filed under Development | Environment
Maybe this time we’ll get lucky, and somebody will actually buy the condos
7:42AM ON
04/08/2008
BY
Dave Segal
A number of us spent much of today cooped up in the Radisson on Gano St — but also drove through the still-being-relocated India St. and 195, while trying to figure out how to not get run over or stuck in the tar pits. Things are shaping up at an impressive clip, and it’s getting easy to envision the new-and-improved India Point Park and all of the potential it holds for the city and state.
And so that’s what we were doing — partaking of a ‘place-making’ exercise, hosted by Friends of India Point Park and the Project for Public Spaces.
Dan Barbarisi places the conversation in context:
India Point Park is in the midst of a total reinvention. It has been chewed up by backhoes involved in the Route 195 project for the last few years, but once the highway relocation is complete, park advocates say, the foundation for a larger and better-used park will exist — if it isn’t gobbled up by developers interested in high-rise residential development.
The Ocean State’s capital city has a severe dearth of great public spaces — and basically none where one can access the water. (Last summer the Projo wrote about ways to spend a day on the water in Rhode Island. Providence’s only entry: Rent a paddle boat at Roger Williams park. For real.)
It’s our assertion that the location of the former Shooters nightclub could serve that purpose. The parcel is owned by the state, having been used for staging for the highway relocation, but it’s about to be sold. We’re proposing a mix of public uses — restaurants, festival space, places to house various nonprofits with water-based uses, a marina with short-term slip rentals, iconic architecture and attractions, viewing stations from which one could gaze down the bay or towards downtown, and more. We’d be reconnecting Providence to the maritime tradition that drove its economy for nearly two centuries, and providing a beautiful, central space for all to enjoy.
The alternative vision, best as we can tell, entails building more condos — most likely with some sort of tax concession. While our vision stands on its own merits, it’s certainly not hurt by the housing market downturn, and the two empty towers at WaterPlace.
April 8th, 2008 at 9:03AM
Beth Comery Says:
If I was a skateboarder, that picture would give me boner.
[Reply]