82 Dover Street update: a 9-month demolition delay

[ron_newman]

[from Amie Hayes at City Hall, via Ward 6 Alderman Rebekah Gewirtz]

The Historic Preservation Commission determined 82 Dover Street Preferably Preserved at their monthly meeting last night. This determination begins a 9-month Demolition Delay period. During this period the HPC will work with the Applicant to determine if there are alternatives to demolition.

Currently, the Applicant is scheduled to discuss this building at the Public Meeting for Preferably Preserved Structures on Feb. 7. At this meeting, Historic Commissioners, Staff and the Applicant will discuss potential alternatives to demolition and, hopefully, come to a compromise regarding the demolition/development of this property.

Please let me know if you have questions or would like more information.

- Amie Hayes, Planner, Mayor's Office of Strategic Planning & Community Development, 617-625-6600 x 2534, ahayes@somervillema.gov

(Earlier discussion here.)

Comments

[maelithil.livejournal.com]

That's good.

The very least they can do is come up with a compromise similar to that of the new construction on Day Street that was tacked onto the Historic carriage house.

[ron_newman]

I hope so. This 9-month delay is the limit of what the Historic Preservation Commission can do, unless the Board of Aldermen decide to add the house to the city's historic district (quite unlikely).

[ron_newman]

Which house on Day Street?

[maelithil.livejournal.com]

31, maybe? It used to be a small, red Victorian that matched the others on the street, now it's a sprawling green monster tacked onto the original structure. They just completed construction late this summer, it sold as two condos and a single family home (for a total of almost 3.5 mil).

Still, better than a tear down.

[ron_newman]

Something similar recently happened to the first house on the south side of Orchard Street, east of Day Street.

The house at the northwest corner of Orchard and Chester is also quite a bit larger now than it once was. I like the result in that case.

[maelithil.livejournal.com]

I think the first house you mention was flipped by the same developers that did the job on Day St. It's a triple decker, right?

[samcoren.livejournal.com]

It's a sticky situation. The history nerd in me wants to see more restoration projects on historical housing than demolitions on them, but doing a good restoration job can be prohibitively expensive depending what work needs to be done. Then again...if you have a million bucks to throw toward on a tear down, chances are you can afford to do it. But then there's the flip side - you paid a million for a piece of property and if you want to tear down the house on it and build something else [within all the building codes of course etc] then you should be able to.

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

Ouch for the buyers of this property. 9 months of carrying costs. Shouldn't the historical status be determined on all properties now, not at the point of someone considering a renovation. Stay away all those who wish to invest in our city is the message we're sending. Also, I wondering if Somerville is flattering itself on thinking it is full of historically significant houses that would be a shame to lose. Other than the round house and maybe a few others, I don't walk by houses very often that seem special. Also the ones I see with historical signs on them don't seem that special.

[ron_newman]

I doubt that anyone would spend $1 million on a house more than 50 years old without first knowing that we have a demolition delay ordinance. At least I hope anyone with that much money would do a little research.

The owner does not need permission from the historic preservation commission in order to renovate this house within the next 9 months, only to demolish it.

If you walk a couple blocks over to Chester Street, you'll see what can result if there's no friction against the demolition process. You've got a bunch of charmless boxy apartment buildings from the 1970s mixed in with the grand old homes, in both Somerville and Cambridge.

[somerfriend.livejournal.com]

They probably don't have enough money to get in a time machine and see if the government is going to stop the demolition. The uncertainty is a turn off for people who want to invest in our city and reduces the sales value for existing property holders. The uncertainty of what the government is going to do cannot be eliminated through research.

[emcicle.livejournal.com]

I agree.... but I suspect that the buyer is probably a developer who will build a multi-building/multi-unit high end luxury condos, flip them, and then be gone.... so, i have less sympathy for that. (but I could be wrong, maybe the buyer is an individual who wants to rebuild just a single family there....)

[ron_newman]

I don't understand what you mean about a time machine. If you want to tear down any building in Somerville that is more than 50 years old, the Historic Preservation Commission can review it and potentially impose a 9-month delay. This applies only to tear-downs, not to renovations or restorations or additions.

Many other towns and cities have similar 'demolition delay' ordinances.

[maelithil.livejournal.com]

Please.

I bought a historic house in Somerville seven years ago and it was made very clear to me what the limitations were. No, I cannot tear down the house and build condos, not without a long, drawn out battle with the city. I knew that going in. If the developer didn't know, that's his problem.

Also, reduce the sales value? You realize that property values in Davis Square are skyrocketing? Again, the condos across the street from my house (CONDOS!!!!) sold for almost a million apiece. The carriage house, a single family with no yard, sharing walls and parking spaces with the two condos, sold for 1.4 mil. If there's one thing we don't need to worry about is property values.

[ron_newman]

Just to clarify for everyone listening:

There are two kinds of historic protection in Somerville. The strong kind is called a "historic district", and it covers houses like maelithil's. Any change to the exterior requires approval from the Historic Preservation Commission. Demolition would be almost impossible.

The weak kind applies to any building 50 or more years old, such as 82 Dover Street. It applies only to demolitions. The Historic Preservation Commission reviews all such demolitions and can order a 9-month delay if they determine that the building is both "significant" and "preferably preserved". The owner can either wait out the 9-month delay and demolish freely, or he can meet with the Historic Preservation folks to try to find a way to develop the property without demolition.

[ron_newman]

126 Orchard Street. I'd call it a 2 1/2 story house with a peaked roof, not a three-decker. It's now a three-unit condo. I'm amazed there aren't more units in it now, because the addition was huge.

I think both this and 31 Day show reasonable respect for the character of the neighborhood, and I'd be happy to see the same result at 82 Dover. I doubt that a tear-down followed by brand-new construction would fit in nearly as well.

I know nothing about the ownership history of either house. I thought that the developer of 126 Orchard said he planned to live in the house, but I could be mistaken.

[rethcir.livejournal.com]

I wonder if, in 100 years, someone will see the charm in 70's apartment buildings. Remember, someone thought the West End was ugly enough to demolish, it'd probably look like the back bay now.

[ron_newman]

I fully understand that comment, given that I live in a 1929 brick apartment building that probably replaced two or three old mansard-roofed houses.

I see four other such apartment buildings within a block of here, that were probably put up around the same time. The people living here then probably thought these developments damaged the neighborhood's character, too ;-)

The 1970s brick buildings stand out from the 1920s-30s brick buildings because of their total lack of exterior detail and ornamentation.

[amy-s1.livejournal.com]

Personally, I think a lot of the homes in Somerville have more potential than most people see on the surface, and would much rather see a restoration than a tear-down in most cases. While most are not homes of grandeur, these are truly antiques that we live in. It's pretty amazing what some paint stripping, skim coating, floor sanding, and removal of vinyl siding can do for an old house. When we renovated I refused to remove any of the wood trim and instead I stripped all of the paint myself and we repainted it. I kept all of the bennington doorknobs, mortise locks, and hinges because as they have been in the house for 115 years and are still working perfectly fine. A little sanding and painting and they were like new.

I had a civil engineer in our house looking at a beam and he said the staircases built in these houses are structurally superior to the ones built now, and most carpenters today are unable to reproduce them. Not to mention they have much more character.

The beams are made with hardwoods that are probably 200-250 years old and stronger than any trees left in the northeast after 1930 when most of the old growth was gone.

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

How often do they decide not to impose the 9-month delay?

[ron_newman]

I don't know the answer to that. You'll have to ask them. If you do, please report back here.

(There are actually two different questions here: how often do they impose the delay, and how often do they do it against staff recommendation, as happened here?)

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

I don't see the need for the historical relativism.

Sometimes the consensus opinion (if such a thing exists) does change. But there are plenty of things that were ugly when they were built, and will still be considered ugly decades down the road. And there were plenty of people who wanted to save the West End.

The problem is when the people in charge make bad decisions that permanently affect everyone else.

[boblothrope.livejournal.com]

I think small apartment buildings mixed together with historic urban houses is a great development pattern. Some of the nicest neighborhoods have this, for example Harvard Square and Coolidge Corner.

We *need* more housing, and the best place to put it is in walkable neighborhoods near T stations. Inevitably that means some single-family homes will get torn down.

If the problem is the unornamented boxiness, then there should be zoning laws restricting that, not apartment buildings in general.

[ron_newman]

But we also can get some of that new housing by sensitively adding on to houses that already exist. This thread has named several local examples.

I'm not totally against tear-downs, and neither is the city. The 9-month delay gives everyone involved the short pause that may be needed in order to develop a better proposal. Maybe we'll still have a tear-down in the end, but the replacement will be designed to mesh well with its neighbors.

[ron_newman]

I don't think zoning laws can demand ornamentation and beauty. They can require special permits with design review, in some cases.

[keithn.livejournal.com]

Ron, I don't understand your obsession with preserving this house. There are thousands of houses just like this in the City of Somerville. There are entire streets and neighborhoods of them. This house probably bears little resemblance to how it did many years ago, anyway. It just looks like a vinyl monster to me.

I feel bad for the person who bought this only to be told he has to wait nine months for pretty much no reason at all. People are being a pain in the ass for no other reason besides the fact that they can be.

[ron_newman]

I'm not "obsessed with preserving" the house. I did not even send a letter to the Historic Preservation Commission about it, let alone testify at Tuesday's hearing. What I am doing is informing the neighborhood about what's going on in it. If the result is a better development (tear-down or otherwise), I think the delay is worthwhile.

I don't know whether anyone at all lobbied the HIstoric Preservation Commission to preserve the house. This is an automatic process that always occurs when anyone wants to tear down a building more than 50 years old in Somerville. The Commission reviews all such demolition permit applications and decides whether or not to impose the 9-month delay.

[gruene.livejournal.com]

The West End wasn't demolished because it was ugly. It was demolished because poor people lived there.