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From the Editor: As schoolkids, we were given ample reason to be proud of our Hartford heritage, and we were indoctrinated with special appreciation for the people who gave us our parks. With Frederick Law Olmsted, the Hartford native who designed Manhattan's Central Park, these citizens were part of a movement that believed there should be green refuges from urban pressures within the city limits. Pond, Pope, and others donated land for this purpose, and responsible stewards preserved these spaces for me and my neighbors over the succeeding decades.
I discovered Elizabeth Park as a teenager. We played ball, we played cards, we drank orangeade, we watched girls, we rode bikes, we skated in winter, and we broiled in summer--accepting grudgingly that tiny Lizzy Park could never have a pool because any such facility would spoil the country-garden atmosphere. Even kids will make such sacrifices to preserve a world-famous park.
Beginning in the 1960's, Hartford underwent a transformation. Entire neighborhoods were plowed under to make way for interstate highways and commercial buildings. Grand plans for commerce were everywhere. The city's architectural heritage was ravaged. Displacement from the razed neighborhoods helped fuel an exodus of working class citizens to the suburbs.
In front of our eyes we saw blight creep up Garden Street, to the edges of Keney Park and Pope Park, engulfing Asylum Avenue at one end and Park Street at the other, as owner-occupants deserted in despair and were replaced by slumlords. Our response was to knock down more buildings. Arsenal came down. Clay Hill. Bellevue Street. Ann and High. Zion Street came to look like a hockey player's smile. On the big plots, privileged builders, crooks to a man, erected new slums with public money and knocked down good school buildings to replace them with bad ones.
By 1970, when I returned after four years of military service, Hartford had become a place to escape from. Most of the housing was under the control of absentee landlords. Middle-class kids were being removed in large numbers to private and parochial schools, skimming the cream off the the public school student body. Voting rates were an embarassment. One of the two daily newspapers was failing and did fail in due course, and the other was looking for a corporate buyer, which it found in the Los Angeles Times.
As vultures come to feast on a dead carcass, corrupt self-promoters descended on the governmental structure, and the responsible stewards were quickly replaced by political warlords. To these folks, a park is just vacant land. They have nice yards and no use for the public refuges that ordinary Hartford people need now more than ever.
These defilers proposed to sell Batterson Park to developers. They dismantled the Department of Parks and Recreation. They built a recreation and social services factory in the middle of Pope Park, and they turned Bushnell Park into an eyesore. Keney Park, one of the most beautiful urban forests in New England, they have maintained like a slum for 20 years.
Nobody is heard to whine, partly because so many of the people who ordinarily hold leaders accountable have long since left, but mostly because dissent is suppressed. The absentee newspaper, which has degenerated into a daily dose of celebrity pictures and entertainment features, invariably takes the side of the defilers, megabucks being at stake.
And so we now have a 300-seat restaurant and convention center on the pond at Elizabeth Park. The proprietors were clever enough to enlist as a spokesperson a former city official who happens also to be a member of the most notorious family in Connecticut, the Silvesters. Through her, they promised a snack bar and community recreation area for the refurbished Pond House (named for the Pond family, and not for the little body of water it overlooks). Ice-cream on a stick for the kids,we thought, and popcorn to feed the ducks. What they delivered was an exclusive restaurant and banquet hall, not as concessionaires, but as restaurateurs.
They cater to diners, who clog the park entrance at the rate of one or two people per car, who generate tons of garbage, who traverse the park's roads in their overpowered cars as if they were in some sort of race, who have displaced children and other duck-watchers from a comfortable seat at pond-side, and who have turned a refuge from commerce into a meal factory.
If we kids were willing to forgo a pool for the good of the park, I think diners have to be willing to give up their restaurant. They won't, of course, because, as any server of food will tell you, they are the lowest form of life. The rudest, the most wasteful, the greediest, the nastiest of all people are those who pay a lot of money to be served food. These compulsive self-gratifiers and proud conspicuous consumers would be a stereotype, if the picture we have of them were not so true.
I feel a wrenching of my gut when I contemplate the idea of their garbage overflowing a dumpster within a few yards of my favorite garden.
I used to like to go to the park to paint pictures. I'm not much of a painter, but the subjects are so compelling that I seldom fail to please myself. The last time I went, at the height of the rose season, they had a circus tent erected at one end of the garden, obscuring entire vistas. The next morning, the trash cans were overflowing. That's where we are now.
My wife Ruth likes to walk in the park. It's pretty dangerous now, with all the automotive traffic. And there are places you can't go. The patio by the pond, for example, which used to have a few picnic tables, is now cordoned off for diners. It's noisy there now, and the air is laced with exhaust.
Ruth attended a meeting some weeks ago and was accused by a diner of a being a park purist. And so she is. And so I'm publishing here all the stuff I've received on this over the past weeks and months. Steve Fournier
stepfour@stepfour.com
74 Tremont Street
Hartford, Connecticut 06105
860 233 3044
* * *
June24, 2001: Lindsey Karl
Top 30 Reasons Not to Approve a Zone Change for Elizabeth Park
1. In 1896 Elizabeth Park was given to the City of Hartford by Charles Pond in memory of his wife Elizabeth “…to be forever held and used as a public park."
2. In 1995 the auditorium was renovated with over $800,000 of state, local and private foundation funds raised by volunteers. Features included new acoustical treatments to improve sound quality, new lighting and paint to dispel the dingy atmosphere and a new, easily maintained floor finish to provide a surface suitable for dances. An air conditioning system was added to the entire building for those humid summer nights when thunderstorms drove concert-goers indoors and for the hot summer days when senior citizens ate brown bag lunches and played bingo in the auditorium. The old bathrooms were completely refurbished to be more easily maintained. Both the stage & the bathrooms were made accessible to the handicapped.
3. The beautifully revitalized Pond House has been converted into a private banquet facility without benefit of community input or approval.
4. On June 12, 2001, the New York Times featured news about private efforts that had refurbished for public use two deteriorated parks in Manhattan & Harlem. How ironic that in the same month Hartford & West Hartford are considering giving a publicly renovated park building over to private interests.
5. The fact that a small portion of the net profits from the banquet facility can be used to fund other initiatives in the park should not be justification to support for-profit use of a public building.
6. The Café/Banquet Facility has paid on average only slightly more than $700 per month to the ‘Friends’ over the past 27 months of operation. The City of Hartford’s Parks Trust has received only $7020.42 for its share of Pond House income. It has been argued that private use of the Pond House is necessary so that the funds it generates can be spent on necessary maintenance of the entire park. It appears that much of the spending has actually been used for the increased costs associated with this intensive use of the Banquet Facility, for example, in higher utility costs & the purchase of a $10,000 dividing curtain to allow use of the auditorium by more than one private client at a time.
7. The Town of West Hartford receives no real estate property tax on the Pond House even though the pending application calls for private, profit-making use of the entire building, including the existing patio & 2 new patios.
8. In the SDD application the City’s Michael Collins states that the standards of the R-10 zone have “proven problematic for this historic park.” For generations of Americans parks have been highly desirable assets in residential zones. Why do we need a new zone?
9. The R-10 zone does not prohibit the existing, non-conforming food service & community use of the auditorium in the Pond House, which has been in operation for several decades. Unfortunately the scope of the current operation of the Pond House has increased far beyond anyone’s expectations.
10. A restaurant of 50 seats for Park Visitors to eat in is a wonderful asset to the Park that was included in the Special Use Permit application approved by the Town in 1995 and does not require a zone change or any further Town approval.
11. This commercial development of the park mocks the West Hartford Comprehensive Plan that calls for policies that “continue to minimize impact of nonresidential areas on residential areas,” and that “continue to preserve the quality and integrity of residential areas through the use of Zoning Regulations and Code Enforcement.
12. The operation of a 312 seat Facility (200 Banquet Hall seats & 112 restaurant seats) can never be considered to be “in harmony … with the surrounding residential properties.”
13. Even less appropriate for a residential area & a public park is the use of the Pond House kitchen as an off-site catering facility that has recently taken on the contract to provide food service for the hugely successful Sunken Garden Poetry Festival in Farmington, CT, again increasing the frequency of truck traffic.
14. Whether for recreation, food service or entertainment, profit-making commercial facilities should properly be restricted to existing Business Zones.
15. The 1995 renovation of the Pond House was planned only to enhance existing park activities; in fact, in 1993 the Board of the Friends of Elizabeth Park urged that the Pond House should only “…be an incidental attraction to the Park & not a primary destination."
16. The private Banquet Facility severely restricts the community use of the Pond House auditorium that the people of this area have traditionally enjoyed for over 30 years. Events such as free concerts, recitals, contra-dances, family reunions, senior citizen’s activities and impromptu activities like chess games and kids putting on ice skates have been supplanted by corporate meeting, catered private parties and elegant receptions, at prices equal to those at exclusive country clubs.
17. The proposed reduction to 200 seats for the existing auditorium will have an adverse effect on some community events such as musical performances that in the past drew crowds of 250-300.
18. Construction of a new, outdoor “walk-up window” for take-out food will ultimately add to the ever-increasing intensity of use of the building. While park-users will purchase snacks at this window, it will also attract added traffic from people wishing to purchase the Café’s wonderful take-out food for consumption elsewhere.
19. The proposed construction of the 2 proposed future patios would expand the footprint of this building in an already fragile area of the park designated as wetlands.
20. The widening of the Asylum Ave entrance road to create a new parking area will threaten several stately oaks & is also in a wetlands area. Although the site plan shows the trees as untouched, excavation & new paving within 10 feet of these large trees can not be done without damaging their root systems.
21. The aggressively marketed Banquet Facility increases non-park-related traffic that is disruptive of traditional park activities. Ordinary park users should not have to compete for the park’s limited number of parking spaces with business people rushing to the corporate meetings & training sessions that are booked in the Pond House.
22. Traditionally parks are open ‘dawn to dusk’, yet the City recently decided to keep this 102-acre park open until 10:00 p.m. How can park & traffic safety be ensured in the dark?
23. The City has yet to submit a recent study of traffic & parking needs, even though traffic & parking problems in the Park have been steadily increasing in the last decade & have been greatly exacerbated by the intensive use of the Banquet Facility.
24. Of the 341 total parking spaces identified by the City for the Park, 104 spaces are located, not within the park, but on adjacent residential streets (30 spaces on Prospect Av., 35 on Walbridge Rd. and 40 on Asylum Av.)
25. Of the 236 on-site parking spaces, 104 spaces are required for the Café & Banquet Facility, which is often filled to capacity on spring & summer weekends when park use is at its peak, leaving only 132 spaces for use by all other park visitors: flower lovers, duck-feeders, picnickers, tennis players, Little League teams, lawn bowlers & others.
26. Allowing further commercialization of Elizabeth Park sets a dangerous precedent. What’s next, proposals for commercial use of other local parks like Beachland & Westmoor or of places like the MDC’s land in the reservoir area?
27. The 1995 renovation of the Pond House was first conceived of as a way to meet the recreational needs of all Park Users, but especially the children of this area for whom this is ‘the neighborhood park’. Let’s get to work bringing back the concerts, Family Fun Days, dances & other performances that used to be held here.
28. This very successful Banquet Facility should be relocated to an area like the Riverfront where it would be an asset to the City and the entire region.
29. West Hartford & Hartford already have plenty of wonderful restaurants, private banquet facilities & meeting spaces. Elizabeth Park is our only horticultural gem.
30.Elizabeth Park & all of its buildings must be kept open now and preserved for future generations as a place to appreciate natural beauty, horticultural achievement & historic consequence.
* * *
May 16, 2001: Jim Condren After listening to the concerns about public use of the auditorium expressed
at last night's meeting as well as comments regarding the cafe operators'
perspective, the essence of the conflict over the pond house became clearer
to me. I wish the personality factor (i.e. Louis) could be set aside and the
issue looked at solely as to which constituency should have primacy: park
users or private entrepreneurs. Should the needs, desires, potential for
public use of the building take a back seat to the business needs of the
entrepreneur? If this was a commercial zone designed for revenue generation,
I could see where city and town officials would want to help a particular
business survive. But in this case, it seems that the business plan of a
small group (the Food Group LLC and the Friends) is dictating the agenda for
use of a public space. We are all acting like the operation in place has
legitimacy. I think that Ed Rosenthal makes a good point when he says it is
easier to seek foregiveness than ask for permission. My kids have discovered
that ploy and it infuriates me.
Louis says his business plan requires private use and exclusive catering.
There is certainly a whole range of food service options that fall between
barebones snack bar and upscale eatery/banquet facility that could make a go
of it in that space. The issue of kid and family friendliness is very real.
Restaurants all give off subtle and sometimes not so subtle vibes about what
clientele they are designed to serve. We always asked if a place had high
chairs or booster seats, always a dead giveaway. I have never encountered a
dining establishment yet that successfully serves both low and high end
customers in a space the size of the pond house that does justice to both
groups.
I also find distressing the willingness of West Hartford officials to single
out Elizabeth Park and not treat this as a townwide park issue. It comes down
to philosophy of land use, whether parks are meant to support intensive
commercial use. It is not a clearcut choice, I guess, when you consider
Tavern on the Green or the Pump House Grill in Bushnell Park.
Anyway, which West Hartford officials decided it should be a single-park
issue and can that decision be changed?
* * *
June 21, 2001: Lindsey Karl Hello all you Friends & Neighbors of the Pond House -
I'm wondering how I might go about convincing some/many/all of you to come to the Public Hearings to protest the Zone Change (Thurs, June 28th @6:30 @ Town Hall), the impact of the new paving & patios on Wetlands (Mon July 2nd @7:00) & finally the SDD (Mon, July 9th @ 5:30).
In light of the huge numbers of "supporters" that showed up (including 'First Lady' Patty Rowland) for the April ZBA hearing, its very important that the Town hear the message that people from both Hartford & West Hartford are concerned about loss of community access, increasing damage to park land, often overwhelming traffic congestion & growing safety issues (too many cars jockeying for too few spaces vs kids on bikes /pedestrians)
Please speak up for the Park, and please let me know if I can count you in - if you're nervous about speaking, or are unsure what you might have to add to the forum, consider just standing up to state your name & address & that you are concerned about the effects of all this development on your neighborhood 'green space.'
A couple of quick notes:
The restaurant operation will remain unaffected by the zone change - it is a 'grandfathered' non-conforming use & can continue w/out regard to any ruling.
Any future application for a liquor license for the Cafe is also not part of these hearings.
Continued maintenance of the Pond house in its present 'Beautiful' condition (and, yes, I am bragging here) will also be unaffected by this - one of the main thrusts of our designs for the '95 renovation was to make the building considerable more 'maintenance-free', the old, scarred wood window frames have been replaced w/ anodizing aluminum, the perpetually filthy concrete floors are covered in dirt resistant, easily-mopped linoleum & ceramic tile. This is not to say that Louis is not doing a good job of keeping the building up, but to emphasize that the has changed a lot since its grubby days of old.
It was always planned that the concessionaire - Louis now, someone else 10, 15 years down the road - would pay a reduced rent (Louis pays an avg of $700/month) in exchange for keeping the building clean & open.
Please, please please, let me know who will help.
Lindsey
* * *
June 22, 2001: Peter B. This is all getting too confusing for moi. Here's my simple
compromise; let the status quo maintain in the pond house, but close all or
most of the park to automobile traffic/parking. Do the "planners" of West
Hartford have a P zone for pedestrian? Peter B.
* * *
May 21, 2001: Jim Condren I would love to see some sort of regular concert and community dance scene at
the auditorium. For this to happen some sort of critical mass of West
End/West Hartford folks are needed. Lindsey and I have thought a bit about
this but it seems our energies are focused on making sure that commercial use
doesn't monopolize the place. The no-potluck/outside caterers policy at the
auditorium also puts a crimp in community events.
Just read your extensive notes on your activities regarding the Pond House.
As far as the cafe/banquet facility business needs and expansion (i.e.
patios) proposals, I think they should be secondary to public use of the
park. The notion of a food service operation to enhance park use has been
lost. The business needs of an expanding banquet hall operation are now
dictating events and the process. Louis is confused over what constitutes
public use? Gimme a break. Charity fundraisers and meetings of nonprofits and
governmental agencies do not count as public use. Those groups still have to
pay for room rental and any food. I find such confusion disingenuous.
I had a takeout dinner at the park the same day you met with Louis. Lindsey
and I met with Dan Levine, a reporter from the Advocate. The takeout
operation is very much an afterthought and seemingly an annoyance for
restaurant staff. There is no prominent menu and prices sign as you see at
all snack bars. The little takeout flyer stuck on the glass next to the front
door is pitiful.
One last note: the graciousness with which you and other potential customers
or potential allies/adversaries are treated to in meetings with cafe folks
does not extend to children seeking refreshments or even families seeking ice
cream. They are treated as necessary impediments to the cafe's prime mission,
which is to operate an upscale eatery and private banquet hall in a public
park. Our concern should not be with whether or not they lost money in the
first year. It is whether they should be there in the first place and whose
interests should be served. Well, I have once again hopped up on my soapbox, but I find it hard not to,
considering the actions by the Friends and the cafe operators and city
officials that have brought us to this juncture.
* * * June 21, 2001: Jill Barrett Lindsey's e-mail about the "tear drop" parking lot in the west loop of
Elizabeth Park that the City of Hartford cites as a parking area to meet the
zoning requirements for large events held in the Pond House's banquet
facility, set off an alarming image in my mind. Picture arriving at the park
by car on a summer weekend with several carloads of family, friends and
picnic supplies and arriving at the lot near the oak grove. As you try to
pull into the lot you are stopped by a young man who gets up from a lawn
chair and tells you that the parking lot is a valet lot and can only be used
by people attending the private party in the Pond House. So, you then must
try to find a spot where ever you can and lug the heavy coolers, chairs and
equipment to the grove.
Folks, I've never had a family picnic in the oak grove. However, the numerous
times I've walked the west loop on weekends I've always been happy to see the
many families (mostly of color) who gather in Elizabeth Park for an outing.
I've been grateful to live in a city that provides a beautiful outdoor area
for people to enjoy that is open and free. While I've never tasted a morsel
at these cookouts or tossed a Frisbee, I've left satisfied just seeing people
enjoying being outdoors in a beautiful space in our public park.
Today the openness of Elizabeth Park is seriously being challenged by the
business of the Pond House Restaurant and Cafe. I don't oppose fine food,
large gatherings or even sipping white wine on the patio. I do oppose the
aura of "off limits" that the emerging use of this building has generated.
The idea that an outside patio that I used to sit on while our children fed
the ducks, can now only be used by paying restaurant customers is offensive.
Park visitors peeking in through the windows while a private party is in
progress cannot feel welcome. They're not. A maitre'd stand placed in the
middle of the building's hallway sends a message - do not walk beyond without
permission, even though the men's room that was designed to serve park
visitors is on the other side. It doesn't matter that the restaurant now
offers a bit of snack food or a small sign on the window indicates that there
are restrooms inside. The present operation exudes subtle messages, messages
that have no place in a public building in a public park.
Elizabeth Park is not the only city park where the city has condoned private
takeover of public space.
At Bushnell Park there are concerts at which a fence is set up in the area
closest to the stage and people with food or drink aren't allowed to sit in
the prime viewing/listening area. Those spots are reserved for concert goers
who might purchase food from the vendors who have set up within the fenced
area.
Last fall in Goodwin Park Georgette Yaindl's bike coaltion group was told
they couldn't bike through the park unless they paid the fee charged to autos
that came to view the holiday light show. Fee-based actvities set up to
profit individuals or organizations, no matter how worthy the cause, do not
belong in our public parks. They infringe upon the public's right to enjoy
public space - the very purpose for which parks were built.
Finally, the City Council has voted to support allowing the exclusive use of
over 100 forested acres of Keney Park for a privately run equestrian facility (this has yet to be
built).
Yes. There are features to the Pond House that we all can like. Most of us
have enjoyed lunch by the pond or a nicely catered party. It's the intensity
of use I have a problem with. The Pond House operation has overtaken a
fragile area and its present use no longer fits in its space so the zoning
that's served the park well for most of the last century has to be changed. I
would argue we need to change the use, not the zoning.
Jill
* * *
June 4, 2001: Jim Condren It is 10 a.m. Tuesday, June 19. Do you know what is going on at Elizabeth
Park? Fleet Bank is having some sort of employee outing, 100s of workers with
yellow Fleet tee-shirts are milling around the Pond House. Last week the park
was overrun by drug company conferees and other large assemblages of folks
attending seminars, conferences, etc. Our park has become the site for
corporate outings. Cars are parked all over. It looks like West Farms Mall
with trees. People, are you with us on this? Is this what our park isfor? It was not
designed or intended to be used as a corporate outing center, a la
Mountainside Recreational and Meeting Center in Wallingford. Park visitors
are being forced out, driven away by the overuse of the Pond House.
What can you do? Call or write West Hartford Town Council to oppose the zone
change. Contact the Friends of Elizabeth Park to object to their stewardship
of the Pond House. Tell the cafe operators that this is not what you want in
the park.
* * *
June 4, 2001: Jim Condren For those of you who read the Pond House Cafe review by the Hartford
Advocate's restaurant critics, here is what I sent in response:
To the Editors:
The search for the perfect meal sometimes blinds serious foodies to other,
equally important issues. That was the case when Rickand Judy Lunt, your
restaurant critics, chose to dine at the Pond House Caféand Banquet Facility
in Elizabeth Park in West Hartford. In a nutshell, the pond house is a public
building renovated with public funds that has been privatized without
consulting its owners, Hartford residents. Where once park visitors could eat
popcorn and softserve ice cream, pate and sorbet now rule and the pricey menu
keeps many on the outside looking in. While it is illegal for anyone to drink
a beer by the duck pond, invited guests and customers at the upscale private
banquet facility sip Chablis with impunity. Private functions dominate the
schedule in the auditorium that once held a variety of public concerts,
dances, children’s festivals and other community happenings. The dispute over
the private commercial operation at the Pond House is not simply West
Hartford being overly zealous in applying zoning regulations. It comes down
to whether a public building in a public park should serve all park visitors
or a select few. It is a question of whether you think West Hartford really
needs another trendy eatery or whether we should hold onto public and
greenspaces
* * *
June 21, 2001: John Gale, taking issue with Lindsey
From: John Q. Gale
To: 'architecture Works'
Sent: Thursday, June 21, 2001 12:15 PM
Subject: RE: Pond House hearings
-----Original Message-----
From: architecture Works []
Sent: Wednesday, June 20, 2001 9:51 PM
To: James Baker; Jillpbarrett@aol.com ; VRWC1954@aol.com ; Nonsuch7@aol.com ; casellar@ccsu.edu ; cohenda@home.com ; johnmichelleD@msn.com ; cdudley@hartsem.edu ; stepfour@internet-95.com ; Jgale@lawlordsofhartford.com ; Elizabe813@aol.com; DIonno@aol.com; Lindsey Karl; Kiprit@aol.com; Adeliamore@aol.com; Hank and Mary Murray/Sherwin; Christine Palm; rlpulda@lapm.org; martha_rosenthal@yahoo.com; iowadaisey@hotmail.com; Sally Taylor; KellyCPW@aol.com; Dmk3975@aol.com
Cc: Condren, Jim
Subject: Pond House hearings
(Gale's remarks after parens. He was too busy to write an actual letter.)Hello all you Friends & Neighbors of the Pond House -
I'm wondering how I might go about convincing some/many/all of you to come to the Public Hearings to protest the Zone Change (Thurs, June 28th @6:30 @ Town Hall), the impact of the new paving & patios on Wetlands (Mon July 2nd @7:00) & finally the SDD (Mon, July 9th @ 5:30).[John Q. Gale] If I were to protest the Zone Change it would be because Hartford is giving up too much by conceding that a Zone Change is necessary and by allowing West Hartford to subject the park to "higher standards and stricter scutiny" than all other zones in West Hartford. This I believe is heavy handed.
In light of the huge numbers of "supporters" that showed up (including 'First Lady' Patty Rowland) for the April ZBA hearing, its very important that the Town hear the message that people from both Hartford & West Hartford are concerned about loss of community access, increasing damage to park land, often overwhelming traffic congestion & growing safety issues (too many cars jockeying for too few spaces vs kids on bikes /pedestrians)
Please speak up for the Park, and please let me know if I can count you in - if you're nervous about speaking, or are unsure what you might have to add to the forum, consider just standing up to state your name & address & that you are concerned about the effects of all this development on your neighborhood 'green space.'
A couple of quick notes:
The restaurant operation will remain unaffected by the zone change - it is a 'grandfathered' non-conforming use & can continue w/out regard to any ruling.[John Q. Gale] Your statement here is contrary to the Cease and Desist order issued by the Town of West Hartford. The Town, last I heard, does not take the position that the restaurant use to which Louis is making is grandfathered. Unless you have different information, you should correct this statement.
Any future application for a liquor license for the Cafe is also not part of these hearings.
Continued maintenance of the Pond house in its present 'Beautiful' condition (and, yes, I am bragging here) will also be unaffected by this - one of the main thrusts of our designs for the '95 renovation was to make the building considerable more 'maintenance-free', the old, scarred wood window frames have been replaced w/ anodizing aluminum, the perpetually filthy concrete floors are covered in dirt resistant, easily-mopped linoleum & ceramic tile. This is not to say that Louis is not doing a good job of keeping the building up, but to emphasize that the has changed a lot since its grubby days of old. [John Q. Gale] Again, this statement is somewhat disengenuous. The present maintenance of the Pond House is a function of the use to which Louis has been able to make of it and the money he has been able to generate. If indeed, the use were changed to generate less money, there is absolutely no guaranty that the money would be available to continue to keep the building in its present condition.
It was always planned that the concessionaire - Louis now, someone else 10, 15 years down the road - would pay a reduced rent (Louis pays an avg of $700/month) in exchange for keeping the building clean & open.
Please, please please, let me know who will help.
Lindsey
* * *
June 21, 2001: Lindsey Karl, back to John Gale. John, you are misinformed - with regard to the restaurant/snack bar/cafe use the Town only objects to "outdoor table service" which did not occur prior to Louis' operation. They have also objected to a proposal (applied for, then withdrawn) for a "walk-up window." Apart from the 'non-conforming' restaurant use, they object to the new use of the "existing kitchen" as a commercial, Class 4 kitchen for off-site catering, (the previous kitchen had a Class 2 license.) As to maintenance, what info do you have that Louis does anything other than clean bathrooms, mop floors, etc? If you are referring to the celebrated $12,000.00 velvet curtain, I believe that is something that all park users could live without. If the Friends were to maintain the level of interest that they have shown of late in the Pond House I am sure we could depend upon them for plenty of petunias.
As for the "keep clear notice", no, I can't & didn't directly connect that sign to the Pond House, however, it does seem to be indicative of a climate change in the Park and is certainly not something that I have ever seen in the 47 years that I've been feeding ducks, smelling roses and listening to music in the Park.
* * *
June 24, 2001: Lindsey Karl
Hello again,
I'd forgotten to add some parking notes to my last message for those of you who have not read the complete details of the proposed zone change & SDD - there is an existing parking area referred to as the 'teardrop' (on the Asylum Ave side of the West Hill loop) that is currently often used by people picnicking in the oak grove. In order to provide enough parking for the Banquet Facility the proposal calls for converting this area into a "Valet Parking" zone - I have to wonder how this will be accomplished: Will a velvet rope be strung up in advance of weddings and the corporate outings that occur with increasing frequency? Or will 'valet/bouncers' come along 'asking' folks to move. Several week-ends ago trees & bushes around the Rose Garden were posted with flyers informing park users that "A wedding will be happening here, please keep this area clear." Well, excusssssse me.
Any questions/comments, call or email.
And please, speak up at the hearings.
Thanks Lindsey
* * * Need a Park Purist T-shirt? Call Ruth: 233-3044
* * *
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