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Showing posts with label Main Street. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Main Street. Show all posts

11/08/19

The Aberdeen South Dakota Commercial Historic District

Railroad Town Hub City and Main Street Commercial Development
Since its founding in 1881, Aberdeen has been the dominant regional commercial center for northeast South Dakota and the Aberdeen Commercial Historic District is the commercial core of this regional hub. Main Street is a homogeneous collection of brick buildings built between 1884 and 1983, with special emphasis on the 1908-29 period. The district conveys a strong feeling of architectural cohesiveness with design elements such as corbelling and geometric brick and concrete patterns as distinguishing features that reinforce the feeling of time and place.
General Characteristics the Aberdeen Commercial Historic District extends six full blocks on either side of the predominant commercial street in town, Main Street. All eighty-two buildings were built for commercial use, except for the recent brick Sherman Apartments and the 1899 Masonic Temple. As befits a railroad town, the linear district emanates from the source of Aberdeen's establishment, the Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific Railroad tracks, then continues south to Sixth Avenue - Highway 12.
The commercial development of Main Street has been continuous and the break in construction between 1938 and 1951 offers a distinct end to the period of significance, 1884 to 1938. The lengthy, four-decades-long period provides a significant continuum that illustrates the initial and unbroken economic vitality of Main Street. Within this fifty-four-year period of significance is a notable cluster of construction dates. Fully forty of the eighty-two buildings were built between 1908 and 1929, reflecting the boom years of Aberdeen's and South Dakota's commercial development.
Aberdeen was born of railroad construction and the related Dakota land boom of the 1880s. The selection of a site reflected the economic motives behind its creation. Representatives of the Milwaukee, St. Paul & Pacific Railroad were responsible for the town's founding and based their selection on the best chance for maximum economic return. They chose this site at the expense of the existing settlement of Columbia, favoring an intersection point with the North-Western Railroad, fully recognizing the economic dividends of a location at two intersecting rail lines.
The site was very flat and low. Sloughs and marshes greeted the actual surveyors in the fall of 1880. A town plan, named for the home town of Milwaukee Road president Alexander Mitchell, was filed on January 3, 1881, and the first lot buyers arrived that spring. The first train stopped at the station at the north end of Main Street on July 6, 1881, and from then on building after building was erected in rapid succession, according to contemporary reports by pioneer merchant T. Clarkson Gage. By that fall there were reportedly 250 residents.
Lots on Main Street sold for $125 for a 25-foot frontage, $150 for corner sites
The early buildings were small, hastily constructed wood frame stores with boom town fronts. With the highly advantageous position at the crossing of two rail lines and the resulting converging travelers, merchandise, and commodities, Aberdeen was immediately a locus for commercial enterprise in Brown County. The county grew from just 353 people in 1880 to 12,241 five years later, approximately 2,000 of them in Aberdeen.
By 1886 the eminence of Aberdeen was assured. Now three railroads served the community, giving the city the sobriquet, the Hub City. The U.S. Land Office opened an office there, and all manner of commercial enterprise served the growing hinterland. An 1889 city directory, for example, lists no less than eleven farm implement dealers, six banks and eight mortgage companies, seven dry goods stores, twenty hotels and boarding houses, six newspapers, and ten saloons
Depression and Rebuilding 1890-1929. The late 1880s also brought the end of the initial and speedy prosperity of the heady settlement era. Crop failures, then a nationwide financial depression in the 1890s ended the construction boom and stilled commercial development in Aberdeen. None of the extant buildings along Main Street apparently were built between 1893 and 1898. At the turn of the century came another cycle of plenty which continued unabated into the 1920s. Again, a land boom triggered speculation; rising crop prices brought a return to prosperity. Population mushroomed from 4,087 in 1900 to 10,150 a decade later, a 160 percent increase.
The further development of Main Street reflected the newfound abundance in Aberdeen, both in its expansion and in the quality of construction. Larger and more permanent and costly brick- veneered replacements dotted Main Street; every decade brought a spate of new buildings. Aberdonians gained the largest steel and concrete building in the state, except for the contemporary State Capitol. Built the following year, the McDiarmid & Slater Building occupied a pivotal corner site on the south end of block five, west side. Its distinctive tan brick with contrasting red- brown brick, corbelled cornice and lively geometric patterns exemplified Aberdeen commercial buildings from the early twentieth century.
. In 1926 the elaborate five- story Capitol Theater opened, its exotic Moorish and Gothic Revival motifs and immense neon sign a beacon on Saturday nights.
The 1920s marked the arrival of national chain stores in Aberdeen. Kresge and J.C. Penney
The Great Depression 1929-41. Following WWI and the related slide in farm product prices, agricultural areas such as northeast South Dakota suffered an economic decline. In 1929 the boom period ended in earnest nationally with the dramatic end to high stock market prices. Aberdeen was still the largest town on the Milwaukee Road between Minneapolis and Butte, Montana. With its large trading area extending from Roberts County west to the Missouri River and from the North Dakota border south to Redfield, it still could count on retail and wholesale sales, but at a diminished rate.  
Design Sources for many of the Main Street buildings are likely the product of presently anonymous practices--contractors, pattern books, local architects. During the rebuilding years of the early twentieth century, it is known that architects flocked to booming Aberdeen. Little has been identified about Aberdeen architects, but the 1910 city directory listed no less than seven architects.

5/28/18

Innovative Water Conservation and Energy Efficiency Strategies on Main Street



Business and Commercial Districts Historic Towns and Neighborhoods
Integrated Water Systems in Small Towns and Rural Communities by 2030 the world will need to produce 50 percent more for food and energy and 30 percent more fresh water. Solar pumps are reliable technology which can compete with conventional pumping technologies such as diesel pumping. Large amounts of energy are used in the entire water cycle. Water Pumps play a major role in all water and waste water processes.
Small and Medium-sized Commercial Buildings account for 95 percent of building stock and consume half the energy in a sector of the economy responsible for 20 percent of the total energy consumption. Owners of smaller buildings are often unaware of the amount of energy wasted and the opportunity for savings that building automation systems provide. This sector hasn’t BAS for the following reasons: the high cost of tailoring software and acquiring hardware components is beyond the reach of most small- and medium-sized properties; the owner is not always the tenant that pays the utility bill, hence limited incentive to invest in the building’s energy efficiency.
Building Leases spell out how energy costs are divided between tenants and owners. Often, these leases are not structured in a way that promotes energy savings. Tenants have no incentive to save energy in their leased premises because energy costs are based on tenant square footage. Building owners have no incentive to invest in energy efficiency because the operating expenses are passed onto tenants. Green Leases promote energy efficiency by creating lease structures which equitably align the costs and benefits of efficiency investments between building owners and tenants.
Energy Management Systems can be used to centrally control devices like HVAC units and lighting systems across multiple locations. EMS also provide metering, sub-metering and monitoring functions that allow facility managers to gather data and insight to make more informed decisions about energy activities across their sites.


LEED Neighborhood Development building technologies and advanced real-time energy smart meters allow business and residential energy users to verify consumption in workplaces and homes. Passive Solar Buildings take advantage of the local climate with window placement and glazing, thermal mass, insulation and shading. Walls, floors and windows are designed and located to collect, store and distribute energy without the use of mechanical and electric devices. Conservation and efficiency are energy reduction techniques; conservation implies sufficiency and is the key to sustainability as it lowers energy costs by reducing resource depletion.
Digital Metering and Smart Grids smart meters enable two-way communication between the meter and the central system; unlike home energy monitors, smart meters can gather data for remote reporting. With the inception of electricity deregulation and market-driven pricing, utilities have been looking for a means to match consumption with generation. Smart meters provide a way of measuring site-specific information, allowing utility companies to introduce different prices for consumption based on the time of day and the season.
Sub-meters identify best practices to reduce energy and water consumption in a building allowing owners, property managers, condominium or homeowners associations to bill tenants for measured utility usage via individual water, gas and electric meters. Water Sub-meters promote conservation and help offset maintenance costs.
Distributed Generation occurs on a property site when energy is sold to the building occupants; here, commercial PPAs enable businesses and governments to purchase electricity directly from the generator rather than from the utility. Power Purchase Agreements PPA is a legal contract between an electricity generator and a power purchaser. 


Financing Energy Efficiency Projects face several financial impediments, including information. Financial institutions often lack a full understanding of energy efficiency technologies which are almost always investments with long repayment terms. Small towns and rural communities require specific and unique knowledge, expertise and funding sources.

 Innovative Water Resources and Energy Savings Strategies
 

4/22/18

Insuring Your Historic Property


Insurance Companies are for the most part unable to price a policy and do not have the expertise to repair historic buildings in the event of a claim as these facilities need specialized materials, workmanship, and nay not to meet building code standards.
Cost Factors include geographic location, age of the structure, proximity to a fire station or fire hydrant, construction style and materials used in building the structure, most recent updates to the roof, HVAC, electrical, and plumbing. Also, current labor and material costs.
The National Trust Insurance Services of the National Trust for Historic Preservation are
Historic Building Coverage Experts
Historic Replacement Cost coverage is defined as the cost to repair or replace with the same materials, workmanship, and architectural features without depreciation, provided are reasonably available.
Knowing what your Historic Property is Worth
The Hidden Cost of Historic Reconstruction historic buildings aren't like other properties. If damaged, they're likely to require highly skilled craftsmen, hard to match materials, extra time to rebuild because of the labor-intensive process of historic renovation and professional services to assist in areas like recertification and recovery of tax benefits. In the event of loss or damage, there's only one policy in the insurance industry that will restore your commercial building to its former grandeur.
The Historic Property Policy includes groundbreaking coverage and flexible valuations, including the cost of replacing a hand-carved door and hiring an expert able to document your rebuilding. 
Historic Replacement Cost Coverage is the Cost to Repair or Replace the Original Building’s Materials Workmanship and Architectural Features
If not reasonably available, the insurance carrier will pay to replace or repair with materials, workmanship, and architectural features that most closely resemble those present before the loss. Also,
  • Increased cost of construction due to landmark as well as other building ordinances or laws
  • Increased time to restore your property due to operation of landmark and other building laws
  • Historic certification expenses
  • Loss of federal, state, and local tax benefits
  • Increased building assessments
  • Green building upgrades to enhance the energy efficiency of your property where possible
Certification is Not Required to qualify for Historic Coverage
All currently certified historic buildings are eligible, as well as buildings that could be certified and located in a historic district.  However, just about any building that exhibits historical character, materials, and workmanship can be covered by this policy, whether certified or not.
Specialty Insurance Coverages includes D&O, Volunteer Accident, Special Events, Collections and Fine Arts, Vacant & Builders Risk and Historic Tax Credit.
Classes of Business include main street organizations, historic hotels and inns, historic theatres, museums, historic homeowner insurance, preservation and religious organizations.
To Know More About It

2/28/18

Projects in Small Town Main Streets and Historic Districts



Capitalizing Managing and Marketing Tourism and Environment Projects
The Successful Implementation of Projects in one or more local areas rests on a clear plan to develop and implement a commercial strategy as well as the identification and application of the capital and human resources required.
A Commercial Strategy with Economies of Scale Revenue Based Funding and Sharing
A Key Objective is to achieve some measure of economies of scale in small towns and rural communities through the application of a team effort across multiple communities that share in the marketing and sales effort as well as revenue generating and sharing. 
Business Philosophy develop, fund and manage sustainable tourism, environmental and community economic development projects in selected communities in collaboration with local partners.
Mission create new sustainable wealth and economic opportunities in a community by: Improving local knowledge and expertise, Ensuring accountability and responsibility by participants, Educating clients about our communities to ensure respect for local values and traditions, Utilizing market forces to achieve economies of scale and purchasing power, Developing markets for products and services, Focusing on sustainable projects in tourism, energy efficiency and water resources, Generating capital resources for small enterprises, Partnering with local government to reach into a community,
A Local Collective Multidisciplinary Public and Private Sustainable Community Economic Development Program on Tourism and Environment Projects that create New Entrepreneurial Opportunities
Local a project made specifically for your community that draws on the history, traditions and talents that are unique to your town and region.
Collective a multidisciplinary approach that rests on the following income creating pillars:
Education and Training; Water Conservation and Management; Energy Savings and Creation Programs;
Travel Related Services and Local Typical Products.
Private and Public drawing on the resources, expertise and vantage points of both in a carefully constructed partnership that is unique to the culture, values and needs of your territory.
Entrepreneurial the freedom to be creative, to try something new, and to succeed!
Sustainable quality skills that empower individuals in the community in respect of the environment
Where history and culture, knowledge and learning, local citizens and visitors, the past and the future can come together and, building on past achievements, create new opportunities.
Self-Finance In Kind Payments Revenue Based Funding and Sharing
Local Area Special Purpose Vehicles - SPVs - are Independent of each other but benefit from Economies of Scale generated by a Joint Marketing and Management Project thus addressing a Key Problem that prevents the Resurgence of America’s Main Streets and Historic Districts in Small Towns.
Project Targets small commercial, retail and office buildings as well as museums and entertainment venues located in historic districts and main streets of towns and suburban areas with a population of 100 thousand or less that have a history as manufacturing, agricultural and/or river, canal, coastal, rail and lake transport hub communities.
Utilization purchase and/or lease of energy efficiency and water resources equipment, parts and related software, legal and accounting services, social media, traditional marketing and advertising, specialized consulting in community planning, architecture and design and training services.






Projects in Small Town Main Streets and Historic Districts