Evan Granoff's arguement that the buildings aren't rentable is ridiculous. Businesses rent crappy run down strip mall locations in the suburbs, you can't tell me no one would be interested in a prestigious historic building in the heart of Providence. There are other factors than the age or configuration of the building at play I assume.

Parking is probably the chief complaint from prospective tenants. If parking is such a concern for Downcity, then the business owners should band together to create parking structures downtown.

The Washington Street building that is rumoured to be demo'ed is the pefect place for a garage. It's centrally located, it already has rentable space to camoflage the parking decks, the value of the rental units will go up with adjacent parking available. If the building's narrow size is a problem, it can be added to as part of the parking construction.

There are surface lots on Memorial Blvd. that could be made into garage parking (an expanded Arcade Garage with retail facing Memorial Blvd.)

The only one of the buildings I wouldn't shed too many tears for is the old Buck-a-Book building. Removing that and developing it along with the wide alley beside it could become part of a project to expand the Arcade. If the shops on the north side of the arcade could break through to the new structure, the arcade could offer a couple larger footprint units for strong anchor tenants attracting people to the other smaller shops and eateries there. A modest office and/or condo tower could be part of the new building. Think what a prestigious address, 'Arcade Tower' could become?

Evan Granoff's arguement that the buildings aren't rentable is ridiculous. Businesses rent crappy run down strip mall locations in the suburbs, you can't tell me no one would be interested in a prestigious historic building in the heart of Providence. There are other factors than the age or configuration of the building at play I assume.

Parking is probably the chief complaint from prospective tenants. If parking is such a concern for Downcity, then the business owners should band together to create parking structures downtown.

The Washington Street building that is rumoured to be demo'ed is the pefect place for a garage. It's centrally located, it already has rentable space to camoflage the parking decks, the value of the rental units will go up with adjacent parking available. If the building's narrow size is a problem, it can be added to as part of the parking construction.

There are surface lots on Memorial Blvd. that could be made into garage parking (an expanded Arcade Garage with retail facing Memorial Blvd.)

The only one of the buildings I wouldn't shed too many tears for is the old Buck-a-Book building. Removing that and developing it along with the wide alley beside it could become part of a project to expand the Arcade. If the shops on the north side of the arcade could break through to the new structure, the arcade could offer a couple larger footprint units for strong anchor tenants attracting people to the other smaller shops and eateries there. A modest office and/or condo tower could be part of the new building. Think what a prestigious address, 'Arcade Tower' could become?

Oops, it kept giving me an error when I posted. Apparently it was posting though.

Very interesting site.

I've got to say, its unfortunate that Paolino's demolition started this whole mess, but I'm glad the circular gas station is gone. I never got the argument that it was a good example of modern architecture. Sure, it was a bit of a novelty, but at a key gateway to downtown a one story gas station should be replaced by a much more prominent building.