Buffalo Rising Online

so to summarize: sitting on the table for the planning board is an opportunity to completely change this city (ok, slight exaggeration) Here's hoping! (and praying)....

I hope all of this is built to the curb, if not, I will call Time Tielman and have all these plans scrapped....there is too much development in Buffalo as it is, we don't need anymore......

Olmstead would be rolling over in his grave. mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

West Coast Perspective, how many of the warehouses are they planning on converting to lofts. Your only showing 1 of the 5 buildings in the warehouse complex. Here let me give you a layout of the buildings.

http://preserve.bfn.org/bpr/spr04/1/index.html

There is actually a complex of 5 warehouses between Washington and Eagle with missing buildings demolished for parking lots.

The AM&As complex on Washington has its original 1890s facade showing the 5 individual buildings. A smart developer finding that the single Main Street facade is to difficult and large to develop might take a clue from the Washington side....divide the building down the middle. Take the Washington half and divide it back up into 5 buildings each representing the original facade. That would cut the space in half and make it much easier to redevelop.

A smart developer might even do the same thing to the Main Street frontage...divide the facade back up into 5 buildings, put back the original 1890s facade and that would split the space up enough to make it easy to redevelop.

Is it me everyone, or does Gaustad need meds? I can't say I'm a supporter of Tim. But damn, Gaustad needs some serious therapy and medication. lolol

yeah if you want to build up to the property line, extending balconies over onto the public right of way (air space) would probably need another set of variances etc. And if they want to maximize the amount of rentable square footage then these recessed balconies are the way to go. Otherwise the whole building would need to be setback by the amount of the balcony overhang and maybe that reduces the SF too much for them.

Great line of projects coming through these days still. Lets how the planning board is a little more reasonable then our preservation board...

B21- The warehouses to be converted are the three historical ones fronting Washington Street. The newer addition on Eagle may be demolished. The building on Ellicott is now Historical Warehouse Lofts.

WCPerspective, isnt there an empty lot between these warehouses and the hotel lafayette....

WCPerspective, isnt the development of 4of5 AM&As warehouses into lofts going to put an awful lot of pressure on conversion of the Lafayette into residential?

That empty lot would make a perfect place for a parking garage to serve all those tenants. It would aid the redevelopment of Lafayette into residential and new multi-story infill development on that empty section at the corner of Eagle and Ellicott, especially if they knock down that 1965 warehouse on eagle.

The single story building at 1010 is already being demolished, drove by it Monday and they're knocking it down starting from the rear.

Thank god for the Mercy ER expansion. Anyone who has been through the current facility knows how ridiculously cramped it is and how the low number of beds always puts them on delay. When OLV closed this became the primary hospital of the south towns and the expansion is desperately needed.

With the current state of the national lending market I hope these projects can get financed. They are all great and will do wonders for their respective neighborhoods! Go figure Buffalo’s building boom starts 10 years after the rest of the nations and continues while financial markets worldwide are locking up. Better late than never! :)

Cops walking the beat and residency requirements for Police Officers would go a long way towards making Buffalo safer. Why aren't these ideas even discussed?

And we wonder why crime is such an issue in Buffalo...you never see a cop around. I remember plenty of days being downtown, especially when school let out to see random fights, aggresive panhandlers all the time, and crazy people all over screaming with themselfs and harrasing people walking by.. it reminded me of NYC before it cleaned up.

BRL - These ideas have been discussed, and categorically challenged and dismissed by the BPA. It contributes to the perception that the police are just here to do a job and really could care less about the community. This is one of the reasons that the police seem so 'put out' and dismissive when they have to respond to anything. They aren't accountable to the residents in the neighborhoods, because they are only there to do a job then go home to a different community somewhere outside of the city.

This is why we are so shocked by Chief Barry, she actually lives in the city and cares about the neighborhood, and we worship her as a saviour just for doing the basics of her job. We really need to increase our standards and expectations.

BRL - Both are discussed. Not everyone thinks they're useful ideas. They seem to me like gimmicks. I don't care if cops care, as long as they do their jobs. We see evidence every day around us and reported in the media. They already arrest many more criminals than this area is willing to imprison, of better or worse.

A much bigger problem is many criminals the police do arrest (regardless of where they live or how much they care) are often let right back out on the street too fast by our revolving door system of prosecutors, city judges (whose required city residency doesn't seem to make them "care" much about keeping city criminals away from everyone else), and lack of space in the Erie Co Holding Center downtown and Erie Co Jail in Alden. Why are those things are never discussed? I've posted examples when this has come up before of criminals with huge arrest records and very little jail time. Last week or the week before, a guy around 20 years old with over 10 previous arrests including weapons charges wasn't in jail but still on the street shooting at the cops.

Novelty of having cops living in the city would wear off fast when people realize the same number criminals as before are still around too. A residency requirement would be next to impossible to enforce. It's hard enough to enforce for a few senior officials sometimes. And it won't happen anyhow because the state legislature would need to approve that rule change and they won't.

Discussing it more would be a lot of back and forth. You'll never convince me it would reduce crime, I'll never convince you it wouldn't, and none of us will know for sure because the state leg will never let it happen.

From today:

'A Buffalo man parked in front of a fire hydrant on Sobieski Street took off in his car early today when police tried to question him, but he was arrested a short time later with two handguns, authorities said.

M---- -. -----, 22, of Winspear Avenue, who was stopped about 2 a.m. in the 400 block of Sweet Avenue, was apprehended with two loaded handguns, a Hi-Point 9mm and a Luger. Officers Robert Joyce and John Kaska apprehended Kelly following a foot chase, police said. ...'

http://www.buffalonews.com/258/story/452648.html

Does anyone care if Officers Joyce and Kaska live in the city or burbs? Sounds like they did their jobs, doesn't it, with the foot chase and all at 2am on the East Side after seeing a car load of guns? What does it matter if they "care"?

Do we suppose the arrested individual will be locked up away from us, or be back on the streets very soon?

allfit- I'm not as cynical as you on this one, most cops try to do a pretty good job but without a stake in the community the level of service usually is not the same. Being part of a community, raising a family, buying a home, and knowing the people (good and bad) gives a cop not just a reason to do more but the opportunity. We are fortunate here in Black Rock to have a couple of cops living here and they do make a difference but we could use some more.

Atwater- Residency is not a "gimmick" or a "novelty". Common sense leads any reasonable person to see the benefits of police officers as part of the community. Human nature is to protect our own and this can be our familly, our home, or just the place we live. The extra eyes and ears on the street, the interactions with neighbors,and just being present as a deterrent and as a role model are all obvious advantages. To claim having Police Officers living in our neighborhoods would not reduce crime is just silly.

Well BRL, what we have in common is neither of us will ever know if a police city residency requirement would really reduce crime because it's so unlikely to ever happen. I agree the common sense indicates people will feel more secure, especailly at first, but what I doubt is that the measurable amount of crime would really drop.

Actually in a way I think it would be good if a residency requirement ever does happen. Not because it would reduce crime which I very much doubt, but because for it to happen it'd mean public employee unions would have lost a lot of political influence in the NYS legislature. That would be good other ways. Maybe some laws like Taylor, etc. could be reigned in. Not likely.

If somehow it ever happens, we'll see if crime drops. If it does and BuffaloRising still exists I'll admit here that you were right. If it happens and crime doesn't drop, you'll say I'm still wrong anyway and there was some other reason for it.

It'd be an enforcement nightmare, by the way. Remember a few years ago when some of Masiello's appointees were accused of living in the burbs? The city treasurer was one. It takes private eye kinds of efforts to prove where someone's living. A cop would need only to buy a cheap house in the city, declare it as his or her residence, and then could just keep owing a "second house" in some burb.

wait...i live in the suburbs....does that mean i dont care about buffalo? why else would i be here right now?

Highly doubtful ANY of this will be built due to the financial markets. Tax credits are useless in this market, and hostorical credits are trading 50% below their par value. NO ONE is getting funded now, even projects in NYC