I hate to throw cold water on the enthusiasm about making part of the Midtown site into a public park, but seriously, folks: No.
I know, I know, it was a wonderful scene: thousands of people gathered on Midtown’s Parcel 5 to hear Trombone Shorty the last night of the Jazz Festival. It was great fun. And it was indeed wonderful to see that many people downtown, having a good time, together.
But thousands of people crowd downtown at various outdoor stages at every Jazz Festival. Parcel 5 is a prime development site. Developers’ interest in downtown is much stronger now than it was when Midtown Plaza was dying and city officials were talking about things like a Little Italy food and retail complex. Tower 280, Legacy Tower, The Metropolitan, One East Avenue, 50 Chestnut, 88 Elm, 111 East Avenue, the Sibley Building, The Hive, Charlotte Square: One after another, these things have been springing up and spurring more development.
Parcel 5 is only part of the Midtown development site, and this enormous area won’t be filled overnight. Whatever we put there should be the best use of that very valuable property. And a park ain’t it. Let me count the reasons:
1) A park won’t pay taxes. This city needs money to pay for schools and police and trash pick-up – and for things like the Jazz Festival, which staged the Trombone Shorty concert. A lot of that money comes from city property taxes. Parcel 5’s use should pay taxes or spur nearby businesses that will.
2) A public gathering space featuring concerts with loud music won’t be compatible with its neighbors. Several of the residential developments under way right now border Parcel 5. These will have lots and lots of apartments. Whose occupants might want things a little quieter at night.
Healthy, dynamic cities thrive on the co-existence of a wild variety of uses, but Rochester’s downtown is not yet healthy and dynamic. And even if it were, we would want to plan prudently, not deliberately create conflicts. Putting an outdoor concert space smack in the middle of a group of apartment buildings is poor planning.
3) Parcel 5 as a park, however beautifully designed and landscaped it might be, would be used for big events only a few times a year. Given our climate, it would be empty much of the time. We need uses that put people downtown year-round, day and night. Offices, corporate headquarters, retail, restaurants, entertainment complexes, residential buildings do that.
4) We already have parks downtown – just a few blocks away. Among them: to the south is Martin Luther King Park, with a built-in concert section. Crossroads Park and Charles Carroll Park stretch out along the river north of Main. All three were intended to add green space to downtown and serve as public gathering spaces. They’re ideal for seasonal uses for concerts, holiday markets, that kind of thing. And there are numerous smaller parks throughout downtown.
Parcel 5 occupies a key location on Main Street, downtown’s principal street. The city is accepting development proposals for the parcel right now, and I assume one will be for a new theater for the Rochester Broadway Theatre League. RBTL has wanted a downtown site for years – and earlier this week, city officials released a study of the costs and potential for a large theater on Parcel 5.
Maybe a theater is the best use; maybe the best use won’t present itself for several years, after the new residential buildings fill up and other development follows. Meantime, yes, we can clean up Parcel 5 and use it, temporarily, for concerts. But it’s a valuable development site, and we shouldn’t close out that option with a park that we simply don’t need.
Patience, folks. Patience. Thriving downtowns aren’t built in a day.
This article appears in Jul 13-19, 2016.
I agree with pretty much everything said here. Parcel 5 is a huge development opportunity with the underground parking and truck access for getting equipment in/out of a performing arts center. A new park or green space could be targeted at one one of the numerous parking lots dotting our city. It would be such a waste to force one into parcel 5.
If anything, turn MLK park into even more of a dedicated outdoor performance space. It already does well for Party in the Park but could be so much more if done right. First on my list would be removed that section of Court Street adjacent to the park, re-grade at the end, and build a dedicated stage for performances.
I find this to be a bit of shallow dive of an argument against Parcel 5 being a park.
1.) The not paying taxes argument is eye-roll worthy.
2.) The start times of concerts can be dictated by the venue….so the neighbors will not have to worry about being able to sleep.
3.) The weather doesn’t seem to effect the use of several other parks both in downtown and around the city, so why would it effect Parcel 5 so detrimentally? It’s a park not a special events venue.
4.) Many of the parks you have identified within downtown on your map are not easily accessible, nor do many of them have a high concentration of residents who can use them (MLK Park being the primary exception). Furthermore, you are being a bit generous with the outlines on several of the “parks” identified in the above map.
I personally think that a park would bring life to East Main Street which continues to struggle with few street level retail establishments and empty buildings. Why only spend tax dollars on development that is primarily residential and office space? I would think that the park would be a draw for many of the residential towers surrounding the site…Tower280 is pretending like they have some outdoor recreation space with their rooftop dog park, but really is that cutting it?
It’s a great centrally located space at the edge of burgeoning retail development and a very very high concentration of residential development, why not make it a park? There are plenty of parking lots and empty buildings awaiting redevelopment and “tax-producing” development. Let’s not squander this opportunity.
Forcing development on parcel 5 is a far worse idea than green space, especially if the green space is temporary.
The absolute worst idea is a performing arts center that is guaranteed to lose money each year and need taxpayer life support to survive.
Green space is underrated. In developer’s eyes, green space should be buit upon. Until evert existing vacant building in the center city is occupied, why build any new buildings?
While I agree green space on parcel 5 is less than desirable what are the real options? Ideally we would want office space but downtown has a 20+% vacancy rate for office space even after so much has been converted into housing. Commercial is not going to happen due to downtown density problems. There are too few people to support large commercial and those that are downtown ride the bus. The commercial which would work for bus riders is non compatible with the high end housing which is going in downtown. While residential is presently working downtown most of it is heavily subsidized and has long term tax breaks. Finally residential will prevent other higher uses which is what we want. A casino is a terrible idea as it will destroy any commercial opportunities downtown. White a casino or the preforming arts center would both be tax free.
As a result of there being no real options perhaps the best we can do is wait on this property and see where downtown goes. And the best way to hold this property without looking like a vacant hole in our city is with a park.
A park should go on parcel 5 and a performing art center built on Manhattan square park. Manhattan square park is a brutalist atrocity. Also if you live in a city you should never, ever, complain about noise from a concert. Go live in Wayne or Orleans county if you don’t want to hear concerts and festivals, they never come there. I mean if a concert or festival went til 2a 4 times a year (they never would, Rochesterians are lame partiers) would it kill you?
We need FAMILY oriented entertainment spaces downtown…like the popular Dave & Buster’s that just went into Henrietta or a roller skating rink. Places that would require hiring many shifts, even security and be affordable. I’ve been to the Playhouse a handful of times and I keep bumping into families from out in the suburbs there! It’s fantastic. We need more of that happening downtown!
From a design perpsective, “green space” is not an ideal long-term plan for this spot. Small parks or open spaces like this don’t really succeed unless there is enough going on in the buildings and streets around them. Some smaller narrower buildings (3 or 4 of them) along Main could look very good, and if the Renaissance Square buildings are also rehabbed (as the Landmark Society has prioritized), Main Street might begin to feel like a more coherent and pleasant retail street. A bigger building can always be put in the back of the parcel near Tower 280, or that can be left empty for now.
Worse than green space, though, would be bland architecture (see Collegetown) or a big square building. Unless it’s very creatively designed, a performing arts center is likely to give us three huge blank walls fronting the side streets, completely killing any foot traffic there. I’d much rather see the performing arts center put on Block F or on one of the many empty lots north of Main Street.
Maybe for ideas of what we could put there, we should look to the past. This stretch of Main Street used to consist of densely platted buildings with actual establishments in them, which can be seen here: https://www.instagram.com/p/BFoywtLI_Qn/?t…
And, MLK Park does a pretty poor job of being a venue, for one huge reason: there’s nothing around MLK Park. It’s a dead area. So people might go there for Parties in the Park, but leave immediately afterwards because there is simply nothing else to do immediately adjacent to MLK.
Thankfully, there have been very few massive loudspeaker events in the park across the street from where I live. A city park should be for people to enjoy nature while still respecting the rights of nearby residents.
We should make sure we get the most bang for the buck from this space. A park requires tree-trimming and grass-cutting and it ain’t free. Something needs to be built on this space that will provide tax revenue for the city. Whoever builds here should allocate enough green space so at least some of their workers have a nice place to enjoy their lunches outside.
In the end, it’s all about consideration; for the employees, the taxpayers, and especially for the downtown residents who didn’t move there to be able to lift up the window for a free concert.
A good question to ask. Would you rather have a nice green space or another vacant building?
Parks are for people to enjoy the outdoors…they are not just for loud music venues..with your logic NYC would not have Central Park..think of all the development that could have happened if it wasn’t for that pesky park..no city has too many parks…developers think of money not what people need…or what would be good for a city.
Thanks for your comments, all. A couple of comments of my own:
To Nonesuch: You’re right, of course. Parks are for more than loud concerts. And this one undoubtedly would be used for more than concerts. But the buzz around a Parcel 5 park right now is coming in part from the success of the very loud Trombone Shorty show. And some of the supporters of a Parcel 5 park want it available for that kind of concert.
Ah, yes, Central Park. It’s wonderful. It’s a gem. I’m grateful that it is there and that it is protected. And its presence is spurring development around it. But seriously: New York is a bit different from Rochester.
Sniff at developers all we like, and sniff at their interest in making money, but they pay taxes. Yes, in some cases those payments are delayed as an incentive to bring the developers in, but they do pay. This city needs the revenue. And developments bring people downtown 12 months a year.
To Tom Janowski: I wouldn’t suggest forcing development. We’ve tried that, and it doesn’t work. But we should give that parcel a chance. After all these years of waiting, we are seeing real development interest in Rochester’s central business district. I hope it’s sustainable. I hope it builds on itself. We’ll know, in a few years. Meantime, I hope we don’t shut off development on what is one of downtown’s prime development sites.
For me, you buried the lede as the last paragraph.
“Patience, folks. Patience. Thriving downtowns aren’t built in a day.”
THIS is the notion we should focus the conversation around. This parcel 5 discussion seems to be so antagonizing because we really don’t have a clear vision for our neighborhood. But that vision will not surface for another few years until all of the projects you mentioned begin to fill with tenants. If parcel 5 is as valuable as you suggest, we must wait for the community to take shape and only then assess how we want to use this asset.
If downtown booms as you and others suggest it might, parcel 5 will even grow in value. In that case more prominent investors will take interest and the tax revenue will be greater (aside, do you truly think whatever developer won’t get millions in tax breaks?). It will be worth it to wait an extra year or two to get that dream investor instead of one who wasn’t even willing to pay their taxes on the property across the street!
The Trombone Shorty show exposed the need for a large urban green space for outdoor concerts. If they don’t want Parcel 5 to be that spot they should more or less tear down Manhattan Square/MLK Park and start from scratch.
I love alot of this discussion. What is not being mentioned is the EXACT same thing with parking. We have City Council Members saying parking is a problem and we need more of it. No, there are enough publicly owned parking garages everywhere in this city…much like the correlation to open space.
I agree with this article, but we DO NEED large open space in the city; the best location: old RG&E land adjacent to High Falls. Imagine: an outdoor ampitheater near the Falls, access to the River and scenic vistas.
A park on the old BeeBee station site would be what, 10 or 20 times larger than parcel 5? This is absolutely where all the “green space” energy should be focused. It would be a real show stopper and then you add in some kind of stage/performance space, what an amazing and unique venue we could have right on the edge of downtown.