Buffalo Rising Online

The message is obvious to everyone except Buffalo's developers.

Look at the cheap vinyl and aluminum sided suburban farm houses they are building on the eastside as excuses for infill. They have no connection to Buffalo!

Period houses with period details with stone or brick, shingle or clapboard, big windows with lots of light, bay windows, porches, etc.

Ashland is one example but Buffalo has examples from every style though obviously certain periods predominate. The message is obvious to all but Buffalos developers that urban infill can work if homes are rebuilt with similar scales, details, styles, accents, etc as are found in Buffalos existing in-demand homes.

Developers dont believe it but Buffalonians would buy a $300,000 period home in Buffalo nearly as easily as they would buy one in lancaster. If it was a large enough infill development.

If anyone wants an idea that would turn around every city block to be more valuable than their suburban equivalents. Create a neighborhood association for every city block that can be filed with the city which takes everyones backyard and makes it shared property, then the neighborhood association can take an empty lot on the block and buy it for community offstret parking or use the shared backyard for a community pool, playground or tennis court....for the nature lovers a preserve with a koy pond...for the farmers an orchard....

Point is that in many cases demolition doesnt work and neither does infill, especially if it looks cheap and out of place which most new homes do next to older homes.

Infill can work in Buffalo IF developers bring the details that people love about older urban homes and communities into infill.

its not communist at all, people would retain individual ownership of their property but in order to them to share portions of their property with others for a group project like a pool or tennis court or whatever a neighborhood needs to be formed or if an accident happens whatever property owner could be help liable and sued. Basically a neighborhood association just allows people to share their backyards without fear of lawsuit.

and if one empty lot on each city block was purchased by a neighborhood association, then we could solve much of the off street parking problem while maintaining the livability and urban density of our communities.

Plus for alot of reasons people like the idea because the shared backyard concept is safer for urban kids than the parks and other typical street gathering places where they can be approached with any number of temptations.

This has existed in various forms for a very long time and its been very successfull in allowing urban properties to compete with suburban homes that have large yards and attached garages.

Steel is dead right, where good urban design and solid well buildings exist people have the opportunity to invest and more importantly take real pride in their homes. I wish the city would take a look at what works, and why and use it as an example of how to spur development or keep investments over the long term.

Ashland, Norwood, Park, N Pearl, Whitney, Prospect, Columbus, Porter, Pennsylvania + others have all retained relative stability even when problems start knocking on their door or take over neighboring streets because the quality of housing and beauty of the streets demands so. People are more willing to hold on and invest during the harder times if they feel that pride in their streets.

You can even see this in parts of the east side where pockets of quality housing existed and retained their value. E Morris, Victoria, Wakefield, Hamlin Park, Timon etc.

People moved away from the plop buildings of the older generation (telescoping immigrant homes) for a reason but yet the city continues to build that type of cheap architecture that will never retain its value in the long run on the east and west sides. If we are going to rebuild, it should be done in such a way that 50 - 100 years from now those structures will not only still be structurally sound but standing tall with a new generation of owners. Our tax dollars should get the longest value possible, not the quick fixes.

This goes to infrastructure as well.. that is a whole different story.. BRO where is the article about Hertel or Main Streets new infrastructure already falling apart because of crap materials and the low bidder mentality.

I have not seen any new telescoping homes built in the city. 200-300k homes in Lancaster are still getting you vinyl and plywood, maybe a brick front facade.