Old House
Another potential fuss looms between preservationists and First Presbyterian Church, although the parties hope an amicable settlement can be reached.
The dispute again regards the fate of an old house near the church. In the past, preservationists and the Fisher Park Neighborhood Association have clashed with the church over houses on the North Greene Street side. The church saw the old dwellings as potential parking lots.
This time, the space-hungry First Presbyterian wants to demolish a two-story house built about 1930 at 620 N. Elm St. on the opposite side of the church.
The house has no significant historical value, but it's an elderly member of the Fisher Park Historical District. The neighborhood association hates seeing houses in the district disappear.
Preservationists also blanch at the reason the church gives for wanting to remove the house: for yet more parking. Parking lots, preservationists say, have harmed cities by creating large gaps between buildings. They say parking lots are rarely attractive. It's time, they argue, to end sacrificing so much space for the sake of cars.
The church has offered to give the house to anyone who will move it. Some years ago, when the church wanted to remove the historic McAlister House on Greene Street for a church addition, antique dealer Margaret Carlson moved it a tenth of a mile up Fisher Avenue and put it beside another old house she had saved for displaying antiques. She connected both houses and today they compliment each other.
But Preservation Greensboro Inc. says moving the North Elm house, which lacks the grandeur of the McAlister, isn't feasible. The move would be too costly. Besides, Fisher Park lacks space on which to put it.
PGI and the neighborhood assocation hope to work with the church in considering "creative" ideas that might save the house and provide the church more parking.
One idea, says PGI Director Benjamin Briggs, would be to jack up the house - like a beach cottage - and park cars under it. Then the house could continue as it has for the past 25 years as offices, mainly for psychologists and counselors.
Briggs says another possibility is for the church to establish a shuttle service between the city's Bellemeade Street parking deck several blocks away. Parking is free in the 1,200-space deck on weekends and nights.
The North Elm house may not be unusual architecturally, but it's ownership pattern sure makes it different. According to Greensboro city directories dating to 1930, Margaret Gay, a widow, lived there from that year until the late 1970s. After that came a series of owners and residents, all women. A man didn't own a piece of the house until about 1981, when Jerry and Janet Merritt lived there briefly while operating an ad agency in another house nearby.
After the Merritts left, the house was subdivided into offices.
The Greensboro Historic Preservation Commission will consider the church's demolition request at a meeting next Wednesday at 4 p.m. in the City Council Chambers of Melvin Municipal Building.
Comments (4)
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I wanted to be one of the first to welcome you to blogging, Jim.
Briggs' ideas are sound. Have you or he heard any response to the alternatives he has forwarded?
Posted on August 28, 2005 5:30 PM
Thanks so much to the bloggers for bringing this issue to the public's attention.
This house is a perfect example of the type of building that transitions between the central business district and a residential neighborhood.
First Pres claims its hands are tied, because an anonymous donor bought the house outright for the express purpose of tearing it down for parking. Instead, they should either sell it right now for a profit, or rent it as a source of monthly income while still being able to use its parking spaces on Sundays. By tearing this house down, how much would the church really gain, versus what our neighborhood would lose?
As both a member of First Pres and a resident of Fisher Park, I say get to church on time and find plenty of available parking. Take a nice walk from Magnolia Street where there's always plenty of space, and enjoy being part of the downtown neighborhood First Pres claims to want to be.
Posted on August 29, 2005 10:27 PM
First Presbyterian Church has many positive options for 620 North Elm Street other than demolition or moving that house.
One option is for their more nimble, heart-healthy members to use any of the free 143 parking spaces only 2 blocks away in the School Administration parking lot.
Another option is a shuttle and/or walk to the over 700 free parking spaces only 3 blocks away in a covered parking deck, or or on nearby downtown streets.
Another option is raising the house, providing covered parking underneath as well as in the home's existing parking lot. Magnolia Place "twin towers" are being built next door, so the new height would fit in. A pierced brick or brick piered foundation, perhaps incorporating some of the curved style of the home's handsome upper "eyebrow" windows in the new foundation, would be very attractive. The raised house could be retained for church use or for rental income.
Another option is from other property owners who are willing to discuss a property swap to the advantage of both parties, saving the house for other uses, in place, as is.
Another option is for First Presbyterian to add a well-designed low profile parking layer to their existing parking lot on North Greene Street.
And there are many places this house could be moved, as a last resort, some within and some adjacent to the Fisher Park neghborhood.
I'm sure there are many more options. We need not be limited by traditional unimaginative options like "tear down and pave."
Posted on August 30, 2005 1:06 PM
Jim:
Since you're in the business, I would hope you might have given more consideration for the neighborhood than to use the terms/phrases "potential fuss" and "the house has no significant historical value..."
ALL houses in a center-city neighborhood have significant value. Does that mean that the parking lot WILL have "significant historcal value"???
But, thank you anyway for putting the subject before the public. I was on the Fisher Park board when the "fuss" over the house at 709 Greene Street gave us a vacant lot. You knock enough houses down over the years, and pretty soon you don't have much of a neighborhood.
Think about the number of fine homes that have been demolished in the past fifty years in Fisher Park. If it goes on at the same rate for the NEXT fifty years, there won't be much worry about parking in Fisher Park, will there??
Posted on August 31, 2005 10:15 AM