Quote:
Originally Posted by glowrock
Brian, that is such a ridiculous, over the top statement to my assertion that Pittsburgh still has a higher percentage of its historic building stock downtown than most, if not all other major city's downtowns as to make it simply ridiculous!
|
No, it is a necessary consequence of your logic. You are just refusing to see that.
If it is OK for more historic structures to be destroyed because Pittsburgh still has a higher percentage of historic structures than most cities, then your logic will only stop applying once Pittsburgh no longer has a higher percentage of historic structures than most cities. So, you are in fact advocating for a policy of allowing historic structures to be destroyed until Pittsburgh no longer is distinctive in this way.
The only way to escape this logic is to provide some additional meaningful explanation of how you would draw the line on historic demolitions short of that point. And to my knowledge, you have not yet offered any such explanation on where and how to draw such a line.
Quote:
If you actually have construed my statements about BALANCING historic preservation with the needs of an economically-growing region then you have absolutely no concept of my thoughts to begin with.
|
I'm sorry, but giving lip service to the desirability of historic preservation doesn't constitute a meaningful balance in practice when all you are actually advocating for is allowing more historical destruction whenever developers want to do it.
In other words, you keep saying things like, "I understand the issue with the reduction in small-scale, more pedestrian-oriented historic structures, I really do.
But . . . ."
And then after the "but" comes nothing but arguments in favor of allowing developers to destroy more historic buildings. The bottom line is the stuff you say before your "buts" is just empty words if it doesn't have any material influence on what you say after your "buts".
I realize your self-image is not of someone who wants to let developers destroy Pittsburgh's historic legacy and thereby homogenize it. But all you are doing here is providing rationalizations for just such an outcome, whether you want to admit it to yourself or not, and in fact if you want to avoid being that person you are going to have to start doing something different.
Quote:
I am most definitely NOT fine with destruction for no legitimate reason.
|
No one is, that is silly. The problem is "a developer must have legitimate reasons for wanting to destroy a historic structure" turns out to provide no meaningful protection whatsoever to historic structures. For there to actually be any "preservation" in "historic preservation," you have to have policies and practices that allow you to say "no" even to developers who have "legitimate reasons" for their preferences.
Quote:
However, unlike you apparently, I DO sometimes believe there are legitimate reasons for demolition for the right projects.
|
But of course I am not always in favor of preservation. Heck, I had internet battles for years over the Civic Arena, which I recognized was not a proper candidate for preservation despite its various historic merits. Even in these cases, I am suggesting compromises where only the facades would be preserved, which as was just pointed out is in fact a real compromise.
I could go into more detail if you would like. The City's historic preservation code is a pretty decent place to start--it lays out criteria for determining whether a structure or district does merit protection, and so I would start by applying those criteria (in a faithful way). Then as the code goes on to provide, I would suggest the HRC and developers work on reasonable compromises, although I do understand that some developers would then prefer to just go to an unencumbered site instead.
All that is how you could go about establishing a real balance of interests. And that is all I am suggesting.
Quote:
Obviously I'm persona non grata around here at this point because I no longer live in Pittsburgh and don't necessarily agree lock-step with the most fervent historic preservation advocates. I guess that makes my opinions about an overall balance of historic preservation and new construction moot.
|
For what it is worth, none of that personal stuff matters to me (in this case, I didn't even know where you lived). I'm just responding to the substance of the things you are writing here.