Buffalo Rising Online

hey, what r u going to do? at least the Hospital is staying. remember all the business in the area that would close if it moved? now that it's here to say, Elmwood (btwn Bryant & Utica) has never looked, er, better? how about another 'dollar' store?

A developer with vision could do something real special with this big chunk of land. This plaza needs to go. It needs to be replaced with mixed use high density buildings now!

no suprise here. pity for allentown though.

I'd like to see a mixed use, consumer-friendly development which respects the heritage and preservation of our urban fiber. Something which shows: planning matters. I want something that wows me but still respects our inner heritage. I want to be able to dictate the terms of development even though I will invest not one dime in it. I want a developer to come in, commit the necessary resources, and risk and then I want to sue them right before they commence. I want a project that ignores the underlying economic conditions of the area and invests hundereds of millions w/o taxpayer subsidy. I want it to be largely a public green space with small retail (mom and pop). I want ...

where's Tallulah Bankhead when we need her?

WholeFoods - several of us e-mailed them back when Quality Markets moved out.

no offense to those that live there, but... The Stuyvesant project across the street is a real eye sore and a source of alot of problems (criminal & otherwise). Who would invest here in light of this? Maybe Pano's can use this as a parking lot and run shuttle buses back & forth...

I think someone ought to propose something really tacky for the site. One that will infuriate all..... the whatever they are .. Something that will provide a diversion from Bass Pro and 33 gates etc. etc. etc,

As someone who lives right across the street on North, I can tell you that Latinas is a dump. The only reason it didn't close earlier must have been b/c the owners were receiving tax breaks/free utilities or some other government support. The shelves were frequently barren - I can recall days where I walked in and there was no milk or eggs. Typically if you were shopping for an item, you had only one brand to chose from. The store appeared clean and the staff was friendly...but you could tell they were clearly the "B" or "C team" when compared to Wegmans or even Topps.

I knew the closing was imminent when I observed things like only 4 parking lot lights lit in the back (the other 10 simply not turned on to save power).

This is a tough plaza to attract development...based upon the publicly subsidized housing across the street. In truth though, that appears to be the only problem. The surrounding neighborhoods on all sides are filled with working professionals, especially western Allentown, which continues to grow as money is increasingly invested in areas like Arlington, Days Park and the countless side streets inside the Richmond, Allen, Elmwood and Ferry borders...and even beyond.

That's the problem with Allentown...an eclectic area of our city experiencing considerable growth and just waiting to explode...except for the federally subsidized housing spotted throughout (Stuyvesant, Allen St. at lower Mariner, North&Irving...to name a few) and Friends of the Night People. I'm certainly not arguing that those in need are less important than the potential for development...but a solution to this problem could pave the way to a booming neighborhood surpassing even Elmwood Village.

friends: didn't mean to suggest that the building itself is bad but, a tremendous amount of annoying people emanate from there which compounds the problem of the mall/parking lot across the street.

Aloha, no one is saying that...so don't jump to incorrect defensive conclusions as users so often do on this site. Subsidized housing is important and imperative to any city...but it is not a beacon that attracts commercial development to an area that badly needs it. Thriving cities are filled with areas where residents of all economic tiers co-exist. They just seem to do a better job of it.

Allentown is really making progress - and I want it to continue - but I'm just afraid that it will hit a ceiling, i.e. the bricks and mortar of federally subsidized housing. I'm not sure what the solution should be...but I don't moving anyone is an logical or moral solution.

Aloha says "Like it or not, there is a real need for subsidized housing in this city," The interesting part of this phrase is "...Iin the city" As opposed to in Amherst or Cheektowaga? Why is it just assumed that the city is the place that all poor people must live? I think it is Clarance's turn for some section 8 housing.

exactly steel. there only are a few parts of the city that could be called "wealthy" such as north buffalo, elmwood village, & allentown. it makes no sense to warehouse those less fortuante in these parts of the city; particularly when there are so many other areas of town (and the suburbs) which need people. does nyc house the less fortunate on the upper east side? i always thought it was unfair to those in allentown to have friends of the night people and a majoirty of the sro's in their backyard. buffalo: everyone likes diversity and no one is suggesting that certain people must be kept out of any neighborhood, but, at the same time, there is nothing wrong with trying to encourage "wealthy" or "nice" neighborhoods. do people, including the current inhabitants of the stuy apartments, really have the "right" to live in the elmwood village? can't the "bare essentials" be provided elsewhere, for a lot less $?

That space sat empty for several years before Latina's set up there. It's in one of Buffalo's niciest residental areas, between Allentown and Elmwood Villiage without any competition, and it still can't survive. This says volumes about where Buffalo is going. People, get real. It looks like half of Elmwood Ave is empty store fronts, you can forget about any of these other neighborhoods turning around. This town is a joke.

@BP - There's a Trader Joe's right off Union Square...no parking in the front there ;-)

As taxpayers who fund the federal subsidies given to landlords, we have a right to encourage politicians to de-subsidize housing if landlords are guilty of poor management and neglect. I think the level at which a building is maintained reflects the type of tenants that live there. Most tenants who receive Section 8 vouchers or other benefits are not panhandlers or lowlifes...they work hard in jobs many BRO users would never dare consider...and need assistance to provide for their families. These types of tenants do not have a negative impact on neighborhoods.

If we tighten regulations on landlords of subsidized housing in Allentown and encourage the improvements of conditions, I think it will reflect on who lives at those properties. This type of approach would be far less invasive, less expensive and would provide far less political fallout for politicians. Small measures can sometimes serve the same purpose as drastic proposals.

Not only does this thread demonstrate a fundamental misunderstanding of economic development, demographics, and market research, it demonstrates a stunning lack of understanding as of poverty and how it occurs and perpetuates.

Will Steel be organizing a "Ship The Poor People To The Suburbs 2007" effort? That'll get BRO some play in the community.

Aloha/Steel-

There's a huge problem with your thought process. It won't work. Being an ex-Human Services company social worker, with a wife still in the business, Section 8 isn't in the burbs for the same reason you love the city. Walkability, close access to public transportation, density, etc.

The 'burbs were created, and maintained by a commuter class. It's all driveable. The vast majority of S-8 peeps don't have, or have access to a car. As such, it's a perpetuating problem, mid/high-end city residents move out, with cars, and continue to commuter class. Lower-income residents stay in the city, fueling the idea that the city is for "poor" people, limiting desireability for mid/high-income residents.

Moving S-8 residents to East Aurora, OP, Amherst, Lancaster, Clarence, though fun for you to shoot back at the suburbanites you all love, would hurt the clients greatly.

I do believe, however, we should re-evaluate the placement of S8 housing periodically in the city (Stuyestant, and Marine Drive for prime examples). We can, and should, provide clean,modern, and safe housing for those less fortunate. But, I don't believe it should be at the expense of development, or progress within the city. Can you say waterfront subsidizied housing anyone? I'm not trying to be cold; I am all for supporting people less fortunate. But, there are limits.

As far as Latina's, and the plaza, first off no shock it's closing. Do you think the other grocery store left because it was insanely profitable? I also think it's interesting how we all want lo/mid-rise condos/apartments, with greenspace, and first floor retail. Carlamlone hit it right on; nobody here's ponying up the loot, and it's a big ticket item. It's not gonna happen. At least for a while. Why rip down a partially occupied plaza, when there are lots in the city? So, let's think more grassroots... Can we re-facade the plaza? Can we re-do the light fixtures? Can we add another strip of shops? Can we add some of the cool ironwork used on the "Welcome to Allentown" sign next door? Can we get some resident artists to dress the place up with planters, and unique artwork? Can we get a neighborhood group to pitch it all to the developer, subsidized by the residents who care so much about this "eyesore"?

There's lots we CAN do without a $20Mil project to make this commercially viable plaza cooler. Think differently guys.... -Oldimpala

buffalo geek: i didn't go to ub so, unlike you, i guess i don't know much about eco develop. and, to you & aloha, i'm glad you like things the way they are at summer/north/elmwood and please don't forget to post what the (inevitable?) new dollar store has to offer...

Geek and Pundit,

You know very well that my point is that most people in the suburbs will not accept subsidized housing in their neighborhoods and consider the city as a repository for the poor. Remember Wheatfiled? They will then condemn the city for having poor people. The city should not be thought of as a dumping place for the poor. The wealthy suburbs need to start sharing the burden. There is no place in the suburbs that in anyway comes close to housing as many poor as Allentown. That is without even going into the east side mess. Why is so much subsidized housing in Buffalo? There are buses in Amherst, Kenmore, Cheektowaga. That is also where the jobs are. Why not allow these people the opportunity to live near these jobs?

We need a Bells.. No wait Super Duper, wait Twin Fair - even better Super WalMart... Just kidding

MRodgers... have you ever considered that many of those who refuse to take their medication do so out of choice? The same choice that empowers downtown workers who choose to park in front of your house rather than pay to park in a lot/garage. Do you suggest a Stalinist plan whereas only MRdogers or select "right" people dictate what people can or can not do?

Demographics is one the reasons the aforementioned section of Elmwood has a hard time retaining anything. Look at the stats for that part of Elmwood: fewer people with lower incomes since the last census. Just as you can't grow a royal palm in the Yukon, you can't expect a high end supermarket like Whole Foods or Trader Joes to move in an area that is high risk with few rewards... Whole Foods/Traders Joes is in the business of making money; they are not a charity. Wegmans keeps WF and TJ out of the Buffalo market.

Buffalo Geek and Buffalo Pundit posts are right on. Perhaps Geek and BP should be on comrade MRodgers committee to dictate what people can do within the city limits.

Lets get a Dashes up in there... Thats a cool grocery store! Either way i hope a store comes in soon because not haveing one is just another reason for people to move into the suburbs. there are not many grocery choices with in the city.

WELL...all the Urbanites and ELMWOOD ELITISTS ,who preserve every standing building, are now talking about demo of this very plaza!! IMAGINE THAT! MOSTLY all ,said the hell with off street parking and wanted an environment where you could walk or take the bus. NOW you have it!! If you need groceries, walk your asses down to AMHERST ST. Wegmans' and do your food shopping there. BE CAREFUL what you wish for....

MRodgers-

I'm not so sure I agree with this statement:

"One thing we're forgetting here is that most of the subsidized housing and low-income housing was there before the revitalization efforts. Therefore, the social gentrification proposed is wrong."

I think the market can, and should dictate where subsidized housing belongs. I doubt you'd see Section 8 Housing on Central Park West, or in The Village, or in an successful portion of any major city. The ebb and flow of economics dictates you position tax-generating housing where you can maximize profits. We need a social and economic safety net, we don't need to put it in growth-oriented places in the city. Whether we want to admit it or not the perception (Oft times nowhere near the reality) of Section 8 housing is bad; and it DOES decrease property values. If we want the type of growth Buffalo Rising purports it wants, we need to make some socially unpleasant decisions, like moving the residents of the Stuyvestant to a less desireable area, or bulldozing Marine Drive for commercial/residential areas.

I do agree with your analysis of the mentally ill; it's not a choice, it's a disease. And I do feel our county, state, and federal governments don't do enough. I don't however blame the caseworkers as much as an underfunded system. I do feel (After time with many caseworkers) that most are overworked, undercompensated, and have nowhere near enough time to do what they NEED to do to care for their patients. I do blame Reagan-era cutbacks that have continued to gut the system. And as our population is beginning the age, it will get worse...

Just my 2-cents, again.. :)

MRodgers: you win: everybody can and does live at Summer/North/Elmwood. That's why the neighborhood is doing just grand. heck, why bother worrying about yuppies or well-to-do young families who want to live and shop there when we should be encouraging examples 1 & 2 to stay or relocate there? Joey: thinking there's a difference between tearing down a nice house for more parking at a second-rate greasy spoon and tearing down a monstrosity of a failed plaza for something real that may work, makes one an elmwood ave elitists?

MRodgers... With all the efforts of churches, non-profits and that state, if people choose not to take advantage of help out there what more can be done? There is indeed a great deal of choice involved. Many choose to live a life in squalor.

The issue isn't whether the working poor or the mentally ill are an impediment to revitalization efforts. I'm disturbed people would find anyone who fits the aforementioned situation to be "entertainment" or target for ridicule. People fall on hard times because of bad choices or just downright bad luck. I respect those who try to better themselves.

The issue is whether city residents should put up with feral segments of our population that refuse to work under any circumstance. There are generations of people who believe that public housing and a county check is a lifetime guarantee. I have zero tolerance for able bodied people who beg/steal than work. The fact is that highly concentrated warehoused public housing is always a source for crime... It might not be a warm and fuzzy statement but nevertheless it is true.

What has always struck me about this location is that regardless of whatever supermarket occupied the main space and regardless of whether there is ian occupant in the main space or not, the parking lot on Elmwood always looks incredibly large and incredibly empty. As for the rear parking lot, exactly whose idea was it to tear the McKim, Mead and White designed Metcalfe House down for another empty parking lot.? As Buffalo demo blunders go, this is right behind the Larkin Office Building, another building taken down for parking. The other observation that I've had about this so-called plaza is the disproportionately of the supermarket space to the 3 or 4 other retail spaces at the far right end of te building. Other than the constant presence of the UPS store, the other retail space has bounced back and forth between occupancy and vacancy for years. To change the current situation, we'll need some RFP's from Mr. Wanamaker's office and at the end of the RFP cycle, a designated developer who will, on the merits of their proposal, demolish the plaza building and tear up the acres of asphalt. Personally, I'd like to see underground parking with a large portion(75% ???)of the current asphalt returned to green space. with a new building set into this green space in the style of a town common. This setting could create a very pleasant experience. As for Allentown's daytime wanderers, the fantasy of these wanderers suddenly wandering around the original village portion of Williamsville, congregating down by the old Glen and casually urinating all over Mill St. gives me a hardy laugh. I'm sure that in response, the usual Amherst officials would call for a discontinuance of the public bus lines that run out Main St as a follow up to their traditional stance against a metro rail expansion to UB North because of their fears of bad city people coming to loot the Boulevard Mall.

What ever happened to drug users and abusers, now they are 'self-medicated victims of society'. There are so many services available to these people that they can either choose to use or ignore; but there is no reason for them to turn to crack, alcohol, or other drugs for 'self-medicating' purposes. That is a bunch of political correct bullshit, but it is what I have grown to expect from the liberal left on this board.

Speaking of liberals - STEEL, when are you moving to Buffalo? When you move, will you live with the poor and mentally ill, or will you move your family to a cleaner and more affluent area? I really can't wait for you to put your money where you mouth is because I, for one, have grown sick of your blowhard pontification from across the Great Lakes.

SirBob, I do have a blog. In fact, I'm the proud owner of a local online media company. A quick google search of BuffaloGeek will point you in the right direction.

If you'd like to know my academic and real world credentials as they pertain to economic development, site selection, entrepreneurialism, non-profit management, sales, marketing, and urbanism; feel free to shoot me an email. However, I would imagine your question was snarky in nature and not intended to produce a real conversation.

John Martin,

Suburban Buffalo Makes up 2/3 of Erie County residents and about 7/10 of government in the county so yes the suburbs are in the driver's seat as far as transportation systems and infrastructure and where the poor live and they make darn certain that the poor are concentrated inside the city and stay there. We do not solve social problems in this country. We move away from them. How is it at all suburb bashing to ask that the wealthy suburbs take on some of the burden of housing the poor. Who said that this burden should be shouldered by the city only. Funny how you can never call the suburbs to task without getting called names.

Excop,

no one forces you to read anything I write. If or when I move to Buffalo I will be living in the city and so yes I will be living in proximity to the poor. I am not sure what that has to do with being liberal.

If you don't mind, I'll answer your question and try to keep things on a more constructive level.

While you correctly point out that the majority of government in Erie County is based in the suburbs; regional mass transportation, highways, road construction, housing subsidies, and general infrastructure source from state and federal funding. It's not as if the Mayor of Depew has the power of the pen to suddenly house the poor and indigent on a whim.

Why is it the "responsibility" of the city? Well, it is and it isn't. Tax dollars from Clarence and Amherst go into buckets in Albany and are redistributed through various programs and grants to organizations and governmental authorities in urban areas across the region and state, including Buffalo. So, in essence, they do share the burden already.

Why do poor people live in urban areas? High density, ease of transportation, and dozens of other reasons. To simply wish away urban poverty by clamoring for Amherst to fix hundreds of years of poor planning mistakes doesn't actually solve the problem. It simply shifts it to another locality, which benefits no one...in fact, it would probably do more harm than good for the people being "shifted". Anyhow, the statement that we need to "shift the burden" lowers the people in question to mere commodity...and how does that help anyone?

As to your point about being called names for "calling the suburbs to task"...I guess I would say, "pot, this is the kettle, you're black". You might want to think about the manner in which you construct your arguments here and on other sites as they are perceived as anti-suburban, which is construed as counterproductive. We need comprehensive regional planning, not urban/suburban sniping and inflated egos.

Whether or not I agree with the criticisms of your writing is immaterial, but you do need to take into consideration the feedback you receive. You might find some truth in the counterarguments people typically launch in your direction.

Back to the topic at hand, if we want urban strip malls torn down and developers to build to an arbitrary standard of urbanism and mixed use, we need to set smart code guidelines and clean up the various zoning laws and deed restrictions. It's counterproductive to go project by project and scream from the sidelines as to what you want built. Arguing about whether or not the parking should be in the rear or front of a plaza that may or may not be torn down is a pointless battle, which sadly enough, represents about 90% of the "development discussion" on this and other local websites.

We need to argue for better development standards and enforce them. Developers will be happy to follow them once they are set...just as they are in every other city in America.

we will never see a Whole Foods or Trader Joes in this area of the city unless like Bass Pro we pay them to come here. If that plaza and this area was desirable and profitable, Danny Wegman would of snapped that plaza up ages ago.

...no one forces you to read anything I write. If or when I move to Buffalo I will be living in the city and so yes I will be living in proximity to the poor. I am not sure what that has to do with being liberal...

True, I typically skip over your comments; however you seem to spend a great deal of time sharing your liberal viewpoints with the readers here. You complain about the suburbs, the treatment of the poor, the vision and plans of local developers, and our local politicians; all from your pulpit in Chicago. Like I said, put your money where you mouth is, if you want to make a difference to the Western New York community, then do something other than sharing your incredibly narrow-minded and one-sided viewpoints on this and other blogs. You seem like a pretty astute and intelligent person; I am sure you could figure out how to make a go of it in WNY. Until then, you are just another out of towner trying to tell people in Buffalo how they should run things.

What are you doing for Buffalo? What is your contribution other than complaints of social injustices and pointing out architectural blunders?

If you want to do something for Buffalo, then do something IN Buffalo. Until then, please do not tell us what we need to do with our most affluent suburbs, we would be in a much worse state without them.

I've personally relocated two companies to Buffalo which employ a total of 41 white collar IT professionals. I've also been the lead on two data center site selection projects in the area, 22 across the country, and have served on various economic development panels in the past 12 years. Would you also like some references and a CV? Will that get me up to the standards necessary to post here at BRO?

Good lord...