Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Not One More Torn Down

Dear St. Johns Episcopal,

Perhaps you didn't know this but downtown Knoxville, where you have been for oh 100+ years, has a glut of surface parking and a lack of good building stock to work with.

Your current plan to demolish 2 perfectly functional buildings in favor of a small parking lot screams of both an ignorance of those who you live around and a complete tone deafness to the current situation in downtown Knoxville.

You inhabit one of the finest examples of architecture in this town and yet seem to have no sense of place. Please explain to the local community why there is such a desperate need to destroy thousands of feet of habitable space in favor of asphalt. I cannot tell you how incredibly angry I am at the prospect of this move and will be speaking out against what you are proposing.

I am a supporter of property rights, but please be aware of your responsibility to the community. Destroying high density buildings in favor of surface parking is a continued symptom of the short sighted approach to needs that has run rampant in this town for years.

Sincerely,

The Wigshop

PS- I have loved the taller building and walk by it almost daily. St. Johns if you want to sell it please let me know as I need a larger place to live with my burgeoning family. I'll even let you park behind there for free.

details:
http://archive.knoxmpc.org/zoning/downtown/agendas/oct2011/agenda.pdf

story to read, thanks Mr. Neely

Let the Design Review Board hear from you. (updated link thanks to alert reader)

Let St. Johns Episcopal hear from you.
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12 comments:

  1. AndreaOctober 19, 2011 at 6:53 PM

    Thanks for speaking out about this! I wrote to the church and to the design review board earlier today. So furious that this church is considering this course of action! They need to be flooded with angry and irate emails.

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  2. AndreaOctober 19, 2011 at 6:55 PM

    Also, that link to the Design Review Board doesn't have contact information but this one does: http://www.knoxmpc.org/zoning/downtown_members.htm

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  3. The PolOctober 19, 2011 at 7:08 PM

    thanks andrea, I updated that link.

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  4. AnonymousOctober 20, 2011 at 9:35 AM

    Wow. Thanks for bringing this up. It is the first I have heard of it.

    Hard to believe that this is even being considered in the year 2011. There's so little of our downtown left in tact that this would be a huge loss. Sending them an email right now.

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  5. John F. Weaver, Jr.October 20, 2011 at 10:07 AM

    I sent the design review board my best diatribe. One item of note, the email address for Kim Henry (chair person) seems to be out of service. Does anyone have an updated address?I will be posting this same message on Knox Heritage's Facebook page.

    This must be stopped!

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  6. AndreaOctober 20, 2011 at 10:09 AM

    I noticed Kim Henry's email was not working and I looked for another, but couldn't find anything. It was actually very difficult to find any of the contact information for the board members. I did get an email back from John Sanders of Sanders Pace Architecture and he said "Thank you Andrea for this email. We take this very seriously and I agree with your points entirely." So that is promising.

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  7. John F. Weaver, Jr.October 20, 2011 at 3:53 PM

    Someone has posted on Flory's blog that the Haslams belong to this church. I don't know if that is true. If someone could verify that, perhaps appealing to the Haslams would be in order.

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  8. NOctober 20, 2011 at 4:22 PM

    I read that as well, would be interesting to know if that's true...can't hurt to try I suppose.

    Would Knox Heritage be another one worth contacting or are they more involved in single family housing type stuff?

    I still don't understand the motivation behind all these demolitions. How does one profit off of such a thing?

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  9. John F. Weaver, Jr.October 20, 2011 at 6:11 PM

    I've been all over Knox Heritage, don't worry about that. They are aware and on it as well.

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  10. GamecockOctober 23, 2011 at 6:43 AM

    I'm an Episcopalian in maryville, so I don't attend St. Johns and was not familiar with the issue until I read this post.

    I would question the leadership of St. John's as to their priorities are in improving it's community: serving it's beauty, heritage, and human-scale livability or meeting a complaint about parking inconvenience.

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  11. VICTORIA, victoriaOctober 27, 2011 at 5:14 PM

    i absolutely LOVE your blog! so great!

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  12. AnonymousNovember 22, 2011 at 10:53 AM

    This is NOT the will of STJOHNS Church. This comes from a VERY dictatorial DEAN .STJOHNS parishioners are not allowed to vote on ANYTHING!! They are TOLD what has already happened!
    I would say most Parishioners do not even know this is happening!
    Please continue to oppose this
    outrageous move!

    ReplyDelete