Why Density? Well This Is Why.

I had a good albeit trying evening out in Worcester on Wednesday night. After bringing the car to Lou's Custom Exhaust on Harding St Tuesday morning my car no longer sounds like a heavy duty front end loader so I don't mind driving it around town. If you haven't heard of these guys what they do is pretty cool. They are able to do everything for a cheaper price then the competition because they manufacture all their exhaust systems on site. I sat and watched as they custom cut all the pipes for my car right in their shop. Pretty neat.

For entertaining/movie watching purposes I am in the hunt for a new TV. Being as I like to give the local folks my dollar first I went over to Percy's on Gold Star to see what they could offer.

FAIL

Percy's is only open until 6pm on weekdays so obviously they do a brisk housewife business. Good for them. Odds are I won't be back. What ridiculous hours for a retail store to keep. I mean open a little later and close a little later, you know?

From there I hit up Best Buy in the Greendale Mall and then swung over to the Shoppes at Blackstone in Millbury to price out TV's at the soon to be an eye sore Circuit City and Target. 8 minutes from the Greendale Mall to The Shoppes. Not bad.

After that it was back into the city for something to eat. I drove back into Worcester via 146 and took a right onto "Olde" Millbury St and into the Canal District. I briefly though about Baja Grill but decided to keep going to see what captured my interest. I drove across Kelley Sq and down Water St seeing the fairly new Cavo Doro which used to be the old Club Car. I figured I would stop in and see what the food there was all about.

FAIL

Per the bartender the kitchen is closed for a little while because it wasn't doing so well. Really? You've only been open for how long and you are already drastically altering your business model. Most people I know probably don't even know you exist. Wow.

I parked on Harding St so instead of getting back in my car I decided to try another place I have yet to go to, Roma Pizzeria. Roma is a restaurant that has opened over the past year that is brought to you by the same folks who ran Primo's on Shrewbury St and The Restaurant at Union Station. Dude makes good food and Roma is no exception. Brick oven style pizza with fresh toppings and a sauce that was a little chunky which was nice. Will I be back? Well here is where we get to the title of the post. I know, it took a while.

As I am sitting at my table looking out onto Harding St I am struck by a couple things. The first is that Roma has four, maybe five, parking spots of their own. Second I think about how many people are actually living right here. There's the newly redone apartments directly upstairs from the restaurant, which actually probably give them a little bit of business and there are a few people living over on Water St across from Blu. Other than that, everyone who comes to Roma has to go out of their way to go there. Wait through a bunch of traffic signals, deal with city traffic, find a parking spot. So again I ask, will I be back?

I live right Downtown so yes, I will be back. It's right around the corner, and especially when the weather turns it will be no big deal to walk down there. If I lived over on the Westside though would this pizza be good enough to sit through 15 red lights on my way here? Probably not. That is nothing against Roma though. Fact is the pizza here is probably better than 90% of the pizza you'll get in Worcester. But here is where the problem of neighborhood density comes in and the dirty little secret of why so many folks probably consider opening a storefront in the urban core of Worcester to be such a losing proposition.

If you are going to open a new retail, food, or bar business in Urban Worcester you better be good. You better be really good. Destination good. You can't afford to be anything less. Most of your potential clientele doesn't live right around the corner. Most of them are going to have to get in their car, circle the neighborhood a few times to find a parking spot, walk a couple blocks, maybe obtain a designated driver or a cab. Long story short they are going to have to go out of their way.

Odds are your business isn't going to be this way though. It's not going to be a destination. Odds are if you know what you are doing it's just going to be pretty good, AND THERE ISN'T ANYTHING WRONG WITH THAT AND IN A CITY THE SIZE OF WORCESTER THIS SHOULD BE ENOUGH TO KEEP YOU IN BUSINESS.

There are probably close to 100 stores, restaurants, bars and specialty shops in the city that are pretty good with varying levels of success. It's the lack of success of the good "neighborhoody" type places though that gets me down. Take a bar like The Greyhound in Kelley Sq which is a great neighborhood bar. Aside from the Scotch selection (which in my opinion has no equal inside the city limits) there is nothing to really draw you to the Greyhound. Fill the Canal District with 40 or younger urban minded professionals though and I would lay money on the Greyhound maybe not being packed, but doing a very good, very steady business. Same with Roma, same with Baja Grill.

The sad part about Urban Worcester though is that we aren't just losing our best and brightest college graduates, we are also losing our best and brightest entrepreneurs, whether due to losing their shirts simply for not being able to open a 5 star establishment, or due to them seeing the writing on the wall and choosing to go elsewhere with their ideas.

WE NEED PEOPLE. WE NEED PEOPLE WITH MONEY, AND WE NEED THEM LIVING IN THE URBAN CORE. I WILL VOTE, ENDORSE AND TIRELESSLY CAMPAIGN FOR ANY CANDIDATE FOR COUNCIL THAT CAN CONVINCE ME THAT THEY HAVE A PLAN TO MAKE THIS HAPPEN IN URBAN WORCESTER.

I ended my night with a couple of ciders at a couple of bars. First off I headed over to Nick's on "Olde" Millbury St and bought a Strongbow from Mr. Chip O'Connor and grabbed a seat in the back of the room to listen to Hat On Drinking Wine for a bit. They advertised this as being a full band show however they sounded a bit thin without a bass player. I did enjoy their laid back brand of Americana while I was there though. A few times they straid a little to close to Counting Crows territory for my tastes but they never fully went there so that was cool. They play over at Nick's every Wednesday night from 8-11 and are worth checking out.

I then went up to see my man Paul Curley at the Greyhound for a pint of draft Magner's and some impassioned Canal District themed conversation with some familiar faces. I love The Greyhound.

So a very thought provoking Wednesday night in the Woo.

Please Please Please No Strip Malls

A post over at Wormtown Taxi brought my attention to an article in the Telegram yesterday about the infamous Wyman Gordon property that straddles Madison Street just west of Kelley Square. If you aren't familiar with it do yourself a favor and go take a drive (or a walk) down there and take it all in. The property is large. The figure quoted in the article is 15 acres. That is a lot of space.

In the article what is talked about is that there is some interest in possible retail development of the parcel. Are we talking strip malls here?

The city needs to be very very very careful as to how this proceeds.

People always get all up in arms about these conversations. Who is a city to go and tell people what they can and can't do with their property, blah, blah, blah. This is nothing new, and believe it or not it's not even anything new in Central Mass. Sturbridge for instance has a signage regulation which I believe limits the height and size of your businesses free standing signage.

See Sturbridge has a plan and an idea of what Sturbridge is. It's clearly defined to them. Some things are Sturbridge and some things are not. You are welcome to do business in Sturbridge, but you are going to do it in a way that is aesthetically pleasing to Sturbridge. In that way Sturbridge defines it's identity and holds on to it.

Now of course we are talking apples and oranges. Sturbridge is a small town, Worcester a much bigger city. This however is where strong neighborhood organizations and very specific neighborhood definititions come in.

If retail where to go in what kind of retail would compliment and add to the Canal District? What type of buildings? What type of parking? How does a development need to look and feel to exist harmoniously with the rest of the neighborhood?

In my opinion it is better to leave the whole thing barren then to rush into something just to have something there. As is stated in the comment section of the article, this parcel, and how it is developed could be a make or break for urban Worcester. We really do not need a strip mall with a dollar store, a nail salon, a storefront church, and a pizza place. I hope the property owners, business owners, and residents of the Canal District get this and are prepared to tell the city what they would like to see there.

What would I like to see? Well, you know me... always the dreamer.

Progress in Worcester? Imagine that.

The days of The Continental are numbered. By the end of May the title of coolest apartment on Beaver Street will be handed down to some undeserving Clark student and I will hopefully be settled into some new digs.

I talked earlier in the year of moving to Portland Maine and also talked about moving to Brighton. Portland would of course involve me having to quit my job and shortly after my Portland visit I learned that they started a new bonus program here that makes it kind of ridiculous to leave this job. At that point I set my sights on Brighton. I realized however that within a year or two I am going to be ready to buy something and I am sure as hell not doing that within the 128 loop. Being that I refuse to not live in the suburbs and I also refuse to quit my job and I also refuse to move out of Worcester, only to move back to Worcester a couple years later, well... that leaves Worcester.

For the most part I am okay with this as things are really starting to shape up here. People are still complaining but I have never seen so many things happening in the city as what is happening right now. And it's stuff that is actually happening not just being talked about. Worcester finally seems to be moving forward and the fact you can actually see it happening is kind of exciting.

I have stipulations though, and the biggest of which is that I need to be in a walkable neighborhood. Being there are only 2.5 walkable neighborhoods in the city (because let's face it, Highland Street is only kind of walkable, there's only about 4 or 5 worthwhile things to walk to) I need to put my focus on The Canal District/Green Island and Shrewsbury St or something very close to one of those neighborhoods.
I am pretty intrested in The Bancroft. It's affordable and it's being completely redone. There is going to be a fitness center, a lounge and a game room. When the building fills up I can only imagine that the empty storefronts in the immediate area will also.

I went down there on Monday morning to kind of skulk around and check out what was going on down there. I was standing out front putting the rental offices number into my cell when a pretty clean cut dude walks up to the front doors. I ask him if he lives in the Bancroft and he says no but he is with one of the companies contracted out to do renovations. I tell him I'm intrested in the place and he asks if I want to go up and take a look at some of the units he's working on. They look pretty nice, nothing spectacular, but nice all the same. This piques my intrest even more.
Last night I went down and parked my car on Franklin St around 7pm to see just how walkable the area was as far as the kind of stuff I would be into doing. I got out of the car and walked down Portland St and cut through a parking lot over to Madison St. Here I had options. I had brought a book with me with the thought that I was going to get a something to eat. Ping's was closed for renovations. I noticed however that somebody thought it was a good idea to open a conveniance store/deli in that plaza. OOF!

I then briefly thought about getting some Coney and then I thought well shit, let's see how far it is to just walk to Kelley Square. Where was I going to get dinner? Tony's? Yeah, I will just get a sandwich at Tony's. As I approached the Square though I saw Takara and made my descision. I walked in there for the first time and looked around and it just didn't feel right. It looked like a pretty good time and I wanted my first time eating there to be social. I will wait on that one. I decided to walk towards the Broadway, making a mental note to hit the Vernon at some point during my travels tonight and check out the open mic. I crossed the square and started walking down Harding Street and remembered that new Deli/Fruit stand place and made another command decision that if they were open that's were I would eat. They were closed and I was just about to take a right on Harrison and head to the Broadway when I remember that a couple weeks ago I was at Canal Fest and had one of the best burgers I have ever had at the Blackstone Grill booth. So I take a left instead of a right and walk up to Green St. I take a right on Green St and walk past the White Eagle and the new Banner Sports Bar which looks far from finished.

As I come up on the Blackstone Grill I see two tables out front and since it is such a nice night I decide then and there that I am eating outside. I go in and order the veal parm dinner which they are out of so I settle on the chicken parm. I notice they have beer, nothing too exciting but your basic Bud/Michelob/Coors selection. I buy a Bud bottle and get this: I proceed to go outside sit down at the table and drink it. That's right I was out of doors in Worcester Massachusetts, not fenced in like an animal and drinking an alcoholic beverage. In a very short time they brought my meal out, 2 giant slices of garlic bread and a huge portion of chicken parm. I ended up getting two meals out of it and I still feel as though I made a bit of a pig of myself. And this was no shitty pizza place sauce either. The sauce had some pretty awesome chunks of pepper in it.

So I am sitting out there, alternately looking at the Worcester skyline, the sky (I could actually see some stars!) above the asian jewelry store and reading my book. Some dude I don't recognize drives up to the Lucky Dog and gets out of his car and I realize it's Phil MacNamera. I wave to him and he comes over and sits down and we shoot the shit for a while. Erick Godin pulls up and I give him a wave and he heads into the Dog. I pay my bill, have the very friendly folks at the Blackstone Grill wrap my leftovers up, bid Phil a farewell and start walking back up Green Street, across McGrath and up Franklin to my car. I put my leftovers in the vehicle and kept walking.

I walked up to Main and took a right and walked past city hall and took a right on Front St. By this time it's about 9:30pm. I walk down Front and take a left on Commercial. Downtown is a ghost town. There is hardly any activity at all. The thing that strikes me the most though is all the businesses that are closed for the day that don't have any hours posted. Viva Bene I am looking at you!

I take a left on Exchange and look into the courtyard of what used to be the Firehouse or whatever other tons of names it has been since. One of the gates in is not locked and I contemplate going into the courtyard and nosing around but I decide against this and move on up Exchange St to Main.

I take a left on Main Street and notice right away that there are a few new businesses opening soon. A new bar where the old Octane was and a new cafe wer A'brizzio's used to be. If they make as good of a roast beef and turkey as A'brizzio's did I will be happy.

It's really wierd how downtown just shuts down on weeknights. Hopefully with more people living down here this will change. There is one thing I noticed over just about everything else. In all the walking I did in downtown and Kelley Square I never once felt nervous, scared, creeped out or intimidated. As I said, downtown was pretty much a ghost town. The only people I really saw were some folks hanging out in the open bars and folks walking in and out of the White Hen and Honey Farms. Green Island (or "The Canal District" as I guess they are calling it now, what the hell was wrong with Green Island?) had a bit more activity as there were more places open. Even with the activity and the couple of thuggish looking kids walking around I still felt very safe and secure. That's an important thing to note. Worcester, specifically, has a reputation as being a scary place. It's really not. It might be the most beautiful place, and it mide not be filled by the most attractive people in the world but most of them are harmless. I don't see you encountering any kind of random violent crime here as long as you are aware of your surroundings and don't walk into any dark alleys.

I then got in my car went down to the Vernon, got a beer and watched some of the open mic and then went to work for the night. A thing to note about this little adventure is the hard time I had making a decision on where to eat while I was on foot. I think that is pretty incredible. Living in Worcester and having whole weekends where I might not even have to move my car seems almost too good to be true.