The meeting in Middletown council chambers about the U.S. Army proposal concerning the above pictured site has been tentatively rescheduled for Thursday Jan 24 at 5 PM. The property in question is in the area bounded by Freeman Road on the North and Saybrook Road on the West. (We apologize for an earlier description that was erroneous)
h/t Jonah Center’s John Hall for notice of above meeting and announcement of Home Energy Saving meeting Tuesday Jan. 22.
See our earlier report here.
And you thought you had only the squirrels to worry about!
The moving of buildings, large and small, is a tradition here in New England. Years ago thrifty Yankees would recycle their buildings in many ways. Post and beam houses were disassembled and erected elsewhere. Entire buildings were jacked off their foundations, lowered onto log rollers, hitched to large teams of oxen or horse and taken to their new location. When lumber was cheap and iron nails dear, old houses would be burned for their nail content! Today, methods have changed but the tradition of moving buildings continues. The building moved yesterday, a former Methodist church built in 1853, was moved 2 blocks from #9 Liberty St. to #47 Rapallo Av. here in the city. Further North on Main St, the building next to O’Rourke’s Diner, also a church, was moved to that spot many years ago. Much more recent is the dismantling of the 18th century mill on Washington St. near West. St., and just several weeks ago, the dismantling of an 18th century house on West St, just above the Gulf station. These buildings have been preserved and will be erected elsewhere.
This particular move required much planning and co-ordination among the consulting overseer, the moving contractor, various utilities, and the CT DOT. Traffic lights street lamps, and utility lines had to be temporarily taken down or protected from the huge building which would take over most of Main Street for its passage. This preliminary work was done early Saturday evening and traffic was rerouted to enable the crews to work unimpeded. All was ready around 1:30 AM Sunday morning and the building was then seen to inch its way off the corner lot, over the curb, and onto Main Street. Once there and heading North one could measure its progress in inches per hour! It was a fascinating spectacle, one that attracted quite a few observers despite the late hour. All in all, a slow motion parade with only a single float; not something you see everyday! Oh, and this building will be converted into four low income housing units on Liberty St as part of the revitalization of the city’s North End, and will make way for commercial development of its former site at Liberty and Main.
Middletown North End Action Team (N.E.A.T.) Community Organizer Lydia Brewster
The North End Action Team is a grassroots advocacy group that began in the spring of 1997.
Purpose of N.E.A.T.as a non-profit community organization, shall, through its members and the Advisory Board, organize and mobilize the residents in the neighborhood, empowering them through a process of democratic decision-making and direct action, to address particular issues affecting the neighborhood. This corporation will propose neighborhood initiatives, design and produce communal events and fulfill the function of watchdog at City Hall and in the state government. N.E.A.T. shall not endorse political candidates or parties.
Our Mission:
The North End Action Team is a neighborhood advocacy group consisting of residents and stakeholders of the North End neighborhood of Middletown, Connecticut. It’s mission is to enrich and advocate for neighborhood interest.
N.E.A.T.’s storefront headquarters at Main St. and Rapallo Ave Middletown
Sign announcing the project featuring the major tenant It’s Only Natural Market
Developer Peter Harding (r) and Nehemiah Housing Corp.’s Michael Taylor (c)
In 1986, Middletown community members formed Nehemiah Housing Corporation to develop and operate a range of housing options for families and individuals who are unable to find quality affordable housing. Nehemiah builds communities by developing affordable housing for families and individuals with resident services and quality property management, as appropriate, with a focus on Middlesex County.
The happy new tenants: Don and Ann Marie Sataline owners of It’s Only Natural Market
Brian Cigal of TimberFrame Barn Conversions enjoys coffee and snacks provided for workers and spectators at N.E.A.T. headquarters by Lydia Brewster (r)
N.E.A.T. hospitality!
Workers dwarfed by the huge building and its carriage! John deNicholas (l) , Nicholas Bros., supervising.
Hydraulically powered aircraft type wheels and tires inch the building forward
Halfway into Main Street, starting to turn and head North
Moving North on Main Street; estimated speed an inch a minute!
Paul Cigal (r), overseer of project with Joe deNicholas, of Nicholas Bros.,the moving contractor,
I spoke with Paul Cigal today about his professional experiences and his involvement in this moving project:
Over the last 20+ years in the building trade and historic preservation field, I’ve had experience coordinating projects that involve moving buildings on wheels; with cranes; and by taking apart, moving by flatbed truck, and reassembling at a new location. My friend and former partner, David Berto, is involved in this Middletown project with N.E.A.T., and he contacted me to ask if I would participate in this one. These types of challanging projects are just what I like to accomplish and I jumped at the chance. Working for Peter Harding as project coordinator, I solicitated bids from the trades, applied for and secured the many permits required for the move, and completed tons of paperwork. I’d guess I talked with more than 100 people over the course of two months in order to move this house.
Contact Paul Cigal at paul@convertabarn.com
Go to the Nicholas Bros. website to see some of the amazing array of other buildings they have moved.
(all photos and video credit ConservaCity)
Hartford Courant articles yesterday, and earlier.
Also see Caterwauled blog for 7/3/07 ,8/9/07, and 10/1/07. for discussion of some of the controversy regarding this project.
ConservaCity Photo
Update added 1/12/08: Long, interesting article in today’s Hartford Courant about the building and the move.
As part of the Liberty Square project this historically important former church at 9 Liberty Street in the city will be moved Saturday to a new site on Rapallo Avenue. Details of the move including traffic information are reprinted below from the Hartford Courant (1/10/08):
MIDDLETOWN — – During the late evening hours of Saturday through early morning Sunday, a house will be moved from the intersection of Main and Liberty streets to 47 Rapallo Ave.
Traffic will be restricted on area streets from 6:30 p.m. Saturday to 2 a.m. Sunday. Grand Street traffic will be closed to eastbound through traffic, although local access will be maintained for parking lots and residents.
Starting about 2 a.m., the house will start moving north. Northbound lanes of Main Street will be closed at Washington Street and traffic will be detoured to Dekoven Drive to Rapallo Avenue to get to the Arrigoni Bridge and Route 9. Southbound Main Street traffic will be detoured onto Grand and Pearl streets to get to Route 66.
The house will be moved onto Rapallo Avenue no later than 7 a.m., and Main Street will be re-opened. That section of Dekoven Drive and Rapallo Avenue will be closed to through traffic until the house is placed on the lot.
Parking on Main Street between Grand and Liberty streets and on portions of Rapallo Avenue will be prohibited starting at 10 p.m. Saturday.
For more information call the traffic bureau at 860-344-3265.
Also see Caterwauled blog for 7/3/07 ,8/9/07, and 10/1/07.
Tags: liberty square middletown ct,house moving,historic middletown ct,
Here are two recent headlines from The Scotsman (U.K.):
1) Big freeze takes hold as snow smothers Scotland
January 3, 2008:
The Met Office issued a severe weather warning covering almost the entire country, with heavy snow predicted for much of Scotland.”
2)Bad weather – we have to get used to it
January 10,2008:
METEOROLOGISTS last night said Scots will need to learn to live with the extreme weather and the chaos it has brought to the country over the past few days, as the unpredictable effects of climate change begin to bite…..As the wind whipped around Holyrood, politicians were told to expect major climate changes as a result of global warming.
(emphasis added)
An interesting video here on You Tube about the media driven hype and the ignored science.
Tags: global warming hoax,al gore fraud,climate change,adapting to climate change
Even the MSM is starting to notice the hype and alarmism regarding climate change. To update our previous post (see below) we now find this interesting op-ed by Jeff Jacoby in today’s Boston Globe (1/6/08).
….”2007 to be ‘warmest on record,’ ” BBC News reported on Jan. 4, 2007. Citing experts in the British government’s Meteorological Office, the story announced that “the world is likely to experience the warmest year on record in 2007,” surpassing the all-time high reached in 1998…..But a funny thing happened on the way to the planetary hot flash: Much of the planet grew bitterly cold.….In South America, for example, the start of winter last year was one of the coldest ever observed….. In Buenos Aires, it snowed for the first time in 89 years, while in Peru the cold was so intense that hundreds of people died….University of Oklahoma geophysicist David Deming, a specialist in temperature and heat flow, notes in the Washington Times that “unexpected bitter cold swept the entire Southern Hemisphere in 2007…..Closer to home, 44.5 inches of snow fell in New Hampshire last month, breaking the previous record of 43 inches, set in 1876. And the Canadian government is forecasting the coldest winter in 15 years.…. so relentlessly has the alarmist scenario been hyped, and so disdainfully have dissenting views been dismissed, that millions of people assume Gore must be right when he insists: “The debate in the scientific community is over.”….But it isn’t. Just last month, more than 100 scientists signed a strongly worded open letter pointing out that climate change is a well-known natural phenomenon, and that adapting to it is far more sensible than attempting to prevent it. (emphasis added)
ConservaCity 