Anyone know whats happening with the Richardson

[300miles]

Ummm...Millions of people use Central Park on a daily basis. Can the same be said for the Richardson grounds? hmmm....

NYC spent a lot of time and money over the last couple decades to fix up central park. And more people use it today than back in the 70's.

If they let Central Park continue to rot over the past 20 years, it wouldn't be used nearly as much.

Things don't just magically become succesfull without improvments or maintenance. Some investment is needed.

The Richardson complex has been completely abandoned and let rot for 20 years. Of course nobody uses it today.

[Linda_D]

I'm still for turning the Richardson Complex into condos.

I think the Asylum predates Olmstead in Buffalo. It definitely wasn't part of Delaware Park, any more than Forest Lawn was. They just happened to be contiguous. The Asylum property once stretched all the way north to Scajaquada Creek until the state took the northern part for the "new" Buffalo Normal School which is now Buffalo State. At some time it probably had an extensive farm enterprise attached to it since that seemed to have been a "therapy".

Except for the Asylum, park, and cemetery, this area was mostly farmland until well after the Civil War when Buffalo's elite started buying it up for "country estates" between Forest Lawn and the Asylum. Development of the area north of Delaware Park didn't even start until after the Pan American Exposition, and most of it was developed in the 1920s.

[leftWNYbecauseofBS]

NYC spent a lot of time and money over the last couple decades to fix up central park. And more people use it today than back in the 70's.

If they let Central Park continue to rot over the past 20 years, it wouldn't be used nearly as much.

Things don't just magically become succesfull without improvments or maintenance. Some investment is needed.

The Richardson complex has been completely abandoned and let rot for 20 years. Of course nobody uses it today.

Stop. You can't critique him... Linda D says shovel ready is an urban planner. Just like you would be glib to talk about psychiatry with Tom Cruz. He has read some books on it.

[Shovel ready]

Ummm...Millions of people use Central Park on a daily basis.

Can the same be said for the Richardson grounds? hmmm....

So why do we need a huge olmsted park there if there is already a well-functioning one just a few blocks away?

[Shovel ready]

I'm still for turning the Richardson Complex into condos.

I think the Asylum predates Olmstead in Buffalo.

Olmsted did design the grounds, IIRC.

[ChesterB]

2 interesting articles here: http://www.greaterbuffalo.blogs.com/

Note that Olmsted and Dorsheimer chose the location exactly because it was next to the Park, and that the Park itself was purposely next to the cemetery - the intent being to combine those areas into one big tract of 'countryside', even if each had a different use.

There's nothing "dead" about the grounds, except parts with asphalt pavement. Many trees remain, lots of grass, many many birds, etc. Trees make something called "oxygen" - my lungs like that stuff. The remaining grounds can be restored easily - there's room for at least 1,000 new trees and shrubs. Condos in the old buildings, if that's possible, wouldn't stop the improvement to the grounds.

ps - yes, lots of neighborhood people use the grounds as a park, the way it was intended. It isn't huge, and should be improved, not further destroyed. Why do so many WNY people hate Nature? I'll never understand that - while NYC is constantly planting and making the smallest plots into mini-parks, too many people here want to "develop" anything that managed to escape being paved in the past.

The parks we have are so chopped-up and neglected that they hardly qualify - Delaware is mostly a barren golf course, minus the Zoo, minus the expressway, minus the Albright.

[Linda_D]

2 interesting articles here: http://www.greaterbuffalo.blogs.com/

Note that Olmsted and Dorsheimer chose the location exactly because it was next to the Park, and that the Park itself was purposely next to the cemetery - the intent being to combine those areas into one big tract of 'countryside', even if each had a different use.

There's nothing "dead" about the grounds, except parts with asphalt pavement. Many trees remain, lots of grass, many many birds, etc. Trees make something called "oxygen" - my lungs like that stuff. The remaining grounds can be restored easily - there's room for at least 1,000 new trees and shrubs. Condos in the old buildings, if that's possible, wouldn't stop the improvement to the grounds.

ps - yes, lots of neighborhood people use the grounds as a park, the way it was intended. It isn't huge, and should be improved, not further destroyed. Why do so many WNY people hate Nature? I'll never understand that - while NYC is constantly planting and making the smallest plots into mini-parks, too many people here want to "develop" anything that managed to escape being paved in the past.

The parks we have are so chopped-up and neglected that they hardly qualify - Delaware is mostly a barren golf course, minus the Zoo, minus the expressway, minus the Albright.

The Olmstead Parks Conservancy has been working to restore Delaware, but the 198 is really a problem because it divides the park. If I could do one thing to improve DP, I would get rid of the 198. Not just turn it back into a "parkway" like in the 1950s but get rid of the road entirely.

[Jim Ostrowski]

Bring back the Humboldt Parkway and extend it through the park.

[biker]

The Olmstead Parks Conservancy has been working to restore Delaware, but the 198 is really a problem because it divides the park. If I could do one thing to improve DP, I would get rid of the 198. Not just turn it back into a "parkway" like in the 1950s but get rid of the road entirely.

I'm not old enough to remember a "parkway" from the 1950s, but there have been meetings over the past few years discussing turning it into some sort of a non-highway road. That must be what they're talking about.

I can't imagine doing without the 198, but when the City loses another 50,000 residents, I guess that's a natural aspect in the evolution to a smaller Buffalo.

[leftWNYbecauseofBS]

So why do we need a huge Olmsted park there if there is already a well-functioning one just a few blocks away?

The design of Buffalo Parks and Central Park are vastly different. Olmsted wanted to create one large park in Buffalo, this would have been done in South Buffalo by expanding South Park to the water. But when this plan was left on the table, Olmsted wanted to create a park system connected by parkways. Delaware was not intended to be THE park but rather a link in the chain. The grounds of the IIRC was also meant to be a part of this system.