fix buffalo today

Vast neighborhoods on the City's East Side continue to disappear as residential structures are vacated, demolished and dumped in landfills. The commercial fabric along some of the City's great streets is carted away too. fixBuffalo readers may remember a series of posts involving a City owned building at 669 Genesee Street. The view from 669's roof has been this blog's banner photo from the beginning Another iconic commercial structure at 311 Genesee was demolished in August.

Walking and shooting Genesee Street over a period of time has revealed additional changes. This collection of mixed use buildings near the intersection of Leslie and May Streets has been home to various retail establishments over the years including a very cool bbq joint that was situated in the unique corner spot here at May and Genesee.
The same perspective from Leslie Street a few months later reveals how quickly the mixed use fabric of residential and commercial buildings is disappearing.
While a google flyover of the City's East Side shows the ever increasingly larger urban prairie from the comfort of a laptop, walking the neighborhoods reveals the true level of the disaster City residents face on a daily basis. The hollowing out of neighborhoods and the disappearance of the City's commercial fabric is palpable. Structures that are here today are literally gone tomorrow. The pace of disappearance and the transformation of the City's streetscapes seems to be accelerating. Perhaps next year's new Census data will reveal the true nature of the changes. Economic development still seems lop sided and tilted towards non-strategic housing development and what keeps people in Buffalo and in their homes - job creation - is an after thought.

Additional pics are being collected on a regular basis in this Genesee Street flickr series.

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

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Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

This is one of the 16 BMHA buildings that will be demolished.

Check out the City Honors archive for additional information and new pics.

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

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Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

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Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

The long awaited reconstruction of the playing fields, facilities and running track at Johnny B. Wiley is still on schedule and is expected to be completed next Spring. The two million dollar project includes a number of upgrades to the facilities at the site of the former War Memorial Stadium.

Re-pitched with new draining systems, the football field was covered with artificial turf this past week. New goal posts were installed.
See Part I - additional updates to follow.

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

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Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

See the Kaleida Archive for additional information and posts.

Construction updates to follow in the coming months.

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

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Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

Late last week four heritage properties that appeared on the City's list for the annual tax foreclosure sale were profiled - links to four posts - and by 1pm today the auction results were known.

• St. Matthew's on East Ferry was redeemed at the eleventh hour and never made it to the auction block.

• Sacred Heart on Emslie opened at $15k, no one bid and was adjourned.

• Ahavath Sholem Temple on Jefferson opened at $15.5K with one bidder who later defaulted for not paying a deposit. It was later reopened and after no one bid it was adjourned.

• The Pierce Arrow Power House on Elmwood opened at $35K, no one bid and was also adjourned.
  

When an auction item is adjourned the property remains in the possession of the same individual or entity as it was prior to the auction. A number of veteran auction observers, seasoned local investors and neighborhood activists mentioned that they'd never seen so many properties on the City's in rem list. When asked if they'd thought it was a good idea that so many properties were 'adjourned' - when the City had the opportunity to take possession of the properties - answers were mixed. In the past the City would typically take possession of a property and either demolish or sell it.

This year it appears as though the City is simply postponing the inevitable; the demolition of 1000's of additional structures. While there were a number of residential properties, real gems, ready for renovation - an overwhelming number of these houses were actually demo candidates. The message is clear. If you own a property - run it into the ground - and default on your taxes, there's no consequence. For large parts of the City's East Side, the promise of a bulldozer coming down the street was just postponed, indefinitely.

The future of these four heritage properties - absent a responsible level of interest and investment - remains uncertain.

There were two related Buffalo News articles that appeared this morning. Church Sales spur Debate - already has a growing comment stream and mentions Transfiguration Church on Sycamore Street as the poster child of Diocesan neglect. Here's the Transfiguration Archive - a frequent subject of posting here at fixBuffalo - for additional information and amazing pictures. Brian Meyer has this story about the City's foreclosure auction.

The auction continues tomorrow.

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

__________________________________________________________________________
Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

__________________________________________________________________________
Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

The Power House of the Pierce Arrow Motor Car Company was built in 1911. Symbol of the Machine Age, master work of America's best known industrial architect, Albert Kahn, and representation of the muscularity of buffalo's manufacturing economy, it is now up for auction. The Power House is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is ready for the kind of investment that New York State Rehabilitation Tax Credit has made possible.
The world's first integrated automobile factory - where raw materials came in and finished automobiles rolled out - the Pierce Arrow Motor Car Company, according to a reliable source, is one of the most intact early 20th century automobile complexes on the planet. The Power House is the capstone. It appears to be in structurally stable condition, with numerous cosmetic concerns. The interior space is one of the most compelling in the city, it soars four or five stories from its second story base, and the stack is suspended in mid-air by a steel latticework. Simply stunning.
Power houses are some of the most adaptable structures that exist. The Pierce Arrow Power House is less than a mile from the Albright Knox and the Burchfield Penny art galleries. It's located at 1727 Elmwood Avenue. The current owner has been in tax arrears for years and has recently abandonded the structure.

Check back next week for auction results.

See also - Part I - Part II - Part III - Part IV

The synagogue here at 407 Jefferson Avenue was built in 1890 and was once the largest place of Jewish life on the City's East Side. Today, along with the forgotten Beth Jacob Cemetery at the end of Lansdale Street, Ahavath Sholem remains one of the last vestiges of Jewish life east of Main Street. According to City records the synagogue was sold to Saints Home Church of God in 1960 and in 1982 Greater New Hope Church congregation bought the building.
The congregation had listed the property as late as December 2007 - see pic - with a local realestate agent when the property was still sealed. Based on utility records that were found strewn about the office last week, it seems as though Greater New Hope abandoned the place in 2006.
With a number of other religious and heritage properties on the auction block at next week's tax sale - that are structurally sound and in much better condition than the former Ahavath Sholem synagogue - the future of this place remains uncertain.
The pictures in the following slide show - Ahavath Sholem slide show - clearly show what happens when the wind, weather and water are allowed to penetrate a building's shell.
Make sure to check - City for Sale - Part I for additonal information about the city's annual tax sale and a link to the user friendly spreadsheet and searchable data base. City for Sale - Part II and yesterday's Part III include numerous pics and a profile of two additonal religious heritage properties that are on the auction block next week.

Check back next week for the auction report.

See Shooting Buffalo for more about this series and my flickr for additional pics of Buffalo, NY. I'm collecting this daily series of pics - here.

__________________________________________________________________________
Artspace • BAVPA • Woodlawn Row Houses • fixBuffalo flickr
Creative Class • Shrinking Cities • Saturdays in the Neighborhood

According to City records the congregation known as Witness Cathedral purchased Sacred Heart Roman Catholic Church and three adjacent religious buildings in 1988. Twenty years later the property - sans school, see the devastating demolition from last February - is now on the City's auction block.
The three buildings, situated on a one acre lot, include the church building, the priest's residence - immediately behind the church - and convent, both of which front on Watson Street. The Larkin Company's expansion nearby in the Hydraulics led to the construction of this complex in 1913 when the company needed a parking lot. The local Diocese sold this space in 1977 to a Ukrainian congregation. They reportedly struggled with the complex after a neighborhood propane explosion in 1983 blew out the stained glass windows. The current owners, according to neighbors, abandoned the church in 2007 and are currently mired in what appears to be an eight year long housing court case, according to city records.
While the Church building appears intact and structurally sound there were a couple dozen slate shingles in the alley between the church and an adjacent city owned house yesterday afternoon. Interior pictures over the years have been impossible to get. These two other buildings appear to have a few small roof openings, yet appear rather sound.
Here's the post and complete listing for next week's annual tax sale - City Sale Part I. The spreadsheet and database are user friendly. If you're interested in other religious and heritage properties on this year's list, make sure to check out City For Sale Part II for another amazing live/work possibility.

Check back next week for some auction follow-up and for tomorrow's post - the last of three heritage properties will be profiled that will be available at next week's tax auction.

While reviewing the City's inrem listing - story here - for next week's tax foreclosure sale, St. Matthew's Church at 1066 East Ferry Street is topping the list - again. fixBuffalo readers may remember a series of posts about the last time this heritage property was sold - here's the archive - by the City, at the 2006 tax sale.
A truly amazing space that's ripe for the right person to pound into a creative live/work space. The possibilities here seem endless.
St. Matthew's first opened in 1928. For seventy years - with the adjacent school, convent and priest's residence - St. Matthew's served a parish that declined by the decade. In 1998 the local Diocese split the property and sold the church building for $22,000 to a congregation that abandoned the premises six years later. As that congregation became delinquent with water bills and user fees, the City sold St. Matthew's for the staggering sum of $3500 (yes - three thousand five hundred!) in 2006. While the current owners attempted to sell the church on eBay a number of times during the past two years, deals collapsed.
If past experience is any guide for this year's auction - the next person or group willing to part with $3500 - with a cool plan in hand - will own one of the most amazing spaces currently available in the City.
Check back next week for the City's auction results and report about what's happening with St. Matthew's. Tomorrow, another heritage property, yet another church on the auction block - with some equally amazing buildings, parish hall, priest's residence and former convent included. Sort of amazing and staggering.