When all those folks from Olneyville, and Fort Thunder, said that the Shaws at Eagle Square wasn’t going to do much good?   Ehh… I’m already in a super-cynical spot these days, so just read it:

Residents of Providence’s Valley section will have an easier trip for groceries come Sunday as the PriceRite grocery chain opens a store in the Eagle Square shopping center.

The new PriceRite is filling a 55,000-square-foot space left vacant last summer when Shaw’s Supermarkets closed a store. It’s a tactic the Wethersfield, Conn., chain often employs.

“We take over existing buildings,” said Kurt Schultz, a PriceRite spokesman.

The Valley section’s gain is Olneyville’s loss as the PriceRite operation is moving from a smaller building on Manton Avenue, about a mile from Eagle Square. PriceRite had occupied its spot in Olneyville since 1998. PriceRite has five years left on the lease for the Olneyville store, Schultz said, there are no plans yet to sublet the building. The Olneyville store will close tomorrow at 6 p.m

As we learn that RI just shed another 1,200 jobs last month, I’ve been looking for harder numbers on the potential employment growth that’d follow from a renewable energy economy.

The best I could find was this study on the Mid-Atlantic, which provides a broad understanding of the magnitude of the benefit we’d see. If anybody has New England-specific numbers, please pass them along.

(This scenario assumes that a relatively modest 9% of our needs would be filled by renewables; the real potential is much higher — perhaps 75% or more in RI alone.)

Remember that we’re in a position to become a manufacturing hub for both the New England and the Mid-Atlantic. And also remember that this doesn’t account for the benefits of a better RIPTA, increasing waste-oil biofuel production, and other green initiatives.

Developing economically accessible wind energy resources in the Mid-Atlantic would create tens of thousands of well-paying jobs.

Wind industry experts place the economically developable wind potential of the Mid-Atlantic states at around 10,000 MW. Developing this amount of energy by 2015 could satisfy just over half of new electricity demand, generate over nine percent of regional electricity needs, and power over 3 million homes. Through 2014, the benefits of this scenario for the Mid-Atlantic region include:

• 11,100 year-long jobs in wind turbine manufacturing and installation, with a total payroll of $334 million.
• 740 permanent jobs in wind farm operation and maintenance, with a yearly payroll of $30 million.
• 12,700 yearlong jobs and 850 permanent jobs indirectly supported by wind turbine manufacturing, installation, and service, and induced by increased spending in the regional economy.
• At least $23 million in royalties paid to rural landowners who lease land for wind generation. Landowners with favorable wind resources can supplement their yearly income by more than $2,000 per turbine, with a majority of the land still free for farming, grazing, or other use.

(more…)

With a column about one of my favorite local buildings — on the stretch of Weybosset that first made me fall in love with this town’s cityscape…

Another encouraging editorial out of the Projo:

With its wind and waves, Rhode Island is well positioned to move more aggressively toward alternative energy. That should be encouraged, given America’s enslavement to heavily polluting fossil fuel, whose costs are soaring, with no end in sight.

That is why four bills submitted by Senate President Joseph Montalbano (D.-Lincoln), and supported by two prominent environmental organizations — Environmental Rhode Island and the Conservation Law Foundation — appear to make sense.

But it’s never easy — the new worry is that the CRMC might be about to screw everything up by mandating a one-year ban on off-shore wind. I’ve heard different things about what the CRMC proposal actually entails. The big question is whether it’d prevent test turbines from going up during the interim. You need to test the force of the wind for a year before you put in the actual installation: If testing is allowed, the proposal is probably okay. If not, it’s a TERRIBLE idea, that will set us back in a way that’s not justifiable.

Does anybody out there have more detailed info?

Matthew’s post about last week’s hearing on the sale of the Shooters property spurred a conversation about the most awesome graffiti in Providence. (There isn’t even competition, ever since the pastel-blue “NERD” was sand-blasted off of its Masonic Temple perch.)

Sarah Says: This building has my favorite graffiti of all time on it. Someone tagged it with the word “FART.” I giggle every time I get on 195.

Beth went out an took some photos to prove the point, but has writer’s block and enough self respect that she’s not willing to post complete b.s. So here I am, covering her ass.

Brussat’s column today. To quote our friend David Byrne: some good points, some bad points — both in the column, and at Kennedy Plaza. But I think Brussat hits the nail on the head, here:

But a bus station next to a skating rink flanked by two parks and surrounded by civic, residential and commercial buildings add up to a lot more than many American or even European civic squares offer. We mustn’t sniff at what we have. It is not too crowded. It could, of course, be better maintained. Yet perhaps it can still be improved.

This Just In: Tonight at six there’s a hearing at city hall to discuss the old Bootleggers, that crazy building wedged in-between 195 and the bay next to India Point Park. The DOT, who owns the property, is trying to sell it to, um, anybody with enough dough to cough up for park-adjacent waterfront property. (Anybody smell condos?) People in the neighborhood, especially those who like the increasingly trod-upon India Point Park, want the land rezoned as public space.

Back in the day, the club was frequented mainly by guidos who didn’t feel like driving all the way to Scarborough, but the club, separated from the Hot Club/Al Forno/FishCo area by the 195 overpass, has seen better days.

People in the neighborhood want to see the area rezoned as Public Space, adding to the park and the only public waterfront space in the city. The DOT, obviously, would rather sell it to anybody they can.

If you can’t make the meeting, you might want to e-mail Councilman Yurdin ( ward1.agv1@providenceri.com) the City Clerk and let him know how you feel.

The folks over at the Partnership for Creative Industrial Space are psyched about the hearing on their Ordinance tomorrow:

The Industrial Commercial Buildings District (ICBD) Tenant Relocation Ordinance is scheduled for Public Hearing Monday, March 3, 2008 at 6:00 pm in Providence City Hall.

This ordinance - a call to developers of rehabilitation projects to recognize the hardship of tenant displacement and the negative impact on the local community and economy - will enact a policy within the ICBD where commercial tenants can receive a financial stipend and at least 90 days notice of termination regardless of the terms of a lease.

Dave has a piece today, on the relative uglinesses of the new towers of Capital Center. I’m actually mildly contented by the Waterplace towers at the moment, having viewed them from the Biltmore’s 17th floor today, during the conference on “re-envisioning” Kennedy Plaza. But normally, I like to complain as much as he does:

The headquarters of GTECH Corp. was widely disliked before it was finished in October 2006. Waterplace Luxury Condominiums (the official name of the 17- and 19-story towers across Waterplace Park from GTECH) are close enough to completion for the public to judge them. It will come as no surprise that they, too, are widely disliked.

This much is indisputable. What fascinates and even surprises me — indeed, it baffles me — is that almost everyone I’ve spoken with or overheard dislikes the Waterplace towers more than GTECH.

I stand by my earlier assertions that the Waterplace towers, and the whole damn park, are going to look better after the Blue Cross building goes up (crane on site today) even if it’s not deserving of the tax break it’s getting.

Yesterday the Project for Public Space put on a generally productive and informative session on ways to transform Kennedy Plaza. But there’s been way too much of this, latent and explicit:

Then there’s the issue of the homeless. Kennedy Plaza, and particularly Burnside Park, is a frequent refuge for the homeless year-round. Kent said that the best way to approach the issue of what he called the “undesirables” is to make the park a draw for others.

“The best way to handle the undesirables is to make it attractive to everyone else,” he said.

I’m very much interested in ways of transforming Kennedy Plaza into a space that’s beneficial to everybody — and many such ideas were raised today: reconfiguration of streets, lighting, plantings, newsstands, more commerce, etc. And, of course, providing sufficient funding for RIPTA.

But I am not interested in further marginalizing people who already have it rough, in shoving them away, in closing off our public spaces from them. And to the extent to which that’s an end of participants in these conversations, let’s please all keep watch.

From 3-7 tomorrow afternoon, the Project for Public Space will be hosting a workshop on Kennedy Plaza. PPS says this:

“We all want Providence’s great places, especially parks and open spaces, to be places where we come together. Once named Exchange Place, Kennedy Plaza has the potential to be a vibrant central gathering place for our city. Come imagine a Kennedy plaza that is a destination for visitors and residents, a place where people come together to talk, play, and celebrate.”

It’s at the Biltmore. Call 785-9450 x 201 to register.

I was a little early to this morning’s Providence Tomorrow charrette about the Mount Pleasant and Elmhurst neighborhoods, so I wasn’t too surprised when the parking lot at the Triggs golf course on Chalkstone was more or less empty. I mean, the postcard announcing the event wasn’t exactly eye-catching, and not many people have the time to attend meetings on Monday mornings. Plus, people with Monday mornings off probably aren’t particularly inclined to get out of bed and sit with city planners in a cold and leaky clubhouse. (more…)

What a hilarious letter from Scott Wolfe in today’s Projo:

I was recently in Providence at the lovely Providence Place mall, where it finally dawned on me. As I walked around, I was happy and yet depressed, because I was so angry that Worcester had absolutely no upscale place for me to shop and offers no quality of life whatsoever, as Providence does.

The wonderful thing about Providence is that it is small enough to get around without any hassles. When I compare Worcester and all its ugly triple-deckers and bombed-out factories with idle smoke stacks, I cry.

Yep. That’s Providence for you. No bombed out factories whatsoever. No ugly buildings right downtown (certainly none like in the picture above). Who needs working infrastructure and living wages when you have the glorious upscale shopping of the Providence Place Mall?

Good photo on the Projo’s site:

PROVIDENCE — Demolition is under way downtown at the future site of a Hotel Sierra, a mid-price hotel whose Kansas developers are banking can fill a gap in Providence’s stratified hotel market.

The hotel, formerly known as a Sierra Suites, is to be built between Washington and Fountain streets, tying in with the parking garage next door. It is one of several moderately priced hotel projects now in various stages of completion or development in Providence, where luxury hotels dominate the marketplace.

More specifically, on the economic stimulus package that La Bushe just signed into them thar law-books. This seems to mean that he won’t be running for President, probably, because no one who’s running for President would badmouth cutting $600 checks to American workers. Right?

Some money quotes:

“They want to send out a check to everybody to stimulate the economy. I suppose it won’t hurt the economy but it’s in many senses like giving a drink to an alcoholic.” AND…

“America has a balance sheet that’s starting to look more and more like a third-world country.”

Ouch Mikey! Quit it! Also, Barack Obama proposed a New Deal-style $60 Billion “ National Infrastructure Reinvestment Bank to rebuild highways, bridges, airports and other public projects,” which Bloomberg likes.

• This, on the Arcade, which is notably decrepit of late:

Evan Granoff of Granoff Associates, which manages The Arcade, said that the company is pursuing a mid- to large-size retailer to take over a “significant” portion of the mall. “Once we find a major tenant, [the big national store] will act as an anchor, and then we will fill in the remaining space with smaller retailers,” he said. “We don’t want to start giving out leases until we know what kind of space we have.”

• Small crane up at the BCBS site.

• Also, the lanterns at the top of the new Waterplace towers are finally mostly on.  And dare I say, they almost make it look… nice.   Finale Desserts will be opening there this spring.

• RISD has big plans for the opening of the Chace Center.