Categories
Related Posts
High hopes
by Rod Lee, editor of INSIDE WORCESTERJuly 20th, 2010
Canal District businesses and residents can’t wait for $7.5 million in “Streetscape” money to kick in this fall and trigger a major cosmetic upgrade of the neighborhood: now Worcester’s funkiest (replacing Highland St. in that regard).
The question is, will it come soon enough for newer ventures like Blackstone Vignettes, Ziti’s, Smokestack Urban Barbecue and The Perfect Game to benefit?
Much is riding on Streetscape taking the resurgent Canal District to the next level with an infusion of such embellishments as new trees, new streetlights, new sidewalks, new street benches, new trash receptacles, new bus shelters and the like: an upgrade similar to the one that turned Shrewsbury St. into a showplace.
College students Ruby Wuabu and Iris Sanxhaku hold a banner promoting weekly wagon tours now taking place in the Canal District. (Rod Lee photo)
But, as VHB designers John Bechard and Mike Sutton pointed out at a June 22 meeting of the Canal District Business Association hosted by CDBA President John Giangregorio of Three G’s Sportsbar at Smokestack Urban Barbecue, “Harrison St. is still in the budget, but the city has to fund” that portion of the job. And, given the city’s tight fiscal situation, therein lies the rub.
Merchants, including Dorrie Maynard of Blackstone Vignettes on Harrison St., are watching, and waiting.
“It’s going to happen,” Maynard says of the Canal District’s looming heyday, when shops like hers will join established businesses like The Broadway, Weintraub’s, Kelley Square Pizza, Dzian Art Gallery, Jose Murphy’s, 86 Winter, the Hotel Vernon, Good as Gold Coffee and Joseph’s Lock & Safe as links in the chain. “You have to pay your dues,” Maynard said.
Maynard is no newcomer to the challenges of retail. She ran a nifty boutique opposite The Sole Proprietor on Highland St. for ten years, then a store at the Cider Mill in Sterling and a thrift store for Abby’s House here in Worcester. Her Blackstone Vignettes shop in space owned by Dino and Robin Lorusso seems like a good fit with its plethora of clothing, jewelry, artwork, books and home furnishings. And, she says, the Lorussos are “trying to push retail:” a good thing.
Still, the disappearance of ventures like Tush, on Green St., and now Debbie Burlingame’s Brickyard Place Antiques & Collectibles, on Water St., gives pause. And yet the Canal District is “buzzing,” as Giangregorio, who has taken the bull by the horns in bringing businesses together, puts it. Already under way are historical wagon tours featuring Bob Largess’ much-utilized wagon and people impersonating famous Worcester characters on Thursday evenings (these began July 8), an antique auto race and show (“The Snail’s Pace,” on September 12) and Canal Fest. Streetscape work in the Canal District starts this fall with final stripping and landscaping due to be done in 2012.
About Rod Lee
A career newspaperman, Rod Lee is founder, editor and publisher of Inside Worcester: a monthly journal of observation and opinion about people, places and things in New England's second-largest city. He is also the author of three books and is currently working on his first novel, based on the life of his maternal grandmother.Tags: 86 Winter, Blackstone, blackstone vignettes, broadway, business, canal district, dzian, good as gold coffee, hotel vernon, jose murphy's, kelley square, perfect game, smokestack urban barbecue, sole, streetcape, tush, Ziti's
This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 20th, 2010 at 5:31 am and is filed under Business.