New Maine Medical Garage - 222 St. John Street

[George Rheault]

In case you did not know, Portland is currently experiencing a new "Golden Age of Structured Parking" although it probably will turn out just as bad for healthy urbanism as the other eras.

The latest installment is before the Historic Preservation Board on Wednesday, April 18th (nicely jammed up with a simultaneous City Council meeting).

http://www.portlandmaine.gov/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Agenda/_04182018-2401?html=true

Since this is Maine Medical, expect a lot of boot-licking.  It is also hilarious/outrageous that the HPB, which mostly exists to fetishize pre-1910 Portland before the automobile era had yet to really impact Portland's built environment and only has "advisory" authority here, will probably be the city body that has the biggest impact on the final garage plan.

On a positive note, this new MMC employee garage could have been a lot worse...`

[Zack Barowitz]

It is sorta an interesting question of how a 3,000 stall parking garage could fit into an area that had seen significant destruction via urban renewal (destruction of Union Station and subsequent building of the highway which entailed more destruction). In addition, that area is/was the African American Pullman Porter neighborhood so who knows how that factors in. 

Apart from the historical questions some issues are:

- access to the garage from veterans bridge

- pedestrian routes from the garage to the MMC campus/agglomeration (heated sidewalks?)

- a ground level cafe/warming station in the garage where people can wait for the shuttle bus

I guess I'll be there tomorrow. 

Zack

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[George Rheault]

Good luck Zack on trying to soften the edges of this giant beached roll-on/roll-off vessel.  

The railroad managers are laughing at us from the grave.  They would never have believed they could still be oppressing the working classes of Portland over a century after sprinkling their stately mansions around the Western Promenade.  And poor Senator Muskie is turning over in his grave.  Never in his wildest dreams would he have anticipated his low-cost home rehabilitation programs funded during the Model Cities era would have spawned a militant class of NIMBYs opposed to ever letting the West End spread its wings when prosperity finally returned again to Longfellow's "beautiful town seated by the sea."

MMC's gigantic parking pile represents egregiously bad planning.  At best, it could have served as a podium for some tall residential towers so AT LEAST the St. John Valley neighborhood could have been counter-balanced with some human inhabitants to go with the 3000 soul-sucking parking spots.  The views would have been pretty nice too.

Unfortunately this kind of creativity would have required MMC to partner with experienced residential developers and the entitlement battles would probably have outdone the Bayside Midtown War in overall ferocity and expense.  MMC would probably rather bet on Medicare-for-all happening first than any building permits coming out of such a bitter scrum.

It is not enough for the WPNA to put all of Bramhall under museum glass, they also feel it is god's will that their unobstructed views out to the Jetport's runways and 295 should be enshrined forever.  And as a result of that power struggle, the only political compromise our city leaders could come up with was letting MMC turn St. John Valley into a permanent service alley.

  

But at least that service alley will have improved trail access to the top of the Western Promenade!  https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/wpromneighassn/ffRkNgMqAjs

  

[Nick Aceto]

Holy shit that was good.

I wish I could convince a few of our developer clients to take a closer look at the sjv. So much opportunity to do some exceptional urban design..

N

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From: pb...@googlegroups.com <pb...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of George Rheault <george....@gmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, April 17, 2018 2:44:21 PM
To: PB...@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: [pbpac] New Maine Medical Garage - 222 St. John Street

 

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[Zack Barowitz]

The toxic dirt mound next to Bunker Brewing is a sweet development site (if we can figure out a new place to dump the contaminated dirt).

Zack

[Abby King]

weighing in a bit late here but...just to add insult to injury...i was told at a recent Parkside Neighborhood Association Meeting that not only are all the ducks lining up in a perfect row for this behemoth parking garage but that there will be a separate, non-metro shuttle-bus to take employees from the new garage to the big hospital. just to make sure they don't walk, bike, or use public transit to travel those 2 blocks.

Abby King

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[zbar...@gmail.com]

Abby,

Yea there has been a lot of hand wringing on the part of the hospital about having the employee garage "so far away ." Likewise they apparently have not figured out how to do the shuttle bus turnaround (an attempt to buy the Eagles Club parking lot failed). At the same time, they seem completely uninterested in putting in a small coffee shop in the garage which to my mind would be a nice benefit to there employees. 

There is a meeting tomorrow with the neighbors where they'll give an update to the site plan. Un/Fortunately I won't be able to attend. 

Zack 

Sent from my iPhone

[Celina R Azevedo]

Wow. 

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[George Rheault]

If the neighborhood was willing to be bribed, they should have held out for a lot more than a vague $30K annual payola.

I personally would fire the ineffective representative negotiating on your behalf (Councilor Spencer Thibodeau).