Thursday, December 21, 2006

Mixed use development

A building with condos and an Indian museum with a lacrosse field on the roof next to the river in Luzerne County. And you thought the inflatable dam was a crazy idea?

Study: Condos will help pay for proposed museum

American Indian museum on hold

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Gort:

2:05 a.m.? Man, you gotta get some sleep! Anyway, I have some thoughts on this issue I'll post in a day or so...once I catch up on some long overdue Zzzzz's. Later.

LVDem said...

currently I live 3 blocks from an art museum, 1 block from a park, another block from a cemetary, 1 block from an old warehouse that has been turned into apartments, and near 4 corner stores. Think about that. Over a 4 block area (I'm assuming of course that the size of the development is roughtly the same size), there are hundreds of uses. This crazy mixed use development was created by those wacky people during William Penn's time.

The uses in your situation might sound strange, but keep in mind that mixed use development has existed for centuries. It is only with the rise of the car that we have seperated our uses. Cities like Allentown are full of mixed use.

Now admittedly, the lacross field on top of the roof next to a river is a bit interesting. Can anybody say "game over" as a ball goes over the roof and into the water.? Additionally, I'm sure there is something not so great about the development, like the need for major public subsidies or that it knocks down buildings and will likely create a suburban streetscape in its place. But the mixed use notion isn't so crazy when you think about it.

LVDem said...

actually, related, but slightly different. Could the real estate market in Kings support 80 condos or apartments? That's an ambitious project for such a small town. Heck, the Lehigh Valley has a pretty hot condo market and it's tough to fill the much smaller projects in our cities. Just a thought.

Anonymous said...

a classic example of what happens when you sniff the fumes from the river too long....