Saturday, May 13, 2000
What to save
Citizens must make decisions
By Randy McNutt
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Years ago, I didn't pay much attention to the changes in communities around me, including my own.
I was too busy to care.
Then the traffic — and subdivisions — overwhelmed me.
These days, it seems that the county where I grew up, Butler, marks change by the week. The same thing is happening in parts of Warren County.
As a result, the life we used to know is disappearing in dark clouds of diesel and predictable rows of brick and vinyl.
With the rapid growth of subdivisions, shopping malls and highways comes the inevitable: losing community icons, the things we leave behind.
“There has been some controversy near the proposed shopping mall near Monroe,” said Bruce Goetzman, a Cincinnati architect whose specialty is preservation. “Adjacent to it are a number of historic sites. It's the area around them that will begin to change. And then farmsteads will get gobbled up in an increasingly accelerated way.”
This provokes an interesting question: What will be preserved?
Probably not the High Street Bridge in Hamilton. The Ohio Department of Transportation plans to tear it down and build a six-lane bridge by the middle of the decade.
The plan upsets some local historic preservationists, who see the distinctive 85-year-old bridge as integral to the downtown's ambience. The bridge design reminds some people of bridges over the Seine.
Nancy Tryloff of Historic Hamilton Inc. has a more practical fear: “When they take that bridge down, the businesses on both sides of town will suffer tremendously. It would be down for two years. In that time, people would develop new habits and go to Tri-County. It would be disastrous. City leaders are determined to build the six-lane bridge, but they won't say where the traffic will be redirected.”
Additional traffic comes from Hamilton's new business strip on west Main Street, the home of Lowe's, Kmart and other national stores and restaurants.
The concrete span was built after the disastrous flood of March 1913 destroyed an iron bridge over the Great Miami River. The bridge was renovated in the 1940s.
An estimated 32,500 cars a day use it. By 2020, the number is expected to increase to 43,000 — a 32 percent increase.
ODOT officials say they could design the new bridge to look old-fashioned. Preservationists see some irony there.
Only a decade ago, most people in town wanted to tear down the 1920s Anthony Wayne Hotel, to build a parking lot.
But Mrs. Tryloff formed a committee that brought in a firm to conduct a feasibility study, paid for in part by the National Trust for Historic Preservation. The study helped attract an Indiana developer.
Early this year, a remodeled Anthony Wayne reopened as an apartment complex for people over 55. People called it a smart move.
In time, perhaps enlightenment and education will change people's minds about what we should and should not save.
“A man from Ohio's historic preservation group came to town a few years ago and said Hamilton has property that the rest of the state would kill for, but Hamilton doesn't realize what it has,” Mrs. Tryloff said.
Randy McNutt's column runs on Saturday. He may be reached at 860-7118 or at The Cincinnati Enquirer, 4820 Business Center Way, Cincinnati, OH 45246.
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