A huge fire struck the Brecht Butcher Supply Company Buildings on Friday night. We have coverage and background here.
These beautiful buildings, at the northeast corner of Cass and Florissant avenues, were owned by Blairmont Associates LC. Critics who have alleged that Blairmont's speculation scheme is endangering historic buildings have been proven right.
Of course, I never wanted to be proven right. All I wanted to see was an effort to sell or rehab great buildings like these.
(Photograph by Claire Nowak-Boyd.)
Posts
8 comments:
More bricks for B*****, and S******, and or any one of the other dozens of brick miners located in this town. You can bet that, considering the(indictable) corruption in the City, someone in the building division or LRA is going to get a nice kickback for not doing their job. And a suburban real estate company turns the screw a little tighter on the efforts of City residents to bring about the revitalisation of the City. I know, it's a little moon-bat conspiracy-theoryish, but consider what would happen if the stock of available buildings to "mine" disappeared. Most of the "recovery" business demolition cos. would disappear as well. I mean, who knows, maybe Blairmont, et al, are a consortium of suburban developers which are systematically demolishing our City to benefit themselves. Make a pretty good book, eh? Arson, civic corruption, pay-offs, late night meetings in isolated parking lots. All the makings of a half-decent plot. A tad formulaic, but what the hell, I've read worse. Still, in reality, the whole thing doesn't stand up very well to Occam's Razor. But...
Isn't the City planning a future big-box center anyway for this area? The area stretching from the closed Schnuck's to this site is huge. Welcome to "Old North Commons?"
Good going, McKee and Steffen!
DAMN IT!
This really sucks. Those companies own a substantial amount of the near northside and are simply not being held accountable to maintain their holdings or even state their intentions. It is clear Blairmont has no intention of moving ahead with any efforts to revitalize the stock of historic buildings they own. The mode will be the systematic elimination of the remaining historic buildings they get their hands on by neglect - for a redevlopment of vinyl coated boxes in the image of Winghaven. City government - where are you? We need you to stand up for the general welfare of the community - not hold out for the special interests of the select wealthy few. Leadership. Please.
Follow the money. Blairmont is a big donor to the 5th and 19th Ward Democratic organizations. So are alleged cohorts McEagle and Pyramid.
No one is going to stand up to this pillage, because it's the northside and the Team Four plan is still the tacit master plan.
Its obvious that this is a large conspiracy. These inaccessible County speculators are buying up land, letting the areas further deteriorate thus prices drop, then they either develop the land or sell to someone else. Maybe the entire area is blighted and TIF's are issued because the developer couldn't make a profit because it is "too risky." In 20 years all of these historic buildings will be gone and wonderful vinyl siding homes with unwalkable strip malls will be the norm.
The City is doing little because they do not have the "money" to manage these properties. Maybe if they increased city services to these areas they would not have declined? Wait, the affluent wouldn't stand for the tax increases required to help their neighbors. Rather the affluent would simply abandon the City and move to the County. Talk about civic pride.
Its sad because our history and communities are being erased by individuals with little to loose and much to gain. When will this end?
Post a Comment