As Boston’s economy gradually recovers, high-profile projects – apartment buildings, hotels and office buildings downtown, in the Back Bay and on the South Boston waterfront – are once again in the headlines. These projects signal Boston’s appeal as a vibrant place to live and work, and we are all the richer for it.
But a deeper look into Boston’s enduring character leads inevitably to its history, and to the older building fabric that imparts its own unique texture and authenticity to the city. Boston’s neighborhoods are the heart and soul of our city, and almost every one of them has a commercial center at its heart. These small districts, key to the vitality and livability of the neighborhoods they serve, are often speckled with historic buildings that rarely attract attention from large retailers or developers. Fortunately, in addition to high-profile new development, a range of less-noticed efforts by non-profits and city government are working their quiet magic by restoring these neglected architectural gems that are the cornerstones of their communities.
The city of Boston recently broke ground on a City Hall annex in Roxbury’s Dudley Square that includes rehabilitating the Ferdinand’s Blue Store, a long-shuttered Roxbury landmark. This is the latest piece of the City’s Main Street revitalization program, which began in Roslindale Village in 1985. Though we generally associate the urban renewal era with wholesale building clearance, the use of historic assets as economic development engines actually began in the early 1960s, when the nonprofit redeveloper Historic Boston Incorporated rescued the Old Corner Bookstore in Downtown Crossing from the wrecking ball, turning this Colonial-era building with a storied past into economically productive stores and offices.
Long a historic preservation innovator, HBI has recently restored the 1859 Eustis Street Fire House in Dudley Square, the oldest fire house in Boston, into a showcase that now houses HBI’s offices, using state and federal historic tax credits. The lower floor is leased to a nonprofit group, earning income to help defray building expenses, and the building’s firefighting history is interpreted in a striking art installation at the entrance.
Other nonprofit community development corporations, once focused almost exclusively on building new affordable housing, are increasingly recognizing the critical value of these cornerstone buildings in reviving neighborhood commercial centers. Using historic tax credits, Nuestra Comunidad has rehabilitated the former Hotel Dartmouth and Palladio Hall, a former dance hall, both in Dudley Square; Urban Edge has converted a former electric substation to a television studio in Egleston Square; and Madison Park CDC has turned the abandoned Hibernian Hall in Roxbury into a popular performance center.
Mission-Oriented
Last year HBI helped the owner of the 1890s Golden Building in Fields Corner to restore this tired commercial building, whose historic value was obscured by decades of haphazard changes. Now the building sparkles with new storefronts, signage and lighting, along with modernized building systems and an upgraded second floor that is home to the Dorchester Youth Collaborative. The project radiates positive change in this lively neighborhood; within months of its completion, the owners of three additional historic buildings in Fields Corner embarked on similar projects.
A mission-oriented nonprofit with an entrepreneurial approach can take on projects that don’t offer returns that would interest an ordinary developer and can use tools and funding strategies that aren’t available to the private market. Well-chosen investments in historic neighborhood centers that are economically sustainable and able to serve neighborhood needs can attract additional investment and spark the revitalization of these community centers, so crucial to the health of the city.
This model of transformative neighborhood investment is not your grandmother’s historic preservation. It doesn’t seek to stop change, but instead to use historic assets to promote dynamic change in neighborhoods that value their history and can benefit from increased investment. Of course, some buildings of surpassing historic importance – Faneuil Hall or the Boston Public Library – should be preserved intact for future generations. But many buildings from an earlier age that have more modest stories to tell can still play a critical role in their communities. With thoughtful investment, they can strengthen neighborhood economies, inspire further investment by others, and serve as beacons of neighborhood identity and pride.
