Niagara Falls Officials Look to Elmwood Village for Ideas

Isnt this the same type of story that gets printed in the Buffalo News once a week over the past 30 years?

Nice to know people like giving tours of Elmwood - would be nicer if we had things done around here as well- new crosswalks, lighting, commercial frontage upgrades etc....

I just read how some developers in Amherst are looking to build an "Elmwood-esque" strip adjacent to UB. Frankly, I think NF would have a better chance as, really, this type of community builds from the ground-up, organically--and is not developer-led.

The big elephant in the room, in regards to NF, is that a downstate developer has a stranglehold on a huge portion of that downtown's real estate, which he is currently sitting on--revitalization of downtown will be difficult until there is a resolution of that.

This article is such a coincidence because just yesterday I was on Wikipedia and I saw this article http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urban_renewal and it was about urban renewal. At the bottom of the page they had a huge paragraph just on the failed urban renewal projects in NF. I thought to myself, "How are they going to dig out of this? I guess this is one way but it will take years before they can recover.

the only area this would work would be directly north/northeast of downtown, but honestly they might be able to pull it off. (as far as housing stock and density) good jobs to draw in people with $$ however is another story

maybe with the Italian roots of the Falls, maybe they would have been better off examining Hertel ave for inspiration...yo, bada bing...cuz

Of course, if you really want to learn about how urban can and does work, you should read Jane Jacob' Death and Life of Great American Cities. She also wrote the lesser known Economies of Cities which better explains how cities grow and die and can be revitalized. Anyone who doesn't have a working knowledge of these books doesn't know what the heck he is talking about, so I hope that the NF people will actually do some research.

One of the points Jacob's makes is that urban renewals of this type usually fail. The reason is because when you build brand new real estate, the rents are very high. That excludes startups, small businesses, and local entrepreneurs. The only ones with deep pockets that can afford new real estate are banks, national chains, and large corporations.

Unfortunately, these types of businesses are the last one who would take a chance on a risky investment, and the very types that you want -- boutiques, independent restaurants, and so on, can't afford the rent.

NF already tried this -- back in the early 80s they built a mall, when every other city in american had a mall. It quickly failed.

Here's the real problem, and it's one that is common to all sorts of places, even Buffalo. People think look at a successful region and think if you just copy what they have, you region will become successful too.

Think of it this way -- suppose you decide that you now have a goal to be a millionaire within two years. How do you do that? You do all sorts of research, and you find that millionaires tend to wear $2000 suits, drive expensive sports cars, live in expensive mcmansions in spaulding lake and are always in the office from 8am to 6pm.

So, you go out an buy a $2000 suit, a BMW, a house at spaulding lake and you open an office and sit there from 8am to 6pm.

At the end of two years, you realize you arne't e millionaire, but you are deeply in debt. Why, you wail? You did EVERYTHING that a millionaire does! So you hire a consultant for more money, and he tells you that you missed an important part -- you have to actually start a business. So you open up a store. A year later, the store fails because you didn't know anything about retail, and the consultant of course blames you, and you re ever more deeper in debt.

You can't just copy what everyone else is doing and think that that is the key to success. You can't push a rope. Building a city takes hard work and it takes time. Go ahead and copy Elmwood. In a couple of years, you'll find out it's a failure, and some consultant will tell you it failed because you didn't exactly copy the light fixtures that make Elmwood a success.

Unfortunately, the entire City of Niagara Falls lacks the cohesive force that sections of the City of Buffalo has created in order to pull off such an accomplishment.

The fact that their own council members had to conduct a road trip to Elmwood Avenue proves that the mentality of having to pack-a-lunch for the commute to Buffalo is alive and well.

It may be more effective if they partnered with the rebirth of Grant Street where they could cheer each other’s hurdles and accomplishments.

Downtown Niagara Falls is not unlike the east side of Buffalo with the exception of the casino which has created minimal development and even those who reside in the section known as “LaSalle” specifically state that as opposed to saying “Niagara Falls”.

Elmwood isnt just a lesson for Niagara Falls to study.

Elmwood can and should be a study for other areas of Buffalo like Hertel, Main, Grant, Niagara, Michigan, Jefferson, Abbott, South Park, Broadway & Broadway/Filmore, etc.

Buffalo has a lot of struggling business districts that could pick take cues from Elmwood.

But in order to really help some of those business districts ... we really need to fight the good fight... to close some of these access ramps to the expressways. Push traffic back onto local streets as they were intended.

The benefits of that traffic would offer customers for business along that travel route. Customers translates into employees...employees translate into renters and property owners...which creates more potential customers.

Subtract the traffic and the whole thing falls apart.

IT's awfully difficult to revitalize a city if there is little or no discretionary income. People need good paying jobs, and without them, you can will have continuing decline.
NF should focus on building a hospitality industry -- tourism seems to be a no brainer. But it needs strong and consistent focus from all levels of government there.

gee, wasn't the casino supposed to be this big bonanza that would provide big paychecks and big tax revenues for the people and government of niagara falls to improve their houses and neighborhoods?

Niagara falls definitely needs to work on a way to boost their population but they need to work out a way to capitalize on their tourism first. I would like to see them try and get a few more high end hotels on the us side. Once we get more people staying on the us side, then more businesses can thrive in the area.

I'm simply hoping that the Elmwood Village can continue to be like the Elmwood Village. Or will the "Green Code" dismantle much of what makes Elmwood a success. What makes Elmwood unique are the many locally owned small restaurants and stores. The present zoning code allows 2,500 SF on one floor or 5,000 SF on two floors for a single business.

The new code may not give Elmwood that protection; thus Elmwood could attract the national chains such as Panero's, Walgreen's, Rite Aid... that want 5,000 to 15,000 SF and more. Then Elmwood can be like every other place in the country.