The Portland Avenue Presbyterian Church was destroyed by fire in January, but now the congregation is drawing up plans to rebuild on the original site. After the fire was extinguished, the frigid January air turned the charred remains into an eerie icy scene. All but the steeple has been torn down, but the brick and stone from the original structure has been saved and will be used in the reconstruction (one of the massive original window frames was saved on site, too). Rev. Willa Fae Williams, pastor at Portland Avenue Presbyterian, says the church is too important to the congregation and the historic neighborhood to just abandon. The congregation has been growing recently and already is involved in outreach to the neighborhood.
The American Society of Landscape Architects has presented the Floyds Fork Greenway Master Plan a 2009 Honor Award. Nearly 600 entries were considered for awards and the Floyds Fork plan was one of only 49 projects to receive recognition in several categories.
It seems now that the Republic Plaza building on Seventh & Market Streets is complete, the Republic Bank building on Sixth & Market is due for a little facelift as well. Scaffolding has been up for a couple days now, but today we noticed blue paint showing at the top of the building. Crews were rolling either a clear or grey coat onto the lower floors, so we’re unsure if the entire building is going blue or just the top. According to city building permits, a sixth floor renovation is also in the works.
What if you couldn’t speed? If you had to go the speed limit; not 5 over, but nothing above the posted limit? A new prototype car in London is equipped with an “Intelligent Speed Adaptation” system (a high-tech governor) that can tell the local speed limit and won’t let the car speed beyond it. The test-driver notices how slow the actual posted limits are and realizes he has been speeding in his regular car without noticing.
Author Tom Vanderbilt notes inadvertent illegal speeding is probably happening with many drivers:
Someone recently asked me, “why do people speed?” There’s no short answer to that question (I’ve got 250-page reports tackling the question), but one possibility that must be considered, in light of the above sentences, is that: They actually don’t know how fast they are going. Any number of studies have shown how drivers, particularly when the feedback is noisy—i.e., they’re sitting high up from the road, the car cabin is ultra quiet (or the radio loud), the road is very wide—routinely underestimate their speed.
Another blogger, Newton Streets and Sidewalks, finds that going the speed limit doesn’t really affect driving time:
For the last year or so, when I drive, I have been consciously driving at the speed limit on Newton roads. Not at the assumed safe-from-a-speeding-ticket speed limit plus 10 mph, but right smack dab at the speed limit. So far, it does not seem to have a meaningful effect on trip time within the city. And, when I go the speed limit, everyone else behind me goes the speed limit.
They suggest a government sponsored moratorium on speeding in their town for official vehicles and school buses. The London example expects abiding by the speed limit to create for relaxed drivers. There’s nothing like rolling up to the next stop light only to meet up with the speed-demon who just couldn’t wait to “get ahead” in city traffic. [ via How We Drive and StreetsBlog. ]
The old Kentucky Theater just north of the Brown Hotel on Fourth Street has been dubbed the Theater Square Marketplace for some time now, but the renovation work is winding down and a grand opening is in sight. The project is the vision of entrepreneur George Stinson and lawyer Eric Haner and when the official opening happens in June, Fourth Street will have a lively marketplace bazaar.
Some of the businesses have been open for a while, like Nancy’s Bagel Box (which is located in the spot where the original ticket window once stood) and Theater Square Wine & Spirits. Bikram Yoga studio has been open a couple weeks on the second floor and Haner’s law firm is in the building. Joining them will be a gourmet cafe, a market, a dessert counter, a florist, a bar, and there’s still room for another retail tenant. The cafe and market will be run by Dustin VonWheeler, formerly of Market on Market, and a large bar will feature a permanent open air pavilion behind the building.
VonWheeler explained that the group hopes to recapture the qualities of theater in the new spaces, and the businesses have been arranged around a central two-story hall to connect all the levels. The interior spaces open up as you enter the building revealing an urban theater in the round: patrons are at once the actors and the audience.
A mix of industrial and natural materials sets the stage. Tinted concrete and tile floors run through the building and smooth concrete block columns with sleek sconces hold up the second floor. Dramatic exposed duct work forms a sort of arched promenade through the space and brightly colored lights hang from the ceiling. A large glass window leading to the bar pavilion fills the hall with natural light.
Not too long ago the building was up for demolition. The original theater was built in 1921 and operated as a movie house for over 60 years. The Kentucky Show, now reincarnated at the Kentucky Center, played for a couple years there in the 1980s. By the mid 1990s, long vacant, the City of Louisville wanted the structure torn down. George Stinson stepped up to save the old theater and for a time leased the space for free to the Kentucky Theater Project. Now, the property has been completely renovated and will serve Downtown residents and workers as well as convention goers strolling up Fourth Street.
A new gourmet market should be similar to the old Market on Market. A range of goods ranging from a box of Cheerios to a $150 bottle of balsamic vinegar will fill the shelves. The idea is to offer the basics a Downtown resident might need for daily life while showcasing hard-to-find epicurean items. The cafe will specialize in healthy and creative “gourmet-to-go” options prepared in a full kitchen on the second floor. Tables are arranged in the central hall so patrons can dine in as well.
At the back of the building, a round bar negotiates between the central hall and the new pavilion on the other side of a large glass window. The pavilion will be able to open large doors in warm weather to create an open-air atmosphere. It has its own HVAC system that will allow it to be fully heated in the winter. There’s also a separate wine bar that will feature a nitrogen system to keep bottles of wine on tap. This allows more obscure bottles of wine to be sold by the glass. The Theater Square Marketplace is perhaps the only place in Kentucky where you could buy packaged liquor at the front of the building and buy a glass of wine in the back.
With the vast array of retail uses found in the Theater Square Marketplace, it’s sure to offer a well rounded gourmet experience, and with many residential buildings like the Henry Clay or Crescent Center less than a block away and the Brown Hotel next door, it’s bound to fill a niche. When it opens tentatively in June, Fourth Street will be quite a bit more lively with the theater of urban life.
Another boarded up building on New Albany’s Main Street are set to become a new bar. Construction was underway today on two adjacent buildings between Bank Street and Pearl Street and people around told us about the bar. Details were sparse, though, so that’s pretty much all we know. Anyone have the scoop on what the bar is called or when it might open?
Inside, three openings had been cut in the brick party wall to connect to two spaces, and it appears each building has its own structural wall. Check out how thick the brick is in the photo below. It also appears a suspended acoustical ceiling has recently been removed as well from the hanging light fixtures, and the original tin ceiling has been exposed. Quite an improvement if you ask us. Hopefully, in time, the upper two floors of the structures will lose the boarded windows and become something creative.
A tipster sent in this photo of one of the simplest art cars we’ve ever seen. It’s a wind-up Smart Car. The car is already one of the tiniest four-wheeled vehicles to be found on the road; it’s nice to see the playful modification fit so well. Broken Sidewalk couldn’t work without the vigilant eyes of our tipsters. Keep sending in your info and photos of happenings around town to tips@brokensidewalk.com.
