Allentown Assaults Livability

With little fanfare, Allentown is preparing to push through a "Noise Exemption District" to essentially accommodate the profitability of the Maingate nightclub. This district would stretch from 17th to 19th Streets,  between Liberty and Tilghman Streets.

In a previous post, I pointed out that the neighbors, both in the senior high-rises and the nearby row houses, will have their quality of life sacrificed for this private business scheme.  Furthermore, in recent years, Allentown has improved the West End Theatre District to create an atmosphere of tranquility. A stabbing this past weekend at the View Club at 11th and Hamilton Streets should give City Council pause when they deliberate this ill advised proposal. There already has been a shooting at the Maingate.

The Civic Theatre has created a unique ambience on 19th Street for well over fifty years,  contributing to the livability of that neighborhood, and the upscale businesses clustered around it.
If the Maingate cannot operate within the state LCB guidelines,  why should the entire area be compromised for the Maingate's profit?  What in the future will prevent a noise abated spot from opening opposite the theater?

Not to mince words, the proposal is based on blatant cronyism.  City Council must rise above it.

photocredit:Discover Lehigh Valley

PREVIOUS POSTS ON THIS TOPIC
   
   City Takes Cronyism To New Noise Level

   Allentown Still Neeeds Lessons On Favoritism

McHistory In The Lehigh Valley

Readers of this blog know that I'm upset about what little value history is given in this community.  Yesterday's Morning Call story on the Lehigh Valley Trust Bank building goes a step farther, and significantly alters the story of an important structure.  After reading the Morning Call article, one would think that the bank closed,  Abe Atiyeh purchased it and then sold it to the Jaindls,  who are now opening an event center after restoration.  The real story is so different,  I can only conclude that this current article was only meant as another NIZ promotion, not a serious background of the building.

When the building was purchased by Seigfried Braun, unmentioned in the article,  it had been modernized.  He and his family spend years and most of their assets lovingly restoring it.  The famed skylight and other adornments were covered over decades earlier, by a massive new lowered ceiling.  What you see now is the fruit of his labor. Restoring the skylight alone took over a year.  In addition to that bank,  he also purchased the Dime Bank and the Elks Club.  The Dime Bank has now been incorporated into the new Renaissance Hotel.  The Elks Club was demolished to make way for J.B. Reilly's aborted massive Two Towers project.

Unfortunately, illness forced Mr. Braun to quickly sell these significant structures for pennies on the dollar, to Abe Atiyeh.  We should thank Braun for saving these magnificent structures.  Although, I like to think that my local political opinions have merit,  my better calling is to defend and advocate for local historical structures, when I have the needed endurance.  Meanwhile, I use this blog to present local history, and occasionally point out misconceptions about it.

above reprinted from January of 2017 and 2019 with a different photo

ADDENDUM FEBRUARY 10, 2020: This past weekend the Morning Call ran an article on an upcoming event with a $100 admission fee at the former bank, now Jaindl owned and called Vault 634. Like Reilly owned NIZ properties,  the announcements for these commercial events are being presented as cultural news,  sparing these titans the usual advertising fees.  While mom and pop businesses pay through the nose to advertise,  and the paper struggles to survive,  the Morning Call continues promoting the NIZ district as news.

photo of Vault 634 by April Gamiz/The Morning Call

Sad Sack Pennsylvania Voters

A new correspondent for the Morning Call in Harrisburg tells us that school tax reform is not on track after all, what a surprise!

In the late 1970's, when Pennsylvania legalized and took over the numbers racket with the lottery, the wide eyed were promised tax reform. When the state legalized casino gambling 30 years later, the gullible were promised tax reform.

Seniors on fixed income really do lose their homes because of taxes, I've known several. State elected officials really do promise reform, I've known many...They never deliver, nor do they actually try.

Here in Pennsylvania getting elected to Harrisburg is a job for life, unless and until such an official decides to give it up. We elect incumbents term after term, regardless of performance. There is a manual on how to stay in office, which includes sending out constituent birthday cards and other assorted nonsense to the morons in your district.

If ever there was a meaningless phrase, reform in Pennsylvania must be it.

Allentown's Double Parking

Yesterday, Paul Muschick of the The Morning Call speculated on the reason for all the double parking in Allentown.  Being politically correct,  he overlooked the oblivious answer... We have  herds of Rude and Crude living in Allentown.  Why has this problem persisted for so long?  The Allentown Parking Authority doesn't want to deal with face to face confrontations with the offensive offenders,  they prefer placing a parking ticket on an empty car and then running away.  The Allentown Police consider the problem beneath their law enforcement pay grade.  Muschick mentioned N. 7th Street as ground zero for the problem.  Fellow activist Robert Trotner referenced Muschick's column on facebook, and a Hispanic business owner complained about the lack of parking spaces on 7th Street,  for the volume of current businesses.  He does have a point, but the double parking in Allentown occurs everywhere in center city,  even with many empty spaces.

The city should identify parcels close to 7th Street that can be acquired for additional parking.  Peter Lewnes has done an excellent job developing 7th Street into a business district, as it was in Allentown's distant past.  Being as politically incorrect as I am,  I cannot refrain from noting that the same merchants and clientele now on 7th Street, were deemed undesirable when they were previously on Hamilton Street.  As I have written before, there was actually more commerce on Hamilton Street with the so called undesirables, than there is now.  However, the NIZ wasn't really meant to increase commerce, but rather to increase the real estate portfolio of certain individuals. Another recent article in The Morning Call,  on the NIZ,  avoided such realities.

reprinted from June of 2018

The Radiation Mystery: Wetherhold&Metzer

The Shoe giant Wetherhold & Metzger started in 1908 on Hamilton street's south side. When business began to prosper, they moved across to the more prominent north side of Hamilton Street. Their store at 719 Hamilton was recently demolished, along with most of Allentown's mercantile history. It was a two story store, with the children's department on the lower level. This post originally was scheduled for sometime in the future, and was to include a Buster Brown poster. Today's Morning Call has a story on the mystery radium 226 found in the debris of the former buildings, and I thought perhaps the molovinsky on allentown historical division could help. Wetherhold & Metzer's downtown store was quite the adventure for a kid. In addition to your mother's money being transported away in a tube system like the bank drive-ups use today, you could look inside your shoes and see your feet.

Needless to say, eventually these shoe fluoroscopes were banned, but for many years one stood in the lower level of 719 Hamilton Street. Many a child, including myself, saw our foot bones in our new Buster Browns. Wetherhold & Metzger also had an uptown store in the 900 block of Hamilton Street.



reprinted from September of 2012

Paul Muschick Might Become A Columnist

Since Muschick is already the Morning Call's columnist, this post title alone probably offends him...Offending people is never an issue for me, I do fancy myself a Lone Ranger in blogging. The Morning Call hasn't had a columnist since Paul Carpenter retired.... Bill White squandered his bully pulpit with Christmas Light Tours and chocolate cake contests. He's still judging chocolate cakes. 

The reason I see hope in Muschick, is that his recent column takes Ray O'Connell to task for considering running for reelection, after he pledged not to. I don't have an opinion on that topic at this point, but appreciate that Muschick does, and that he expressed it. Muschick's new boldness goes somewhat awry criticizing the voters for reelecting an indicted mayor Pawlowski. A search of the paper's archives shows no-one at the paper writing against Pawlowski, including Muschick, at the time. Furthermore, the paper gave the indicted Pawlowski space for column after column during the election. 

For a current columnist at the Morning Call the bar is very low. If I were Muschick, especially with the deteriorating corporate profile for the paper, I would be going all out against the local establishment.