Demolishing our city hall

I am not happy. Why not?  City council has just voted to have our century-old city hall building torn down. It will join the old high school, the old city hall and the old train station in old-building heaven, I guess.

 

City hall, previously the post office, is slated for demolition.

 

The powers-that-be want a one-storey combination service centre, city hall and library (costing over three million dollars) to be built on vacant land behind the existing building.

 

The butterfly garden is right behind city hall.

 

Apparently, renovating and adding to the structure is not an option, despite one architect’s report to that effect.  Well, goodness, an elevator alone could cost a prohibitive $150,000.  Also, the councillors feel Parkhill could use the area it now occupies for green space once the new building is constructed. That’s a lot of respect for grass, given the fields to the north and west of the proposed site, not to mention Coronation Park, barely a block away.

 

Coronation Park is well used - even by aliens.
 

 

Selling the building is not a possibility either, it seems.

Built in 1908, the structure originally housed the post office. It has been so carelessly  “renovated“ over the years that, unfortunately, aside from a spectacular oak staircase, little of its original interior remains. Many of its contents, including all the wooden wickets through which post office business was conducted were removed when the post office moved down the street to new premises, a squat one-store building where the previous city hall once stood.  

 



The new post office,the  bell from the previous city hall and the Carnegie library are down the street.

 

The latter housed a jail in the basement, council chambers on the first floor and a concert hall on the second. One of Greg’s parishioners remembers Christmas concerts held there in his youth. But all that remains of it now is the bell:

 

 

Oddly, a similar building in neighbouring Ailsa Craig was restored by its "Friends" and is now a popular concert hall. Our mayor, who hails from Ailsa Craig but must still be reeling from the shock of such restoration, was quoted as saying you can get “swamped with old buildings.”

According to another source, he feels the municipal government can manage only one “old building”:  the present Carnegie Library beside the new Post Office. By the way, this library is one of 111 libraries in Ontario , endowed by the Carnegie Foundation circa 1913, most of which still function as originally intended; however, about 15 have been destroyed by fire or were demolished in the “enlightened” 60s and 70s.

See this web-site for more information: http://www.mtc.gov.on.ca/en/libraries/carnegie.shtml

 

I love the steps leading up to the library with their short rise and longish run (there is a ramp around back at the parking lot).

 

Our library lacks an elevator and public washrooms, but apparently these and other renovations can’t be undertaken because the wide swath of land behind it is a right of way for the new Post Office.  Other municipalities have been able to find the answers to similar dilemmas, but apparently not ours.

Also puzzling is the wish of some councillors to incorporate elements of the façade of the soon-to-be-demolished city hall into the planned new structure. That implies a pretty meticulous — and expensive — demolition.   Also, their hope that the new structure will reflect the old buildings still standing across the street kind of begs the question — and I think I am using that phrase correctly — as to why they would go to all the trouble of destroying a building, albeit too vertical in nature, in order to erect its horizontal twin.

The old post office/ city hall building anchors the downtown streetscape,  and although not a masterpiece, nevertheless embodies our past.  It reflects Edwardian civic virtues (which in this neck of the woods were likely still very Victorian). Upright, unsparing, functional and stolid, it is a monument to what hard work, civic duty and sober Sunday worship could achieve and symbolizes an ethos which was, and to an extent still is, prosperous, solid, unyielding — and,  sadly, also acquiescent.

Kind of like the roads around here, caging the flat land under a grid where it is woefully hard to get lost, we seem to be immobilized by a similar lack of vision. Taking the easiest path is great for driving, but not so great for preserving our heritage and its buildings for future inhabitants of Parkhill.



This photo was taken in May 2011.



 

 

 

The Potluck Gamble

Everyone knows June is the month of strawberries, but here in the Wilds of North Middlesex, it is also the month of potluck lunches and dinners, a time-honoured tradition to mark the end of another year’s activities.  Between us, Greg and I have attended at least six in the last couple of weeks, and there are more to come ― some even sliding over into July.

The question always arises as to whether to have a true potluck or the modified version. Apparently, a sign-up list is rarely handed around, as that would take the fun out of it entirely, but the hostess sometimes offers to provide part of the meal, hence, the modified potluck. However, so far this year, the normally conservative inhabitants of this area have opted for the more daring true potluck.

This has the usual unintended consequences.

People seem to have their own speciality, like sauerkraut or meatballs or jellied salad.  I confess I am beginning to rather  like orange Jell-O with crushed pineapple, but please, not grated carrots.  I don’t know the last time I had Ambrosia – well, not before the two opportunities I had to indulge this month.  It consists of coconut, miniature marshmallows, fruit cocktail and whipped cream and counts as a main dish. So does apple salad made with dream whip (the healthier choice, according to the provider, than whipped cream).

Greg and I always bring our Salsa Delight: a layer of cream cheese, topped with salsa, followed by chives from the garden, if available, or green onions, if not, and finished with grated cheddar. Our challenge is whether to spread it an inch deep and a mile wide in the flat corning ware dish (my choice) or thicker and less extensively ― and I might add, harder for dippers! – in the two-quart casserole (Greg’s option). It’s a difficult decision and, I feel, may unconsciously reveal something of the deeper nature of each of us.

Anyhow, we enjoyed three different versions of baked beans and the same number of meat ball dishes at one potluck recently. The dinner was held out in the country in a house backing onto a woods and bordered by a large field. Partway through the meal, a coyote bounded across the field, and a while later about half a dozen young coyote pups came running back in the opposite direction, followed by the adult encouraging a slow-poke sibling.

I wondered what they had been finding to eat. As it happens, the population of stray cats on our street has seemed remarkably reduced from earlier head counts.  It crossed my mind, as I took a second helping of Ambrosia, that perhaps the coyotes in our neck of the woods are enjoying their own version of potluck.

In any event, there is a knack to a successful outdoor potluck. It primarily involves avoiding food poisoning. Recently at the Parish Picnic, aka the Sunday School Picnic, we enjoyed two kinds of potato salad and various cold meats, but not a lot in the way of vegetables  –  unless you count the 11 asparagus spears wrapped in ham.  Thankfully, insulated zippered carry-ins, as well as the usual Tupperware, lined the picnic table in the pavilion at Coronation Park.  Anglicans seem to have a container for every occasion.

My enjoyment of the meal was dampened by an account of another potluck, a birthday celebration the previous afternoon after which a number of attendees suffered food poisoning. I found out later it was traced to devilled eggs. The degree of upset was in direct proportion to the number eaten and the length of time which had elapsed while they were being consumed. One devilled egg at the start produced no symptoms; five consumed over the course of a hot afternoon … well, it was not pleasant.

The ladies of the Anglican Guild (i.e., the evening guild that meets in the afternoon) held their year-end do indoors last week. We enjoyed what turned out to be a lot of fruit and veg – perhaps compensation for their non-appearance at the Parish Picnic from two days before. Not wanting to repeat the salsa too soon, I surprised everyone with seven kinds of raw vegetables and a dip of my own invention.

After lunch, we began the formal meeting with a short devotional service. We use thin leather-covered chapbooks dated 1897 and published by “the Gazette in Parkhill,” according to the flyleaf. I always enjoy the prayer in which we ask God to “pour down the continual dew of thy blessing upon him whom thou hast called to minister in this portion of thy vineyard.”

The “him” in question was absent at the time, being at a potluck lunch for his fellow vineyard keepers in Clericus.  However, he did arrive later on ― just in time to be blessed with a slice of apple pie provided by the hostess of the day, thanks to her husband, a retired farmer whose pastry, I can say without a moment of hesitation, is to die for.

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Potlucks seem to be the same all over, as this tune by the Prowell Family of Kansas (and YouTube) attests:

http://www.prowellfamilyband.com/video.html