Fort Wayne IN West Central 4/22/08 - Without Snow This Time

[Robert Pence]

West Central (Without Snow) 04/22/2008

It's been a long wait that has tried everyone's patience, but Spring has arrived. I took a brief neighborhood walk with my camera. The snow (http://www.robertpence.com/20080226_snow.html) was pretty to look at, but this is a lot more pleasant to walk around in.

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Any day, now, they'll start hauling away last winter's temporary levee.
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Rivergreenway passes under the Norfolk Southern (former Nickel Plate) bridge over the St Marys River. Behind the brush, between the two painted sections of retaining wall, you can just make out the remains of a stone footer for the Wabash-Erie Canal aqueduct that crossed here.
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Help keep Fort Wayne beautiful. Exterminate taggers.
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The parking lot west of the Fort Wayne Newspaper press building was once the site of Clifford Coal Company. Now it's a staging area for materials and equipment for construction of the new medical office building at St Joseph's Hospital.
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The other side of the tracks.
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Fort Wayne Newspapers built a handsome new press building on a land once occupied by a parking lot and a run-down, long-vacant warehouse.
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My kind of infill. This house came from the east side of downtown and sits on land that was a parking lot.
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These three houses were threatened with demolition to create parking lots. They were relocated to a quarter block on West Berry Street that had been a parking lot for many years. A large brick Italianate house stood on this quarter block until the 1960s.
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This big brick house came through downtown from a site just east of the telephone company. The mover estimated its weight in excess of 200 tons. It was a slow, careful move.
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These buildings were home to the Fort Wayne Art Institute before the school moved to the IPFW campus north of town.
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I'm happy to see how good this place looks now. It had been poorly maintained and was getting really run down. It had had two fires that I know of, one started by a genius washing motorcycle parts in gasoline in the kitchen sink, next to a gas stove with a pilot light.
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The wood-shake-over-brick house on the corner was built around 1911 by the Latz family, owners of Wolf & Dessauer Department Store. When I lived in the second-story apartment on the right (1967-1971), the house had been converted to five apartments.
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Fort Wayne's only row.
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My patio, finally cleared of winter debris. It's time to start filling pots and planting.
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[Ex-Ithacan]

Blooming buds, wonderful old homes, trains and water (btw, are the flood threats over?) add up to an enjoyable tour of Ft Wayne ( And I didn't notice a single car wreck amongst the pics ;) ). And though the winter pics are pretty, I much prefer the spring. Thanks Rob.:tup:

[Top Of The Park]

Beautiful homes....and something I have never seen on here...a pile of dirt :haha:

[Hysteria]

Nice photos as usual. Your trees seem to be a couple of weeks ahead of ours up here.

[OhioGuy]

Looks nice!

[boden]

Very enjoyable post Rob!:cheers:
I can't believe they MOVED those houses!

[pj3000]

Beautiful homes. Looks like a nice area to live.

[flar]

I can't believe they MOVED those houses!

Neither can I!

Those are some beautiful houses too.

[skyline]

Nice tour and nice weather!

[dawickham]

I love that city and love the springtime! Thanks for sharing.
DW

[Thundertubs]

Great place for a walk.

[KevinFromTexas]

I liked the newspaper building. Interesting lamps here, they look like bug zappers. :)
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Beautiful neighborhood. Love all those old houses.

And liked this one. That side porch is neat. It kind of reminds me of a smaller, less grand version of Mark Twain's home.
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My patio, finally cleared of winter debris. It's time to start filling pots and planting.
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Gotta love Spring. It's when everything outdoors becomes interesting again.