experience for residents and visitors.
Sidewalks have been expanded. The road repaved.
The city plans to install interactive art. A bench inspired by Esther Howland’s first commercial valentine, created in Worcester, will sit outside City Hall. A kiosk will be nearby to explain its significance.
Public art along Main Street in Worcester will include a chair inspired by the first commercial valentine, which was created in Worcester.
A monkey wrench bench, also invented in Worcester, will adorn the sidewalk outside of Mechanics Hall and a giant guitar will welcome patrons waiting outside the Palladium. Across form Mechanics Hall a statue of Abby Kelly Foster will mark where the first Women’s Rights Convention was held.
At the foot of Foster Street, a kiosk in the shape of a bicycle will honor Major Taylor, who won the 1899 world track championships as the first Black man to accomplish the feat. He was the black athlete to win a world championship in any sport. Taylor moved to Worcester as a teenager.
“When you go to a city and you see all this art all over the place, it communicates something to you, ‘Gee, this is an interesting place. It’s a creative place. I’d like to come back and explore more,’” Augustus said.
Public art along Main Street in Worcester will include a monkey wrench bench outside of Mechanics Hall.
The art, Augustus said, is meant to supply a sense of comfort to the area. Dark vacant streets, he said, can be intimidating. An influx in foot traffic, both from permanent residents and visitors, would welcome activity beginning at 6 a.m. and tapering off at midnight.
“You don’t see very many great cities that have great neighborhoods, but an empty downtown or vice versa,” Augustus said. “You need both to have a great city. Our neighborhoods are great. Downtown had a lot of work to be done. And a lot of it is in the process of being done.”
When asked which project acted as the domino to spur the spark downtown, Augustus without hesitation pointed to City Square.
“The mall was the 800-pound gorilla,” Augustus said. “Not only a physical barrier, it was a psychological barrier. It was the physical manifestation of everything that people were frustrated about Worcester - an experiment that worked for a while then didn’t work - a big shuttered mall. [They said], ‘See Worcester will never make it. We can’t do it.’ It becomes this big huge cross that you’re carrying around all the time.”
Seventeen years after the Worcester Common Fashion Outlets closed, scars from the Galleria remain. Restaurants like Fuel America, the future Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse and a rooftop restaurant set for 2021 act as ointment combined with housing like 145 Front to heal the area.
City officials are looking to use the same formula for Main Street.
“When you’re at the federal and state level, there is an infinite number of good projects, but there’s a finite amount of money,” Murray said. “The communities that are coordinated and aren’t fighting with each other are better positioned to secure that state or federal assistance that is oftentimes critical in leveraging private sector investment. We’ve been pretty damn good at that for the last 15 or 20 years. We’ve gotta keep that recipe for success going.”
One of the latest success stories included prying the Pawtucket Red Sox out of Rhode Island after more than 50 years.
When a brand with the Red Sox name landed in Worcester, investors took notice.
The diamond at Polar Park looks like a baseball field with grass in the outfield, three bases, a pitchers mound and home plate.
“Slowly, methodically we showed we could do things,” Augustus said. “City Square was a major leap forward and I’ll tell you, the ballpark, which some people love to hate, I think the ballpark if you talk to a lot of developers, most of them that have come have cited the team relocating to Worcester as one of the reasons they took another look at Worcester.”
Within about the next year the mile stretch of Main Street downtown will see about 350 new apartments. Starting with 118 mixed-income apartments at the former Worcester County Courthouse.
In October, the city announced 312 market-rate rental properties with commercial space on the first floor along the first floor at 340 Main St. in the Commerce building.
At the other end of the mile-stretch, the Menkiti Group is renovating the former YMCA at 6 Chatham Street with 24 lofts. It represents one of a handful of projects the company is working on downtown including 526 Main St, 401 Main St. the former Shack’s building, and 204 Main St., the former Olympic Trophy Building.
The former Worcester County Courthouse will soon house 118 mixed-income apartments on Main Street.
“These [projects] put people to work on the construction trades,” Murray said. “They increase the city’s tax base and have more discretionary dollars to help brick and mortar retail businesses. It’s kind of a multi-pronged strategy.”
Following the completion, residents living in those projects will need to eat at either restaurants or purchase food at grocery stores in addition to working out and finding entertainment.
The population density of the area should spark more investments.
Lynn Cheney opened Maker To Main, a local grocery store, at 328 Main St. in February.
“I choose this location for a multitude of reasons,” Cheney said. “The biggest reason being I’m excited is to see the changes that are transpiring. I’m excited to see certainly new businesses but existing businesses start to reinvent themselves and push forward.”
Cheney opened the doors of Maker to Main weeks before the coronavirus shut down many small businesses. Maker to Main, as a grocer, has remained open throughout. Yet foot traffic in an already barren area has declined.
There’s little doubt 2021 and beyond will carry an increase in density downtown, but small businesses like Cheney’s need to survive the present crisis.
“Our plan every day is just to survive,” Cheney said. “Just survive every single day.”
18
While Maker to Main remains the only option for residents on Main Street to buy fresh produce, Crust Bakeshop offers freshly made bread and bagels and restaurant options fill the area from Armsby Abbey to the Theater Cafe.
“It just can’t be residents and restaurants,” Cheney said. “There has to be other retail options for customers.”
Retail options are planned for the ground floor of 340 Main St. as well as the former Shack’s building.
The 1897 building located at 340 Main St. in Downtown Worcester could be receiving a $54.5 million renovation that includes commercial space and 312 market rate residential units.
Entertainment should also return by late 2021 with performances returning to venues like the Hanover Theatre, the Palladium, the DCU Center and Mechanics Hall.
A courtyard at the Hanover Theatre, which acts as a bookend for the mile stretch beginning at the courthouse apartments, should also be complete next year. The space outside the theater will provide a space for outdoor performances adding to the ambiance the city will add with public art.
The space will include a replica of calliope, a steam-powered organ that an operator could install in a horse-drawn cart, or steam boat. It will have steam that comes off of light spiral structures. Each tower will activate when a person approaches them.
A replica of calliope will appear outside of the Hanover Theatre in 2021. It will have steam that comes off of light spiral structures. Each tower will activate when a person approaches them.
“It used to be that we were a city that rolled up the streets at 5 o’clock,” CEO and President of the Hanover Theatre Troy Siebels said. “And that’s less and less true, which is great.”
The final prong of the 18-hour downtown is jobs. The coronavirus has kept many downtown employees working from home. Fallon Health alone kept about 850 downtown employees home as a result of the pandemic.
Synergy Investments purchased the iconic glass tower on Main Street in October. Since then, the company said and the office space in the building is about 50% occupancy.
Still, the Boston-based company feels confident in Worcester, specifically the downtown neighborhood.
“We’re long-term investors. We believe in the city and the building,” Director Of Business Development at Synergy Investments Ryan Chamberlain said. “Hopefully we are through this tough time in the coming months and everybody will be excited to get back out.”
Main Street in downtown Worcester will under many changes in 2021 with the installation of public art and an infusion of people with new apartments.
When the public can return safely to the sidewalks of downtown Worcester without masks and the coronavirus is in the rearview, public art will welcome them. A host of new apartments saturated on Main Street will add the to population density of the area.
With restaurants, theaters and retail shops, downtown will not only attract visitors but new life long residents.
“Those are the kinds of things that I think are going to continue to excite people and create a sense of positiveness. It certainly wasn’t here when I grew up,” Augusut “Now there are a lot of people, they fall in love with the city. They decide it is a place where they want to have a career and start their families. That’s awesome. That’s exactly what you want to do.”
"street" - Google News
December 06, 2020 at 06:10PM
https://ift.tt/39NlICM
The transformation of Main Street in Worcester to accelerate in 2021 with public art, new apartments and reta - MassLive.com
"street" - Google News
https://ift.tt/2Ql4mmJ
Shoes Man Tutorial
Pos News Update
Meme Update
Korean Entertainment News
Japan News Update
No comments:
Post a Comment