Tag Archives: Main Street

Into The Woods

Posted on January 20, 2013 | 4 comments

In today’s super-safety-conscious times — when street signs warn there’s a stop sign ahead, and you (wink, wink) can’t make a left turn out of Stop & Shop or Saugatuck Elementary School — it’s amazing that one Westport roadway has become more dangerous.

A while ago, the guardrail was removed from a stretch of Main Street. It’s on the west side — on your left, if you’re headed out of town toward Bogey’s 323 whatever.

Main Street, Westport CT

True, no driver, bicyclist or jogger has plunged into woods.

Yet.

I wonder why the guardrail is gone — and if whoever removed it thinks a few wooden horses are a good replacement.

4 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Totally random

Tagged

Main Street Rising

Posted on December 5, 2012 | 21 comments

Tomorrow (Thursday, December 6, Town Hall, 7 p.m.), the Planning & Zoning Commission will review a text amendment involving retail uses above the 1st floor on Main Street.

Currently, only offices, restaurants, apartments and retail food establishments are allowed above the 1st floor in the “Business Center District” zone. The amendment — submitted by architect William Achilles — would greatly expand the ability of retail uses to occupy space on upper floors.

There must have been some grandfathered uses. Klein’s (now Banana Republic) operated on the 2nd floor — in fact, they built it during one of their many expansions.

The Sport Mart — now god knows what, near the cut through to Parker Harding Plaza — used to sell ski equipment on its 2nd floor.

Today there’s an art gallery on the 2nd floor of the east side of Main Street — the same spot where (I think) the old African Room used to be. Further down, just past Brooks Corner, check out these 2nd-floor stores:

And before it moved to the 4-story 125 Main Street building, didn’t the Gap use its 2nd floor?

This seems like a no-brainer. Is there any good reason to prohibit businesses from operating on an upper floor — particularly when they’ve done it before?

Besides — judging from the shops that remain closed, long after Hurricane Sandy — I bet insurance companies would love a 2nd or 3rd floor store.

21 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Local politics

Tagged ,

Stumping On Main Street

Posted on November 21, 2012 | 29 comments

‘Twas the day before Thanksgiving — and the start of what everyone calls “the holiday season” — but downtown Westport looked decidedly unfestive.

This morning, work crews chopped down every tree on the west side of Main Street — right to ground level.

Word on the street (ho ho) is that light poles will replace the trees, which were planted only a few years ago. We’ll have to see if this is a step forward — aesthetically and Westportically speaking — or not.

Paul Bunyan arrived while several stores remain shuttered — more than 3 weeks after Sandy surged up Main Street, onto floors loaded with merchandise and into basements housing electrical equipment.

The locked doors and we-don’t-want-you-to-see-in windows added to the dismal atmosphere, on what is usually one of the most bustling days downtown.

At the same time — slowing what little traffic there was, while adding a decidedly un-holiday glow — work continued on the new “bump-out” opposite Westport Pizzeria.

Meanwhile, directly across Main Street, the little patch of life on the corner of Elm Street shows the after-effects of a recent accident. An enormous truck failed to make the tricky turn.

But hey. We’ve still got that magnificent tree next to Vineyard Vines.

For now, anyway.

29 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Local business, Restaurants, Weather

Tagged , ,

The View From Downtown

Posted on October 29, 2012 | 5 comments

Just after 12 noon, the winds still have not yet grown fierce. It has not yet started to rain.

But here are 2 views of downtown — Main Street and Parker Harding Plaza — courtesy of Beth Carter. This is definitely a storm to worry about.

5 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Weather

Tagged ,

Bedford Square: A Downtown Game Changer

Posted on September 28, 2012 | 55 comments

Paul Schott of the Westport News called the 60,000-square foot mixed-use complex planned for the site of the current Westport Y “arguably the most far-reaching commercial real estate project planned during the last generation in downtown Westport.”

It isn’t.

There’s no “arguably” about it. This is The Big One. A true downtown game changer.

The proposed Bedford Square plan, looking northwest. The new buildings (shown) would replace the current YMCA Weeks Pavilion, and 35 Church Lane.

The development — announced Tuesday — would keep the original Bedford Y. The old Tudor building at the corner of the Post Road and Main Street has, since 1923, defined downtown.

But the Weeks Pavilion — the hideous 1978 addition that, in part because of its unwieldiness, has driven the Y to Mahackeno — would be torn down.

So would 35 Church Lane, an 1890 Queen Anne-style house. That will arouse a lot more sentiment than the lumpy, leaky Weeks Y.

The block — extending out to Elm Street — will be the site of a new “Bedford Square.” Retail, residential, restaurant and office space would ring a large public plaza. Public walkways will tie the entire area in with adjacent downtown areas.

The 30 residential units include 550-square foot studio apartments, on up to 1,800-square foot 2-bedroom homes.

Also planned: a 100-car underground parking garage.

A view of Church Lane, looking east. The current firehouse portion of the Y is at left; Patagonia is on the right.

Construction could start in the fall of 2014 — assuming (a big “if”) the new Y is ready then, and the lengthy town board review process goes smoothly.

Construction is expected to take 18 to 24 months. That would be a chaotic time downtown.

But — judging from the initial rendering — Bedford Square could be a handsome, well-planned, creative and unifying addition to downtown.

Coming as it does while Lou Gagliano’s 2020 Committee is also working to make downtown more pedestrian friendly, the timing seems right.

We’ve seen what the addition of one restaurant (the Spotted Horse) and one retailer (Urban Outfitters) can do to Church Lane. Imagine what an integrated, block-long plan could accomplish.

The Bedford Square plan is definitely — not arguably — “the most far-reaching commercial real estate project planned during the last generation in downtown Westport.”

Let’s hope it works out better than a previous, similarly touted project 60 years ago: Parker Harding Plaza.

Then again, it can’t turn out worse.

Part of the courtyard that would be ringed by new buildings on Church Lane and Elm Street.

55 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Local business, Looking back, Restaurants

Tagged , , , , ,

Trashing Downtown

Posted on August 7, 2012 | 24 comments

The Downtown Merchants Association can’t do much about the same-old, same-old mix of (mostly women’s clothing) chain stores. It can’t instantly turn Main Street into a hip, cool destination.

But it can clean up garbage.

There are already trash receptacles downtown. Some people find it easier to dump garbage right next to them.

According to Westport Patch, the DMA recently purchased 5 new trash cans, and 2 cigarette receptacles, for the area. The total cost was $4,200.

They’ll be “strategically placed” downtown, in areas where people congregate. That includes Parker Harding Plaza by the river, and near benches.

That’s interesting — and necessary. Between workers on cigarette breaks and shoppers who casually leave coffee cups wherever they please, the supposedly high-end area often looks scruffy.

But the money quote belongs to Stephen R. Desloge, president of the DMA.

“It’s a challenge to find out who is supposed to clean up downtown,” he says.

A challenge? The answer is simple:

All of us.

24 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Organizations, People

Tagged ,

Chico’s Is Cool

Posted on July 17, 2012 | 27 comments

Temperatures soared near 100 last weekend. But downtown Westport held its annual “Sidewalk Sale,” so even more stores than usual flung open their doors. Air conditioning poured forth, chilling Main Street.

And, as noted here less than 3 weeks ago, wasting precious energy and annoying a sizable contingent of consumers.

Chico’s was not one of the shops called on the “06880” carpet pavement. Perhaps the women’s clothing chain has a high environmental IQ.

Perhaps they read this blog.

At any rate, here’s a sign posted on the front and back doors:

(Photo/Judy Crowley Simonetti)

The doors stayed shut, unless someone went in or out.

And — contrary to merchants who claim they “have to” keep doors open to attract customers — business boomed.

Chico’s is Da Man.

27 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Environment, Local business

Tagged , ,

From House Of Morgan To Abe Fortas

Posted on July 8, 2012 | 36 comments

For the past few days, “06880” readers have had fun with photos of Main Street taken from the 1930s through ’50s.

Alert reader Fred Cantor sent along this photo he took in 1976. (That spot seems to be a perpetual photographer’s paradise.)

West Lake — at the time one of Westport’s only “foreign” restaurants — had moved in next to the park.

Liverpool — a hippie clothing store — replaced the long-departed Kiddie Lane and House of Morgan.

But Welch’s Hardware was still there.

Welch’s was more than just a long-lived hardware store. At least twice, it popped up in national magazines.

On March 16, 1946 it was on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post. Westport illustrator Stevan Dohanos took a few liberties — he added a floor, for instance, and the “US 1” sign points the wrong way — but Welch’s was the model for what the magazine called “Hardware Store at Springtime.”

And in 1968, Supreme Court judge (and part-time Westport resident) Abe Fortas had just been nominated by President Johnson to be Chief Justice. Fortas would later withdraw due to ethics problems, but on July 5 — almost exactly 45 years ago today — Time magazine opened its profile on him this way:

“Will you trust my judgment, Mr. Fortas?”, asked the salesman at Welch’s Hardware Store in Westport, Conn. Dubiously, the Chief Justice-designate of the U.S. fingered the new, chemically treated dustcloth, examining it carefully by sight and feel. Finally, aware perhaps that this was a matter beyond his competence, he concurred with the clerk’s opinion.

Tramping around the narrow streets of Westport, accompanied by TIME Washington Bureau Chief John Steele, Fortas was enjoying the scruffy anonymity of any other summer refugee from the city. In baggy grey pants, a flame-red cardigan sweater, scuffed brown shoes (one with a tongue missing) and…

Can you think of any other Main Street store that received national attention like that? And no, the Gap, Banana Republic and Pottery Barn don’t count.

36 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Looking back

Tagged , ,

House Of Morgan: The Sequel

Posted on July 2, 2012 | 24 comments

Yesterday’s photo of Main Street’s long-forgotten House of Morgan spurred alert “06880” reader Gary Singer to send one of his own.

It’s taken from almost the same angle as the one Bill Scheffler sent. However, Gary says, this one —

— was taken a decade earlier.  He guesses it’s the late 1930s or early ’40s.

In Gary’s photo, Brightwood Market is where both Kiddie Lane  and House of Morgan eventually settled.

Meanwhile, alert “06880” reader R. Hammond logged onto Ancestry.com, and found 2 city directories.

He says the House of Morgan appears in 1950 as a gift shop at 13 Main Street. It’s owned by Carl L. and Florence E. Morgan. Seven years later it was still listed as a gift shop. Elsie Zabelle was the 1957 owner.

The 1950s era photo, showing the “House of Morgan” (center).

Alert “06880” reader Jack Whittle added more info:

Westport’s town clerk online info shows a trade name for “House of Morgan” filed on 9-27-51 by Carl and Florence Morgan, and a subsequent filing for the same trade name by Mary Lucas Crawford on 3-31-54. Carl and Florence Morgan look to have bought some some property on Wright Street in 1944. (I also see that Carl Morgan’s death certificate was filed on 6-5-53, and it looks like he died in Massachusetts on 10-5-52).

As for date of photo, I am guessing early ’50s. Welch’s Hardware was incorporated in 1946; the House of Morgan info, and that woody wagon parked in front looks late ’40s, and the Kiddie Lane trade name was filed in 1949.

Checking R. Hammond’s city directory info, I noticed that Morgan was not the only “House of…” in Westport. There was also a “House of Byse” listed on State Street East (now called Post Road East).

It was on the ground floor of the office building just east of where Great Cakes and the gas station are today. I vaguely remember it from my youth, though I always thought it was the “House of Buys.” (Apparently it was cleverly named for its owner, Abraham B. Beiser.)

Well, that’s at least 2 Westport “houses” that were not torn down and replaced by mansions.

24 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Local business, Looking back, People

Tagged , ,

The House Of Morgan?

Posted on July 1, 2012 | 14 comments

Alert “06880” reader Bill Scheffler sent this photo along:

Despite 2-way traffic, it’s Main Street near the Post Road intersection. The boy is rounding the corner near the Bedford (old) YMCA building.

Architecturally, the stores look familiar. But today they’re long gone. From the left there’s Grey’s Drug Store; something that starts with “Kiddie”; the House of Morgan; Welch’s Hardware, and the Westport Food Center.

Bill wonders — and so do I — “What the hell was the House of Morgan?”

He also would like to know the date. He offers one clue: The cars are pre-1950.

Bill should know. Among his many activities, he’s chairman of Fairfield County Concours d’Elegance, the fabled antique and collectible automobile show.

Click “Comments” to share insights into the year, Main Street of yore — or the House of Morgan.

14 Comments

Posted in Downtown, Looking back, People

Tagged , ,