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| Race Street Fire House | Philadelphia Insurance Buildings |
Dear Governor Rendell,
This letter is a plea to halt the proposed demolition of several irreplaceable, and in many ways incomparable, works of architecture that are in the path of the expansion of the Philadelphia Convention Center. The specific buildings that we site are the Philadelphia Insurance Buildings at 111 to 115 North Broad Street and the Race Street Fire House.
These buildings have great architectural merit and all are listed on the National Register of Historic Buildings. The Race Street Fire House is also listed as one of our nation's most endangered buildings by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
The importance of the Philadelphia Convention Center rests in its power to strengthen the city of Philadelphia and the neighborhood that it occupies. That means that part of that environment must remain if the Convention Center is to strengthen it.
The importance of these buildings is in their art, architecture and in the scale that they maintain for this neighborhood. The proposed mega-block construction for the Convention Center has failed repeatedly in American cities. In our city, except for conventioneers, if the proposed Convention Center's hugeness continues, there will be no city in that area. Keeping a portion of the city as it exists, which is what this letter is proposing, will allow for a smaller scale to be a sign of welcome in the Convention Center Neighborhood.
There are innumerable ways to save these buildings. No architect or city planner would even break a sweat figuring out how to re-use the Race Street Firehouse. A banqueting hall within the old fire station is one easy example, and would make an unequalled convention space. There are a host of other solutions that the architects and planners of the Convention Center would celebrate in their designs. This would only make the design of the Convention Center smarter, healthier, more innovative and more lucrative. The saving of these "old" pieces of the city is an asset to a Convention Center not a burden.
Please save these buildings.
Cara Carroccia
cara.carroccia @ gmail.com
