Today’s Teardown: 59 Crescent Road

5 thoughts on “Today’s Teardown: 59 Crescent Road”

1. wondering why there are no teary posts lamenting the impending loss of this sweet home? could it be that those who lash-out against “teardowns” are themselves elitists who only have respect for the larger, more prestigious older homes in our town.

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2. Bill, you are right on the mark! A couple of weeks ago, there was a residential/commercial building that was posted as a teardown. No one got weepy, but someone wrote a satirical piece about saving the structure. I might be weird but I agree with the satire, the saving of a residential building with commercial garage bays is more valid than saving the Abel Bradley house. A residential/commercial building in Westport is a bigger architectural loss than an old houde with bell-shaped roof!

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3. Apples and oranges. Most of us who lament the loss of old houses regret losing historic, traditional homes that established Westport’s charming character. They needn’t be grand; in fact, the vast majority are much less “grand” than the new homes that replace them. It’s simplistic to imply that we believe no home should ever be torn down. And I don’t get the elitist reference: It’s elitist to want to preserve a small, old cottage that happens to be one of the least expensive houses in town, but not elitist to tear down less expensive housing stock and build $3m+ houses?

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4. Charming and ugly. The people that are trying to save old buildings want to save “charming” and let “ugly” be destroyed. It has nothing to do with historical significance. If it did, they would be lamenting the dual purpose (commercial and residential) “historical” structure that is being torn down on Hillandale. That structure harkens back to a time when people lived above their commercial establishments. You will never see another dual purpose structure built in Westport again. To me that building is “charming”, to the preservationists it is “ugly”.

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5. John’s right, apples and oranges. i don’t think either of us are “for” teardowns – again, i’m just curious why there’s such an uproar when a “prestigious” home becomes a candidate for demolition, yet there’s not a peep when a less attractive, less prestigious home/structure meets the same fate. especially when the latter represent the last few opportunities for anything even resembling affordable housing in this community.

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