New CVS on Valley at Columbia HS is and odious affront to public space

Agree that the setback looks awful. Makes that part of Valley look like strip of highway rather than the pedestrian place it is.

tjohn said:
Max, I have a proven record of taking seriously posts that were meant otherwise.

I'm in the same club!

(And I missed the sarcasm icon also ... and still don't see it.)

I happened to drive by there yesterday and said to myself that the old News Record building next door now looks pretty decrepit and if they don't find a new lessee soon, they should consider selling and having it torn down for new construction. IIRC, that building has a slight setback, as does the condo building and Pathmark.

While I think the CVS building is mundane and looks like all the others you see over the USA, a few newer buildings help make the community look more vibrant and up to date.

Who knows, 50 years from now buildings like the CVS (if they last that long) may be considered legacy buildings worth preserving--or, more likely, like the Maplewood Post Office, bad examples of turn of the century design.

It DOES look like a CVS, for better or worse.

Is "architects" spelled incorrectly on purpose

TimFryatt said:

bluepool said:

Do you have a full-time job, or do you just spend your time trying to channel the ghost of Jane Jacobs?

Please do stop by my office - www.marvelarchitecs.com - I'd be pleased to show you the work we are doing to improve communities and public space. Just call ahead at 646-641-0510 to schedule and let me know your name

try http://marvelarchitects.com/

marylago said:
Is "architects" spelled incorrectly on purpose

TimFryatt said:

bluepool said:

Do you have a full-time job, or do you just spend your time trying to channel the ghost of Jane Jacobs?

Please do stop by my office - www.marvelarchitecs.com - I'd be pleased to show you the work we are doing to improve communities and public space. Just call ahead at 646-641-0510 to schedule and let me know your name

Has there been a shadow study? Inquiring minds want to know mow much more shadow this CVS casts.

max_weisenfeld said:
try http://marvelarchitects.com/

marylago said:
Is "architects" spelled incorrectly on purpose

TimFryatt said:

bluepool said:

Do you have a full-time job, or do you just spend your time trying to channel the ghost of Jane Jacobs?

Please do stop by my office - www.marvelarchitecs.com - I'd be pleased to show you the work we are doing to improve communities and public space. Just call ahead at 646-641-0510 to schedule and let me know your name

cool site. wish they had designed the Post House

I agree with the original post in total, straight thru to the junk food.

Parking lots in front of stores is a major eyesore and the antipathy of quaint. And for those of us too busy for the gym, perhaps a 15 second walk from the parking lot to the front door wouldn't be the worst thing.

Is the stripmalling of Maplewood really what people want? Not me.

krnl..........you may consider the Post Office design as bad architecture however it was the recipient of

of several Architecture Awards when it was completed and presented to the public.

max_weisenfeld said:
try http://marvelarchitects.com/

marylago said:
Is "architects" spelled incorrectly on purpose

TimFryatt said:

bluepool said:

Do you have a full-time job, or do you just spend your time trying to channel the ghost of Jane Jacobs?

Please do stop by my office - www.marvelarchitecs.com - I'd be pleased to show you the work we are doing to improve communities and public space. Just call ahead at 646-641-0510 to schedule and let me know your name

Sorry about that! My typing, spelling and grammar is wanting, as already pointed out in this thread.

orzabelle said:
Agree that the setback looks awful. Makes that part of Valley look like strip of highway rather than the pedestrian place it is.

That strip is pedestrian all right. No doubt about it.

ctrzaska said:

orzabelle said:
Agree that the setback looks awful. Makes that part of Valley look like strip of highway rather than the pedestrian place it is.

That strip is pedestrian all right. No doubt about it.

we get it - you think it looks like sh*t there. Some of us live in this part of town. We do walk there. Lots of people walk there. HS kids walk there. There is absolutely nothing wrong with instating design standards to prevent the suburbification/strip mall-ness from happening block by block. Bigger picture and all.

I suspect that is why that fence is there----maintain the pedestrian strip.

"Pedestrian" isn't "shi*t". But it ain't Newbury St either. Suggesting that a CVS, while arguably generic and an improvement over what was there, is somehow a ruination, is laughable. I could list twenty active businesses along that stretch that: a) likely aren't going anywhere in the near term and b) are hardly the basis for anything even approaching a contribution to an aesthetic vision for the strip.

Won't instituting design standards make it less attractive for owners to improve? Encourage the use of more PILOTs by either town to entice developers by designating the strip? Affect only a small percentage of available building lots anyway? Seems like a lot to ask simply because one may have issues with a CVS that many others were heralding when it was originally announced. Hardly a harbinger of strip mall doom if you ask me.

And I'm sorry I gave you a hard time. Your sight is pretty amazing, as is the work your company hasdone.

TimFryatt said:

max_weisenfeld said:
try http://marvelarchitects.com/

marylago said:
Is "architects" spelled incorrectly on purpose

TimFryatt said:

bluepool said:

Do you have a full-time job, or do you just spend your time trying to channel the ghost of Jane Jacobs?

Please do stop by my office - www.marvelarchitecs.com - I'd be pleased to show you the work we are doing to improve communities and public space. Just call ahead at 646-641-0510 to schedule and let me know your name

Sorry about that! My typing, spelling and grammar is wanting, as already pointed out in this thread.

marylago said:
And I'm sorry I gave you a hard time. Your sight is pretty amazing, as is the work your company hasdone.

You're very kind thank you.

Bee said:

we get it - you think it looks like sh*t there. Some of us live in this part of town. We do walk there. Lots of people walk there. HS kids walk there. There is absolutely nothing wrong with instating design standards to prevent the suburbification/strip mall-ness from happening block by block. Bigger picture and all.

I'd go a step further and say the town should invest in a streetscape improvement program on this stretch of Valley. It's long overdue

TimFryatt said:

Bee said:

we get it - you think it looks like sh*t there. Some of us live in this part of town. We do walk there. Lots of people walk there. HS kids walk there. There is absolutely nothing wrong with instating design standards to prevent the suburbification/strip mall-ness from happening block by block. Bigger picture and all.

I'd go a step further and say the town should invest in a streetscape improvement program on this stretch of Valley. It's long overdue

Which town? There are two

When is the last time any new construction has looked nice? 1935? I'm serious here. I watched a 15-year building explosion in Brooklyn when I lived there, and none of the new construction was aesthetically pleasing. It was either faux glass Euro-towers, or imitation brownstones which looked nothing like actual brownstones. Construction these days is meant to go up quickly and cheaply. They might through a few flourishes in here or there, but they usually look cheap as well. The CVS doesn't look better or worse than most other contemporary buildings. I understand that part of the argument is that it is set back from the street, but, as others have pointed out, there are several buildings on Valley that are much worse--including that Pathmark abomination next door.

Oh how much I agree with you Mr Fryatt.

Compromise is something you know absolutely nothingabout @author

author said:
The CVS will dispense prescriptions as well as over the counter health care items from what looks to be an easy drive in and drive out. The large housing complex being built on 3rd and Valley will house hundreds of people who will be in need of same.............and now have an alternative to the Rite Aid and The South Orange Pharmacy which does not keep late hours.
We hope for the best and sometimes have to compromise.

Really? Only just now noticed

tjohn said:

author said:
No............all Post Offices across the country are unique. I don't have to mention the large ones in NYC .
In Sussex County NJ there are small general stores/post offices that are great wooden frame buildings that deserve Historical Statues. Bought a Swiss Army Knife at one ages ago.
If you saw an A&P anywhere you saw the exact same building in NoWhere Pennsylvania
They were the Howard Johnson's of the supermarket set.

Either adaptive reuse is the green thing to do or it isn't. You can't pick and chose based on your judgement of what is worth saving. I am beginning to think this whole adaptive reuse thing is just another roadblock thrown up by people who don't want progress in the Village.

ArchBroad..........

Please tell your audience........Do you prefer to use an aluminum or wooden ladder for your

daily climb onto your high horse?

author said:
ArchBroad..........


Please tell your audience........Do you prefer to use an aluminum or wooden ladder for your
daily climb onto your high horse?

OSHA prefers fiberglass as it in non-condutive.

But I don't believe ArchBroad is the one climbing to a high horse.

bluepool said:

TimFryatt said:
It's planning is wrong - setback from the street in a parking lot. It's use is wrong - big corporate box retail providing junk food to high school kids. It's design is wrong - just look at the eyesore.

Pressed-for-time working people like myself will heartily appreciate the placement of the parking lot versus the store... easy in, easy out, back on the road and on your way to the office or the after care pickup... no wasted time driving around to the side or the back of the building to look for parking, then have to walk back around to the front door. Do you have a full-time job, or do you just spend your time trying to channel the ghost of Jane Jacobs?

I'm, personnally, a Mumford fan.

relx said:
When is the last time any new construction has looked nice? 1935? I'm serious here. I watched a 15-year building explosion in Brooklyn when I lived there, and none of the new construction was aesthetically pleasing. It was either faux glass Euro-towers, or imitation brownstones which looked nothing like actual brownstones. Construction these days is meant to go up quickly and cheaply. They might through a few flourishes in here or there, but they usually look cheap as well. The CVS doesn't look better or worse than most other contemporary buildings. I understand that part of the argument is that it is set back from the street, but, as others have pointed out, there are several buildings on Valley that are much worse--including that Pathmark abomination next door.

Well, I think that we shouldn't go to the lower standard of something looking worse next door (or wherever), but take the time to set higher standards for the future. Or any standards, I suppose, as there appear to be none now.

Alias.......if you read some of my posts over many threads you will see that I have no problem

being self deprecating.....Although I never make fun of my horse.

.

Standards involving aesthetics, I suppose. Which are so easily defined as we all know. Personally I like some of the work on Marvel's site a lot, and can't stand some of it. I can heap praise and rip it to shreds (not that it matters, really). But legislate it? That's why we have SID and Planning boards that opine on new construction, code already on the books for the less-dramatic and/or more obvious stuff, and still folks love and hate what comes in.

As to CVS, having been at one of the meetings where the then-proposed building was discussed, I recall there was quite a bit in the air over the setback, the driveway clearance, sidewalk, parking, etc. It's not like they were given free reign and no consideration given to the site