The Convention Follies, Part 1: A Municipal Affair
by Hank Bromley
[This is the first in a series of articles about the convention center controversy to appear over the next two months. This first article addresses why it even matters whether and where we build a convention center.]
A job brought me to Buffalo. The city keeps me here.
I’ve lived in some pretty nice places: five years of student life in the middle of Boston, a city known—at least to itself—as the Hub of the Universe; a year working in the far north of Sweden, at the end of the world; later, eight years in Madison, Wisconsin, in another world altogether (a popular post card, merging a NASA photo with the Madison skyline, is captioned "Earth as seen from Madison"; an annoyed official once called the place "a 23-square-mile island surrounded by reality"). From big city life to forested wonderland to stubbornly progressive model village…all delightful, but none prompted the emotional attachment Buffalo has.
Maybe it takes an outsider to appreciate Buffalo. Among my colleagues at UB, it’s mostly the newcomers and out-of-towners that choose to commute from downtown and babble on about how glad we are to live here. Those from WNY seem to see only what’s been lost over the years, not what’s still here and the potential for rebuilding.
And what is here that’s so special? No single thing. Buffalo has amenities: within a short walk of my home are half a dozen terrific and reasonably priced restaurants, ranging from nouvelle to Continental to seafood to Indian to Greek to Italian, three different artisanal bread bakeries and two specializing in sweets, and shops for unusual clothing, records, books, antiques, artworks, fresh-roasted whole coffee beans, brewed coffee, wine, flowers, fresh produce, and entirely unclassifiable items. It has cultural resources for varied tastes: within two miles are the Albright-Knox Gallery, Ujima Theater Co., Kleinhans Music Hall, Nietzsche’s, the sites of Shakespeare in the Park and the Allentown Art Festival, several architectural treasures, and many acres of Olmsted parkland. And the streets nearby are lined with 100-year-old maple and oak trees, behind which are handsome houses built to last and residents who take great pride in their flower gardens. Where else could I find all this? Maybe a few neighborhoods in Manhattan, but there, an assistant professor’s salary would cover, at best, a basement shoebox barely able to hold my books, instead of a 19th Century bank president’s residence.
When my parents—who did grow up in New York City—last visited, my mom couldn’t get enough of walking around the neighborhood. She’s lived in the suburbs for forty-five years, and had forgotten what she left behind. An urban neighborhood is a singular kind of place, an assemblage of diverse elements in dynamic balance. The people, the buildings, the landscapes, the activities—each are just similar enough to establish a distinctive identity, and different enough to remain slightly edgy and endlessly absorbing. Many commercial districts and suburbs offer only stultifying sameness; wealthier and less urban districts may offer variety, but within a single stratum and at a remove from public space. On my street, to Mom’s delight, the houses are all different, yet close enough together and to the sidewalk for passers-by to admire them—and chat with the porch-sitters.
The once-commonplace urban neighborhood, this intricate complex of disparate elements in creative tension, has nearly vanished from the American scene. A growing national trend, however, involves rediscovering what the urban neighborhood offers. Since this unique environment abounds in Buffalo, we have a tremendous resource, and one whose value is only going to become clearer over time.
I’m not suggesting everything is just swell here. Buffalo has suffered terrible losses—repeatedly. Although it’s a great place to live if you have a decent job, all too many Buffalonians have neither an adequate income nor reasonable prospects of obtaining one any time soon. Perhaps the resulting underdog status and potential "comeback" storyline are part of what appeals to transplants like me, but I realize how segregated the city is, and what different conditions are faced by those living between Richmond Ave. and Main St. and by those to the east or west of that narrow slice. The social fabric and physical infrastructure of the city have become appallingly frayed, partly through the capricious play of larger forces, but partly self-inflicted, via a series of stunningly bad ideas imposed over the decades by short-sighted, self-seeking, and imperiously hermetic local decision-makers.
Which brings us to the topic of this series. Tearing down a chunk of what remains of the downtown core to build a new convention center at the Mohawk site would be another such blunder: it would diminish exactly those urban qualities that constitute Buffalo’s greatest resource and have kindled my passion for the city.
ARTVOICE readers have already heard a bit about the convention center proposal from other members of Citizens for Common Sense; you’ll be hearing a lot more over the next couple of months. This is the first of a series of articles I’m writing to discuss the issues in more detail, and to explain why a bunch of busy people with no direct stake in the outcome have opted to take on the full-time paid lobbyists who have loudly proclaimed a "consensus" in favor of building at the Mohawk site.
Topics to be addressed in the series include:
We’re told a new convention center will bring tens of thousands of visitors who will spend millions of dollars. Of course, one has to wonder how the numerous cities hoping to cash in with new convention centers will all increase their market shares simultaneously, and how many associations will choose to move their meetings from, say, New Orleans to Buffalo—especially between November and March—and how local stores and restaurants are supposed to thrive on alternating deluges and droughts of customers, and how enclosing Ellicott Street in a 800-foot-long tunnel and walling off the East Side will bring more people into downtown. And then there’s the matter of the Hyatt being half-owner of the firm brought in to consult on the site placement study—a study which, not surprisingly, recommended a site adjacent to the Hyatt (see the December 2 ARTVOICE, pp. 10-11).
Look, Buffalo went through this twenty-five years ago, when part of the downtown core was cleared to build the current convention center. That center is a money-loser, and the surrounding businesses, far from reaping a windfall, have been wiped out. We were promised demand for hotel space would soar, and 3000 additional rooms would be needed. Instead, the Statler soon failed, despite—if not because of—its proximity to the convention center, and today downtown has 77 fewer hotel rooms than before the center began operating. We were promised an enormous expansion in business opportunities. Instead, the businesses formerly on the site were scattered to the winds (some moved to the suburbs, some left the area altogether, some simply cashed out, and a few relocated elsewhere in downtown and went bust), and those adjacent to the site fared even worse, now drained of customers and lacking even the short-term boost of a buyout.
The conclusion reached by proponents of the Mohawk site? The problem is that center wasn’t big enough. So we just need to write off that location and do it all over again a few blocks away, on a larger scale.
We’ve been shown some lovely drawings of what our new convention center will look like. Of course, no one has any idea what it will actually look like because the design contract won’t even go out for bid until funding is secured. But more to the point, pretty pictures don’t mean much. I’m sure the old center was also preceded by pretty pictures. So was Niagara Falls’ landmark convention center, by celebrated architect Philip Johnson (look what that’s done for downtown Niagara Falls), and, lord help us, probably even UB’s Amherst Campus.
The somewhat shabby countenance of the Mohawk site’s "Electric District" may not look like much, but buildings don’t have to be pretty to contribute to the community. Those "garbage buildings," as one local developer has referred to them, right now house businesses providing 630 full-time jobs and generating over $50 million annually in sales. Those dollars are not artist’s renditions, or fanciful economic projections inflated by arbitrary multipliers. They’re current reality—CCS member Dan Sack canvassed the businesses in the affected area personally. And the projections for the convention center that would supplant these businesses, according to the CVB-funded Johnson "Feasibility Study"? 579 new full-time-equivalent jobs in Erie County (616 for New York State), $32.9 million economic impact from increased convention business ($36.4 million for New York State). Yes, a net loss of a few dozen jobs and $15 million annual economic activity (if increased convention business lives up to projections), and it’s all ours just for spending $125 million to build it and underwriting an annual $1-2 million operating deficit, in perpetuity. Some deal, huh?
It’s madness. What’s already there doesn’t cost us anything—indeed, those businesses pay taxes, contributing to rather than consuming public funds, and (as we’ll see another week) the area has tremendous potential for further development that builds on its current strengths rather than obliterating them. We are certainly not against development or growth or progress, but—as we should have learned from Niagara Falls’ and our own previous ventures—the intricate streetscape of the downtown core is not the place for mega-projects; shoving them in only disrupts the urban fabric. Forget the pretty pictures, the old center didn’t fail because it’s ugly; it failed because no convention center could do more good than harm in such a location.
Proponents of the Mohawk site have tried to foreclose debate by claiming there’s already been ample discussion. Back on September 2, a Buffalo News editorial (accompanied by one of those pretty artist’s renderings) maintained the convention center site selection had already received a "complete hearing" and been "through the crucible of community debate," then declared the process "completed" and lamented the harm caused by "obdurate opposition." But then on September 15, the News quoted Mayor Masiello as saying public hearings on the site recommendation would be held in the fall. That would seem an odd move on the Mayor’s part if the intensive debate the News alluded to had actually occurred. But of course it hadn’t. And we’re still waiting for those public hearings. Indeed, private groups are now stepping into the breach and providing the open forums for public discussion that official bodies should have. CCS has sponsored one (featuring a presentation by Buffalo native and Portland, Oregon planner Tuck Wilson) with more in the works, and on January 28, Working for Downtown is holding a luncheon discussion at the Adam’s Mark.
In another effort to thwart public involvement by asserting it had already occurred, former News editor Murray Light wrote on November 21 that there had been "more than enough dialogue and debate" (just what does "too much" dialogue mean? the wrong participants?) about the convention center and other projects. "Democracy dictates widespread community input. But there comes a time when final decisions must be made and debate stilled. That time definitely is at hand."
But we will not be stilled, and we will be heard. The convention center debate is fundamentally about what kind of city we want to have, and who gets to decide. Do we want to crudely deform what’s left of our downtown in the effort to support a convention center, or should we shape our development efforts so as to support the city, by building on and reinforcing downtown’s existing resources? The Convention and Visitors Bureau has opted for, and declared a consensus in favor of, the first path. "Everyone" at the table agreed, months ago—but most of the citizenry wasn’t at the table, and now we’re crashing the party.
Hank Bromley teaches at the UB Graduate School of Education and is a member of Citizens for Common Sense. He can be reached at hbromley@buffalo.edu.