Wesleyan University plans to demolish (or move, if they can find a willing participant), two historic homes at 319 Washington Terrace and 329 Washington Terrace to expand their film studies facilities.
Both houses are on the Connecticut Historical Society's survey of historic structures in Connecticut. The house at 319 Washington Terrace is known as the Jackson House. It was first purchased in 1783 to Francis Sage and later conveyed to Charles Hunter Jackson, a commodore in the US Navy. It remained in the Jackson family until 1937, and was purchased by Wesleyan in 1958.
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| 319 Washington Terrace |
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| 329 Washington Terrace |
The house at 329 Washington Terrace is known as the Starr-Rand House. A house built by Captain John Wetmore was built on the site in 1792. The current house was built on the original foundation between 1825-1850 by Philip Curtis Rand or his widow.
The demolition of these historic homes by Wesleyan came to the attention of the Middletown Eye after Wesleyan made a presentation about the demolition, and new construction at a meeting of the Middletown Design Review Commission on December 13.
Reports from the meeting are that most members of the commission were opposed to the plans for the new construction, but that the idea of demolition was not addressed.
In 2013 neighbors of properties on Washington Street banded together, and with the support of other Middletown residents opposed the construction of a strip mall on the North side of Washington Street between Pearl and High Streets. The strip mall was a partnership between local developer Centerplan, Wesleyan University and advocates in the city, including Mayor Dan Drew.
While the city and the Planning and Zoning commission failed to listen to protests, and sided with the developer to change the zoning of the property to allow demolition and construction of commercial buildings, the tenants (reported then as Starbucks and Chipotle), decided against occupying buildings so opposed by the community. As a result, the developer dropped plans to build.
The lesson to Wesleyan, who was a partner in promoting the strip mall development, seems to have been to keep future such developments as quiet as possible.
And so, despite residents very involved in planning and development matters in the city, Wesleyan has already progressed to the potential demolition of significantly historic properties, and the presentation of building plans to city commissions.
One can only ask, "What is Wesleyan thinking?"
While an expansion of the film studies building may not be as alarming as the construction of a strip mall, the new buildings, and associated parking, would transform a lovely and historic block, across from an important green space, into institutional architecture that would not serve the aesthetic importance of this gateway to Middletown.
Surely, Wesleyan, which has an abundance of land that could be developed along Long Lane, could find a better place to construct a $50 million building.
7 comments:
Thank you for bringing this to the attention of community members and alums. What are some concrete steps we can take to voice our opposition to this terrible plan?
I think an email to Joyce Topshe and Michael Roth is a good place to start. I'm certainly in favor of expanding the Cinema Building. I've enjoyed many events there, and it's a benefit to the University and the Community. But not at the expense of historic structures and historic streetscape. Wesleyan often forgets about the community view. I live on Pearl Street across the street from an abomination of an office building on Pearl and Washington. The only windows facing Pearl are those at the entranceways. Otherwise it's a solid brick edifice. One needs to say little about the concrete fine arts complex. I'm convinced Wesleyan was trying to slip this one by the community.
Fight your employer on this one some of you
A few initial comments:
- The aerial view rendering has leafy trees that mask the enormous scale of this building.
- When the first phase of the new building was proposed, Wesleyan claimed the pitched roof designs facing the Green would make the building in scale with the residential context. I think most agree that this was oversold and the result not successful. There is another "monopoly" house shape proposed but the new building will continue to read as out of scale with the neighborhood no matter the gimmickry.
- A "pergola" replaces a house? What does this say about Wesleyan when so many go homeless?
- This project is another example of the University's sad stewardship of their historic resources. They have plans to move the Davison Art Center collection into the basement of Olin Library, while the Alsop House, where the DAC is located, is allowed to deteriorate. Its historic rooms are now unsafe for use. This is a National Historic Landmark (only 60 in the entire State).
“We’re so excited for this opportunity to celebrate Middletown’s great sustainability achievements and help us determine next steps and long-term plans to reduce our environmental impact while building an economically and socially viable community.” (Jennifer Kleindienst, Director of Sustainability at Wesleyan, quoted in another Eye story On 14 December.)
Two things to note:
1)The renderings appear to be from about fifteen years in the future, when the trees have grown tall enough to hide this enormous monstrosity
2)The house on the corner of Washington and Mt. Vernon is being sacrificed for a pergola? That's just vandalism!
I suppose we should be grateful that they didn't try to stick a Chipotle drive thru on the end of it this time.
Just because both those houses are old doesn't necessarily make them worth saving. I personally think they are not all that attractive. I've never liked the "half-house" style. I tend to like symmetry in architecture. Pretty ugly entry added onto that one house. Should we make them take it off?
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