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Download Your Handy-Dandy 2009 Open-Air Autobus of Buffalo Schedule!

Sometimes you can't wait for our cute, little die-cut tour schedule to make its physical appearance at a bar, store, or hotel near you. Sometimes we run out!

Fear not, would-be intrepid adventure-traveler! Here is a downloadable version of the 2009 Open-Air Autobus of Buffalo schedule: Download 2009 Open-Air Autobus tours

Campaign for Greater Buffalo responds to latest attempt to overthrow 2004 master plan for Canal District

The Campaign for Greater Buffalo, in oral comments at a February 25 public hearing and a March 13 letter, has raised a number of issues related to the latest attempt by the Erie Canal Harbor Development Corporation to turn Buffalo's Canal District into a post-modern themed shopping center, in defiance of the 2004 federal-court-directed master plan. Boardmembers Tim Tielman, Richard Berger, and Dan Sack spoke at the hearing on the Draft Scoping Report for ECHDC's so-called "Canalside" real estate development project.
Below is the full text of the letter to ECHDC. A pdf can also be downloaded here: Download Canal DSR comments, corrected

The Campaign for Greater Buffalo has many concerns regarding the so-called Canal Side project as it effects the area we refer to as The Canal District. The Canal District is bounded by the west side of Main Street, the Buffalo River, the west side of Commercial Street, and the south side of Scott Street. We also have concerns with how the project effects the overall sustainability of historic structures in the surrounding area, especially the locally designated Joseph Ellicott  and Cobblestone Canal Districts, as well as the Delaware, Lackawanna, and Western trainshed. There are also issues of social justice and equity which, given the current economic climate, take on added importance.
The Canal District and areas around it constitute a historic vernacular landscape. Maintaining the integrity of the site, whether considering preservation, rehabilitation, restoration, or reconstruction,is of the utmost importance.
As so much of our concern revolves around integrity, allow me to list the seven qualities of integrity as defined by the National Register Program: location, setting, feeling, association, design, workmanship, and materials.
Many of our concerns would be rendered moot if the 2004 FSEIS and the related masterplan and Urban Renewal amendments were simply adhered to; only the remainder of the proposed “Canalside” project outside the Canal District would require an EIS. It would save all parties a lot of time and money.
The Canal District component of the plan should not be radically changed.  To do so will only provoke determined opposition on issues for which consensus already exists, thereby delaying any construction activities by several years. The development of the Erie Canal Harbor Master Plan, which was finalized in November 2004, together with the Final Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement and the amendment of the City of Buffalo's Urban Renewal Plan for the so-called Erie Canal Harbor (the remaining area of Buffalo’s Canal District of the 19th and 20th centuries), represent an intensive and extensive effort to intelligently redevelop the area of the historic terminus of the Erie Canal on Buffalo's Harbor. Underlying the effort was a vision of heritage-based development, with the ancillary benefits of increased tourism,  civic pride, and future civic prosperity.
During the period 2005 through 2008, three years were wasted by ECHDC attempts to discard the entire idea of creating a Canal District. First, the Canal District was to be truncated, cut off at Hanover Street.  (See, Attachment 1) This change was announced by a large sign erected on Scott Street that sought to make the public believe that it was a fait accompli. Then, there were two later proposals to replace all or a portion of the Canal District with a large retail store selling fishing and sporting goods. The public was outraged by the breach of trust. There is a deeply held belief that the story of Buffalo's development deserves to be told by means of the historic landscape of the Canal District.
Our specific concerns are listed below, sometimes framed as questions.

LACK OF TRUE ALTERNATIVES
An overarching concern is the lack of sincere alternatives.  SEQR 617.8 (f) (5) Scoping law requires that the Draft Scope include reasonable alternatives. As required, there is the “No Build” alternative. Then three “alternatives” are put forth, all of which include specifically, a Bass Pro store and its attendant plaza, parking ramp and boat pond, plus a cultural facility in the plaza basement. These are, in fact, mere variations of a theme, not substantive alternatives. There is no alternative that does not include a big box store on the former “Aud” site.
• Two alternatives readily suggest themselves: one without a big box store, which would allow the historic topography to remain unmolested and open the possibility for the historic street patterns and waterways to be extended through to Lower Terrace; an a second, with the Bass Pro big box on the Donovan Building site, which still gives Bass Pro the Interstate-highway visibility it craves, and the potential for a boat pond that would not effect the historic feeling of the Canal District as much. This last has the added advantage that it could enfront Main Street at the same time as it faces the extended waterways. Transit riders could alight directly in front of the store, and the existing baseball stadium ramp across exchange Street could be used to alleviate much new ramp construction.

MISSING DOCUMENTS
• Copies of the December 2006 Re-Evaluation Report and the January 2007 FTA concurrence letter should be included in the final scoping document and subsequent EIS documents, rather than merely be made available for inspection in the offices of ECHDC, which is unnecessarily burdensome and restrictive for the public. Since the decision to basically ignore the 2004 masterplan rests upon it and it resulted from an untested notion that “the Erie Canal Harbor Project needed to be refined in response to lack of funding and/or to provide flexibility in the build-out of future development parcels.” The “refinements” included reconfiguring the streets, which are a character-defining feature of the district. This specifically contravenes an objective listed in the 2004 FSEIS: “Incorporate the historic street patterns of the site into the new development.”
• The public should know who decreed “flexibility” in the future development parcels should override the 2004 plan, and why.
• The Scoping document must include a discussion of why there was no public input or review of the “ECHDC’s schematic planning process” which ultimately led to the proposed Project...as well as feasible alternatives for the proposed action,” as well as details of that process to aid in public evaluation hereafter. The public simply does not know the validity of assumptions and conclusions that involve spending hundreds of millions of public dollars.
• A proposed budget should be included in all EIS documents hereafter. The public has a right to know the public obligations being proposed, and what, if any, private funding is involved. This is elemental in weighing the costs and benefits, prudence and feasibility of the proposed action.

CHANGED GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
•The Project Goals and Objectives have changed from the 2004 FSEIS. The DSR has added this objective: “Facilitate and promote private investment that contributes to the creation of a year-round destination attraction...” This seems designed to fit the definition of a big box store, specifically Bass Pro. Why was this added?

FALSE DESIGN ASSUMPTIONS
• Despite the success of traditional neighborhood business districts in Buffalo and across the northeast and midwest, the DSR calls for “design measures...providing protection from the hot sun...and cold wind and snow...” These measures, if the concept drawings are any indication, would radically effect the setting, feeling, design, and association of the historic resources and would therefore compromise the chief potential attraction of the area.
• As mentioned earlier, making any changes to the street patterns illustrated in the FSEIS of 2004 to facilitate two-way traffic or modern street design standards, would undercut a prime aspect of the site’s integrity.

ABANDONMENT AND BLOCKAGE OF THE TERRACE
• Lower Terrace should not be abandoned by the City and turned into a parking lot and potential retail space. This would make converting the elevated Thruway viaduct into a boulevard (which is is being explored by several governmental and private organizations) that much more difficult. It is also a historic feature of the city going back to joseph Ellicott’s 1803 survey. The historic Liberty Pole stood at the intersection of The Terrace and Main Street.

PARKING AND SOCIAL JUSTICE ISSUES
• A parking study for the 2004 FSEIS found over 11,000 parking spaces within a 2,000-foot radius of Main and Scott streets. The general area has proved to have sufficient capacity for 18,000 people to attend events at the HSBC Arena and additional thousands at the nearby baseball stadium. Why is any dedicated parking, built at public expense, necessary for Bass Pro, and how does this square with the multi-modal goals and the notions of social justice, when those with cars and those shopping at Bass Pro will be showered with public subsidies not available to, and paid in part by, those too poor to have access to a car or who choose to use mass transit? To spend tens of millions of dollars on a Chinese Wall of a parking ramp would seem a misallocation of resources and counter-productive to the goals of linking downtown proper with the waterfront. Particularly, having a covered pedestrian bridge connecting the ramp to the Bass Pro store seems utter folly from an urban design and economic point of view. The extent the bridge is used is the extent pedestrians are removed from the streets of downtown. Cities across the nation are rethinking their 1970’s era skywalk programs and are even tearing them down. Again, there is a social justice component in that two classes of citizens are being created and segregated: those with cars and a will to shop at a given store circulate via overhead, weatherproof walkways, everyone else is on street level, dehumanized by the bulk of the parking ramp and big box store, themselves exacerbating, rather than mitigating, the blighting and anti-pedestrian effects of the Thruway and Skyway.

NEGATIVE IMPACTS ON CANAL DISTRICT THROUGH CONSTRUCTION OF BIG BOX PLAZA
Beyond the broad destruction of the integrity of the Canal District, the DSR envisions changes to the surrounding topography and the construction of buildings which will have an overwhelming impact on the perception of visitors to the Canal District.
• To satisfy Bass Pro’s desire to have a pond for a retail display of small boats at level with its main sales floor, the entire body of land will be leveled off at the height of The Lower Terrace, resulting in stultifying dead zones of massive and long blank walls, exactly as local 1970’s urban-design horrors Main Place Mall, Rath County Office Building, and, directly across The Terrace, HSBC Center. This walled plinth will have the same effect on urban vitality as those decade-old mistakes. The HSBC Center, for example, was designed with vast, level, public plazas dotted with trees and sculpture. The cost of leveling the plazas was blank walls hundreds of feet long along The Terrace, and Pearl, Washington, and Exchange streets. The plazas are empty at all times. So empty, in fact, that visitors are suspect and approached by security guards if they linger. A 15-foot high wall will directly face the Canal District. The wall would have an opening into a the basement of the plaza, which would house a “cultural” facility.
To accommodate the floor-level elongated pond, all kinds of rationalizations are offered to make it seem part of a creative scheme to evoke parts of the Erie Canal quite distant from Buffalo, and then in ways that have no actual historic precedence. For example, the water in the pond is to cascade down a waterfall which is said to evoke locks on the canal. What hooey. Locks, of course, were designed to hold water and not to be overflowed in any event. This would constitute a gross misrepresentation of the historic topography of the site, which is the very reason the terminus of the canal was at this point and no other. Further, it misrepresents what it claims to evoke: canal locks. Third, the insertion of a giant waterwheel in the pond, bizarre and hokey, further misrepresents what any canal is designed to be: slack water. There would be no possibility for a waterwheel to function, even if one were to be allowed in the canal prism. Last but not least, there is a planned “Winter Garden,” perhaps to evoke the failed, though architecturally compelling, Winter Garden in Niagara Falls. Weird.
All of this would be visible from the Canal District and a travesty of an authentic landscape being reconfigured to serve an idiosyncratic commercial endeavor. The effects of reshaping the landscape and further cutting off the area north of the Thruway from the waterfront would long outlast the commercial viability of this proposed retail emporium. The historic feeling of the Canal District would be destroyed.
• A key understanding in the development of the Canal District was that people of all walks of life could share the site, yet the DSR mentions that great stretches of public docking may be given over to Bass Pro, over and beyond the elevated elongated pond, including the Commercial Slip.

NEGATIVE EFFECTS OF OVER-ACCOMMODATION OF AUTOMOBILE ON HISTORIC FABRIC
• The Master Plan, SFEIS and the revised Urban Renewal Plan express clearly the principal that the project should minimize automobile traffic to and within the site, and instead promote pedestrian streets, mass transit, and alternative transportation.  Obviously, imposing modern vehicular traffic designs would seriously undermine the feeling, association, design, materials, setting, and location of the 19th century landscape, destroying its historic integrity.  In the existing documents, the only streets in the district on which vehicular traffic are permitted are Hanover and a portion of Prime Street between Lloyd and Hanover.  (SFEIS, Appendix D, §3.2.4) 
The Draft Scoping Report suggests, in opposition, that the Project should be predominately dependent upon automobile transport.  It states, "Where feasible, all streets will facilitate two-way vehicular traffic." (P. 9)  It is simply not possible to have a Canal District that can be driven through like a themed shopping center. It would lack authenticity and would violate the Secretary of the Interior's  Standards for the Treatment of Historic Properties.  It appears from the drawings in the Scoping Report that the historic street patterns and lot lines (and thus building envelopes) would be altered to create turning radii for modern trucks and large vehicles.  While this would be permissible outside the Canal District, it would violate the adopted standards set in the SFEIS and the Amended Urban Renewal Plan. 
The Master Plan already allows for sufficient vehicular travel to serve the disabled and to bring supplies and service to the establishments in the district.

CHANGED Development Parcels
• The Master Plan and the Urban Renewal Plan Amendments go into great detail in describing the permitted uses in the seven Multi-Use Development parcels in the Canal District. Zoning ordinances and architectural guidelines call for strict adherence to standards that will assure that buildings conform with a 19th century aesthetic while encouraging compliance with modern standards for energy efficiency, handicapped access, etc.  These are ignored in the Draft Scoping Report.  For example, the DSR envisions a hotel in the "Riverfront Esplanade."  However, a single purpose hotel is prohibited by the terms of the revised Urban Renewal Plan for the Multi-Use Development District.  Appendix D, §3.2.3.4.  The prohibition was purposeful – to guarantee a variety of alternative building heights and configurations, and to encourage first story commercial uses. 
• The DSR has largely replaced the 7 development parcels with the single Public Market cutting across the development parcels.  The concept of a streetscape that has as its foundation the existing subsurface resources precludes the Market concept, to say nothing of covering it with a glass canopy.  Building density should follow the original street patterns and buildings should be built to the sidewalk, as required by the Land Use Plan, SFEIS Appendix D, Part 3.  It is hard to imagine how a glass-roofed market would evoke a proper feeling, and it would be contrary to the Secretary of the Interior's Standards.

CHANGES TO PRIME SLIP
• The DSR is to be commended for suggesting a rewatered Prime Slip (it is not clear whether this would be navigable).  The route shown in the DSR drawings is not accurate, however.  All records of the Prime Slip show that its terminus was perpendicular to the Buffalo River and across Central Wharf and Prime Street. North of Prime Street the slip ran parallel with Lloyd and Hanover streets. See, SFEIS, Appendix D, Attachment B, Maps – Erie Canal Harbor Master Plan.

PRIME STREET & CENTRAL WHARF
• The Master Plan for the Canal District calls for railroad tracks to be situated on Prime Street to represent the rail transportation history of the Canal District. It is absent from the DSR, as is the planned public recreational pavilion with balconies along the Central Wharf, representing the former structures there.  The Central Wharf was a key feature of the harbor and Buffalo’s commercial life, where the most essential activities occurred. It should be a focus of the district.  The pavilion should be constructed in the early stages of the project, and not left until a later stage, or eliminated.
• We agree that the boat basin was inappropriate to the Canal District and should be deleted from the project.  There should be continuity of the wharfage all the way to the DL&W Terminal.

PUBLIC FUNDING AND RISK
• There is a strong possibility that economic conditions will not be favorable in the next several years for large retail stores to open new branches in the larger project area.  A reallocation of the project funding to stress the development of the Canal District will be able to reap economic benefits for Buffalo much sooner than other expenditures.
• SEQR § 8-0103.7 states that “It is the intent of the legislature that the protection and enhancement of the environment, human and community resources shall be given appropriate weight with social and economic considerations in public policy.  Social, economic, and environmental factors shall be considered together in reaching decisions on proposed activities.”
The citizens of New York State have millions of dollars to invest in the Erie Canal Harbor site.  Using all the funds available for a single investment (Bass Pro) does not make good economic sense.  The funds should be invested in a more diversified “portfolio” of projects as any investment advisor would suggest. If New York State citizens invest only in Bass Pro (/Benderson) and those corporations encounter financial difficulties, as so many companies have recently, the taxpayers can be left with millions of dollars invested and nothing to show for it.  It is now more important than ever to fully understand the “social and economic considerations in public policy”, required by SEQR, so that our investments are safe.  Too often we read of corporations “too large to fail” (General Motors, Bank of America, CitiBank, AIG…).  These corporations were not always too large to fail but over the years have been allowed to become too large to fail and now the public is made to bail them out.
We should not invest in a “too large to fail” component of this important project; rather the available public funds should be spread across dozens of investments at the Erie Canal Harbor, none of which would ruin the project if some were to fail.

AFRICAN-AMERICAN HISTORY IGNORED
• The DSR is, of course, a general document to outline the broader goals of the project. However, it is vital to the project to include an adequate analysis of the important African-American Heritage aspect of the Erie Canal Harbor. The DSR should at least mention the issue so that it receives proper attention in the GEIS. 
Buffalo has an illustrious history as city of racial tolerance and as a center of abolitionism in the 19th Century.  Buffalo Harbor was the last stop to freedom for slaves traveling the Underground Railroad. Buffalo was chosen as the site of the National Free Soil Convention for the 1848 presidential election, and for other abolitionist party conventions leading up to the Civil War.  Ultimately, the Niagara Movement was founded here that was the precursor to the NAACP.  The potential for tourism is already being realized by many African-American tour groups flocking to Buffalo. 
• Dug's Dive, in the basement of the Elijah Efner’s New England Hotel/Union Block needs to be reconstructed, as proposed in an Erie County-funded plan in 2000.  At the same time that the Canal District is being developed, an African-American cultural district is being developed in the Michigan Avenue and Broadway area, to include the Michigan Avenue Baptist Church, the Nash House, the Colored Musicians' Club and other pre-Civil War buildings.  The story of Buffalo's greatness cannot be told adequately without inclusion of these matters.  The two districts will compliment each other perfectly.  Planning for the Canal District should be coordinated thematically, in terms of African -American history, with the Michigan-Broadway district.  (Contact - Bishop William Henderson, Michigan Avenue Baptist Church, 716-847-6015.)

EXEMPTION FROM ZONING MEANS EXEMPTION FROM PUBLIC REVIEW 
• Page 17 (5.4) states that the ECHDC wishes to exempt the Project from “local land use controls” though the project would remain consistent with “established land use policies.” Removing the project from control of City of Buffalo zoning codes removes controls from public review before the City’s Planning and Zoning Boards and officials answerable to the public.  This district may have special Design Standards (dictated by the 2004 Master Plan) and Zoning but it should be subject to the same process for reviews as dictated by New York State Consolidated Laws Article 5-A, Section 81 and City of Buffalo Chapter 511, Zoning.

The Campaign's Open-Air Autobus tours of Buffalo run from Homecoming Weekend (June 24-27) through September

2009 marks the third year of The Campaign for Greater Buffalo's Open-Air Autobus tours of Buffalo history and architecture. The bus was a hit from Day One with both riders and people in the streets.

You'll get commentary from the experts in architecture and historic preservation, conveyed in a memorable way. There is really no better way to see the city, and we have hosted not only individuals, but businesses, block clubs, classes, alumni groups, and others who find it a great bonding experience.

All tours last two hours and are $20 ($16 for Members of the Campaign for Greater Buffalo), and only $5 for children 11 and under. You learn a lot, and have a lot of fun. Groups of 20 or more save 20%. We also have over 30 walking tours in our portfolio available to groups of 20 or more.

CALL 716-854-3749 FOR LATEST INFO OR TO RESERVE TODAY.

We strongly recommend reservations, and accept MasterCard and Visa.

We thoroughly enjoyed our few days as tourists in Buffalo, but the Open-Air Bus tour was definitely the high point. Thank you for offering an event that was eye-opening about the history and architecture of Buffalo, and a fun time too. We had a blast!

             Your neighbors down the Thruway,

                                 S.S and M.S.

                                      Rochester

You, too, can see Buffalo in a totally new way on The Campaign for Greater Buffalo's fabulous Open-Air Autobus. The Whirlwind Tour on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday is a great introduction to all that is great about Buffalo, while Thursday evening tours go in-depth on Frank Lloyd Wright, the industrial heritage of the Buffalo waterfront, the fabulous residential architecture of three historic districts, and the heritage of the Niagara River and Old Black Rock.

EVERYONE LOVES THE OPEN-AIR AUTOBUS!

Buffalo: The Whirlwind Tour
Give us 2 hours and we’ll give you the whirl
Fri. 6:00pm June 26-Sept. 4
Sat. 10:00am June 27-Sept. 19
Sun. 11:00am June 28-Sept. 20
Meet at Bidwell Pkwy. @ Elmwood Ave.

 Pound for pound, Buffalo is one of the most architecturally interesting cities in the country. Population-wise, Buffalo is squarely in the middle of the pack, yet, because of historical circumstance, it has an architectural richness unmatched by any city its size and by many much larger.  Louis Sullivan’s Guaranty Building and the soaring Art Deco mass of City Hall are just two highlights of 150 years of local history and architectural styles. You’ll see scores of beautiful buildings and houses by prominent national and international architects. Skyscrapers, music halls, parkways—you’ll see why it is hard not to brag about Buffalo’s architecture.

Some other notable buildings on the tour are the 1876 City & County Hall, Daniel Burnham’s Ellicott Square, and Richard Upjohn’s St. Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral, and significant buildings by H.H. Richardson, Frank Lloyd Wright, and the parkways of Frederick Law Olmsted.

Historic Neighborhoods: The Allentown, Delaware, and Linwood historic districts
6:00pm Thursday June 25, July 16, August 6 & 27. Meet at Elmwood Ave. at Bidwell Pkwy.

 The 40-year period from 1860 to 1900 can be described as the Buffalo’s Golden Age. In 1880 Buffalo was the thirteenth largest city in a country of exploding cities. In 1900, it was number 8, its wealth and power at its peak. Buffalo’s elite hired the best architects for their houses, office buildings, and churches. We even sent our mayor — Grover Cleveland —to the White House. Twice.

Titans of commerce, legions of laborers, and masses of managers all had to live somewhere, so Buffalo’s housing stock of this period, and extending through World War I, is rich at all levels and styles.

See Buffalo’s historic neighborhoods up close on this tour of the Allentown, Delaware, and Linwood historic Districts, plus the grandeur of Chapin and Lincoln parkways and Bedford Avenue, the buckle of Buffalo’s bungalow belt! Beautiful examples of everything from Italianate to Second Empire, Victorian Gothic, Queen Anne, Craftsman, and ‘Stockbroker Tudor.’

The Historic Harbor: People and Places
6:00pm Thursday July 9 and August 16.  Meet at Commercial Slip, foot of Pearl St.

 Travel through a panorama of waterfront history with Tim Tielman, author of Buffalo’s Waterfront. Discover the people and places of Buffalo’s waterfront, a window into national social, economic, and architectural history. From the newly restored terminus of the Erie Canal, to the soaring grain elevators that are the foundation of Modern Architecture itself, all along the streets once thronged by immigrants, sailors and ruffians, Grover Cleveland, and the “saloon boss” of bosses, Fingy Connors.

Frank Lloyd Wright's Buffalo
Thursday 6:00 pm July 2 & 30, Sept. 3.  Meet at Elmwood Ave. at Bidwell Pkwy.

 Buffalo is noted worldwide for its role in the career of Frank Lloyd Wright. See the Martin, Barton, Davidson, and Heath houses, as well as two recently built designs for a magnificent boathouse for the venerable West Side Rowing Club and an open-air mausoleum in Forest Lawn Cemetery.

The Niagara River & Old Black Rock: Military, architectural & industrial heritage
Thursday 6:00pm July 23 and August 20.  Meet at Niagara St. and Porter Ave.

 Nearly 200 years ago, the tiny but promising villages of Buffalo and Black Rock, on the American frontier across the Niagara River from the Canadian dominions of the British Empire, found themselves in the middle of a continental war. Buffalo was burned to the ground, and Black Rock was the site of numerous skirmishes, fortifications, and naval activity. Join us as we peel back the layers of time and espy the Niagara Frontier as it was seen by Lt. Jesse Elliott, the first naval hero of the war to receive a Congressional medal, for his daring nighttime raid to capture two British warships on the Fort Erie shore.  

From there, we go to 1825 and the completion of the the Erie Canal and the development of Buffalo, including the beautiful and threatened neighborhood of Prospect Hill. Black Rock has the largest concentration of 1850’s houses in the city. There's industrial heritage, too, from steamer car factories to aircraft plants. We'll see the home of You'll also see some beautiful but seldom sought-out vantage points from which to behold the beauty and power of the river itself.

Campaign's 2008 Holiday Meet-up Dec. 16 at Legendary Lafayette Tap Room

 The Campaign for Greater Buffalo's 2008 Holiday Meet-up will take place on Tuesday, December 16 from 6-8pm in one of Buffalo's greatest bar spaces, the Lafayette Tap Room. Built about a century ago in an early addition to Louise Bethune's Hotel Lafayette, the Tap Room has 16-foot-high ceilings and is adorned by a mounted Buffalo (bison) head that is certainly itself a Buffalo landmark. The event is free for Campaign members and $10 for friends. At 8, acoustic blues performer Fritz the Cat takes the stage at the front of the barroom

Buffalo's hometown craft brewer, Flying Bison, will be providing seasonal brews and finger foods will be served. The Tap Room will have its full menu of hearty tavern fare available for those wishing a sit-down dinner in the commodious dining room.

In addition to the usual socializing and scintillating conversation, there will be updates on various preservation issues, including the Fruitbelt, Prospect Hill, and the Richardson.

For more info, call The Campaign at 854-3749, or e-mail us at C4GB@aol.com.

Richardson and Olmsted's Picturesque Masterpiece: The Buffalo State Asylum

The Buffalo Psychiatric Center (originally the Buffalo State Asylum for the Insane, then the Buffalo State Hospital) is the product one of the greatest artistic collaborations in the nation’s history. It is a work of one of the greatest architects America has produced, Henry Hobson Richardson, and the founder of the profession of landscape architecture in the United States, and its greatest practitioner, Frederick Law Olmsted.

The Asylum, planned from 1871 to 1875, was produced with each man in his prime: Olmsted (left) and his partner Calvert Vaux had recently designed New York’s Central Park and Brooklyn’s Prospect Park, and were at work on their seminal Buffalo park and parkway system. Richardson, of gargantuan physiognomy and talent, would be propelled by his Buffalo work to the front rank of American architects.

Richardson died in 1886, too soon to see the project through to completion. The western pavilions, erected in the 1890’s, followed his design. Outbuildings, including the Women’s Kitchen, summerhouse, greenhouse, and a male staff dormitory (destroyed), were designed by Buffalo’s own man of eminence, E.B. Green. A laundry building (destroyed) and a magnificent powerhouse (altered beyond recognition) were also designed by Richardson.

While the importance of Richardson (left) and his contribution to the work is generally appreciated locally, Olmsted’s is not.  This is largely due to the depredations the landscape has suffered over the last 75 years, itself partly a function of the failure to understand the artistic inseparability of the landscape and buildings in this, one of the greatest works of the Picturesque built in America. Indeed, the work is locally known as the Richardson Complex, acknowledging the architecture alone.

Continue reading "Richardson and Olmsted's Picturesque Masterpiece: The Buffalo State Asylum"

Richardson Park, Now and Forever

It is not often that a community gets $100,000,000 to spend on civic improvements. That happened four years ago, the state legislature approved, and the Governor Pataki signed, a budget bill that allocated funds for the restoration of the Richardson Olmsted Complex, a 100-acre National Historic Landmark with buildings by H.H. Richardson, landscaping by Frederick Law Olmsted, and even some buildings by Buffalo’s preeminent local architect, E.B. Green.

We cannot squander the opportunity before us. We have the resources in hand to create a magnificent amenity for the entire region: a picturesque 100-acre park by America’s most revered landscape architect (left, Olmsted's planting plan of 1877), designed hand-in-hand with the beloved founding father of American architecture to host a sublime monument of the Picturesque movement in architecture.

Continue reading "Richardson Park, Now and Forever"

Campaign for Buffalo and Buffalo Place offer tours of the historic Canal District

Campaign experts will be down at the newly reconstructed terminus of the Erie canal every weekend until August 31st giving tours. Come down to enjoy our short tours or simply to take in the sights and ask some questions. 'The tour will meet under the green tent on the northern end of the Central Wharf. The tour will take off at 12:00 noon and return at 1:00 p.m. Wear comfortable clothing, good walking shoes and bring your own water.' Please come down and give it a try.

Nativity Church to Light Up Its Stained Glass Windows for Holy Week, March 16-23

Beginning Palm Sunday, March 16, from 8 p.m. to 11 p.m., and continuing each night of the Catholic Holy Week, parishioners, friends of Nativity and the general public are invited to view the spectacular stained glass windows of Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary Church, corner of Albany and Herkimer Streets on Buffalo's West Side. It is of interest to preservationists for two reasons. First, the opportunity to see the architecture lighted from within in a kind of reverse image, and then through the stained art glass. Second, to see first hand the quality of one of the many churches the Diocese of Buffalo is discussing closing.

The windows will be lighted from within the Church, allowing them to be viewed during a leisurely stroll around the Church or from one's vehicle. Neighborhood residents can enjoy them simply by walking by on an errand or looking out the livingroom window.

Each window is a gem of stained glass artistry depicting a biblical scene from the Gospels. All are welcome to stop for as long as one would like to meditate on these beautiful works as well as to take in the beauty of Nativity Church, which dominates the open triangle of land where Albany, Hampshire, and Normal streets come together.

Nativity Church, which serves the Buffalo's central West Side, was dedicated in 1903. It was designed by Albert Post in the Neo-Gothic style and rendered in Medina sandstone.  Gothic architecture is best known for the architectural innovation of the pointed arch, which made it possible to place many windows in otherwise heavy stone buildings, suffusing the interiors with light. Windows changed from very simple openings to rich designs filled with stained glass.

The windows of the nave were often used to illustrate biblical scenes. The windows were commonly paid for by individual parishioners as a permanent memorial to a loved one. Such is the case at Nativity, with perhaps the most famous one being that donated by William J. "Fingy" Connors in memory of his father, Peter. (illustration, left) Connors rose from being a teen-aged orphan in the Old First Ward to controlling 40,000 dockworkers on the Great Lakes, being the owner of the Buffalo Courier Express and the chairman of the New York State Democratic party around the time Nativity Church was erected. The Connors Memorial Window can be seen on the west elevation, along a walkway between the church and the convent.

The south elevation, or Albany Street side, is dominated by a three-part Gothic window with geometric stained glass designs. These can be seen to great advantage from the open space across the street. Similar stained glass adorns the apse, best seen from Herkimer street near the rectory.

The lighting of the windows is designed to share the beauty of the church with those who have not seen them from the inside, during the most sacred period of the Catholic calendar. Rev. Angelo Chimera sees the lighting as transforming the church into a colorful beacon of hope and the beginning of a tradition.

Save Our Churches, Save Our Neighborhoods Brainstorming Session is a Font of Ideas

Over 125 people attended The Campaign for Greater Buffalo's initial meeting of its Save Our Churches, Save Our Neighborhoods campaign. The goal was to provide background of the Buffalo Diocese's plan to close up to 60 parishes, the fate of previously closed churches, and to gather ideas for action. Buffalo Common Council President David Franczyk and North District Councilmember Joseph Golombek, Jr. made eloquent presentations. It was a success on all counts.

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Take Me to the River: How Buffalo Can Get Rid of its Waterfront Barrier and Achieve Widescale Preservation and Recreation-based Development

If there is one thing we can do for ourselves and our children and our children’s children, it would be to rid ourselves of the cursed and thoroughly damned Thruway along the Niagara River. Blocks of historic houses in Black Rock, Riverside, and the West Side are being consumed by disinvestment. Whole neighborhoods are at risk. Preservationists, environmentalists, neighborhood activists, and just plain residents would find common cause in this issue. [This article, as it appeared, with illustrations, in the Winter 2006 issue of our newspaper, Greater Buffalo, is available by clicking on the link that follows.]

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Sure, it has been discussed before, even studied. But it always has been with the understanding that the Niagara Section of the Thruway would merely be moved and supersized to modern standards (i.e., a 70 mph design speed and infrequent but huge interchanges). That is not what we need. We need it gone, and a boulevard-like road replacing it.

There is now also some urgency to the question, for the long-running debate about whether and where to build another international bridge is coming to a head in the Final Environmental Impact Statement stage. The Campaign for Greater Buffalo supports a low-level lift bridge between the historic communities of Black Rock in the U.S. and Bridgeburg in Canada. A high-level bridge and its attendant ramps connecting to the Thruway would insure the continued existence of the Thruway and the decline of the neighborhoods it goes through.

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