A unique downtown building
14 December 2007
RS
2 Comments
It looks like the storefront was added to the building at some point, probably well before the 1960s (the development of the Civic Center which reduced density in that area). Small storefronts like this–a corner store–are one of those things you associate with a pedestrian-oriented urban environment, something the city is trying to achieve in the downtown.
This place on Spring Street and Dexter Avenue, next to the Elgin police station, is apparently now a residential unit or part of a residential unit, but it would be nice to see this go back to being some kind of a storefront, whether a barber shop or a bodega.
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Whatever that addition was, it is ugly. I think the main building’s charm is lost because of it.
There’s a couple of other apartment buildings downtown on Center Street that I love as well and I so hope that someone fixes them up someday.
One of them just had overgrown evergreens and bushes torn out from the front, finally revealing a really neat building.
The other one is across the street from it, with really quaint “turret” awnings on each corner entry.
It’s such a shame these buildings have become such rundown tenements. It’d be so much fun to live downtown if it wasn’t so gross in spots.