What is the deal with the trees in front of KeyFoods?
Did they remove parking spaces? Will that area become an open-air drug market? Will I run into the trees when I am jogging?
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3 Answers
This is Pat Manning, the Main Street Manager for the Beacon Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber was awarded a NYS grant to do facade restoration, streetscape improvements, and rental apartment rehabilitation in a specific area within Market Square. The commission of this grant in its entirety has resulted in well over 2 Million dollars of public and private monies being invested in this area. What you see at Key Foods is the "streetscape" portion of the grant.
The owner of the building has offered us use of his land to place over 200 trees and bushes along the front of the parking lot, along the side that borders Lady Grey, and along North Walnut to screen the side of the building from the residential homes. There has been hundreds of yards of new topsoil trucked in and over 600 feet of new granite curbing installed. This work was done in record time by Eastern View Landscaping. There will be a sign designed by our own Randall Martin placed on the Key Food's sign with a map showing the whole of Main Street so tourists know that it is worth it to keep walking west to east. There will also be bike racks installed to hold 12 bikes thanks to a donation from Jon Miles at People's Bicycles. By the way-we increased parking spaces to 62 with a redesign of the lot.
This is all part of the Beacon Chamber's continued commitment to show that the City of Beacon is open for business and the envy of other river cities up and down the Hudson. Thanks goes out to Chamber Ray Rabenda for his leadership and I also would like to thank Mayor Casale and the Council for their pro-active zoning approach to Market Square.
The trees in front of Key Food address the issue of what some have called "the dead zone" of Main Street. After entering Main from the Bank Square area and arriving at the Key Food parking lot, many who are new to town or simply visiting cannot distinguish whether or not continuing down Main will provide any further fruits. From what I can recall, Jonathan Clarke of Dutchess County Planning & Development, in a meeting during the TOD debacle, gave a presentation about proposed zoning changes throughout Beacon and city layout plans which addressed the urban planning concept of "the open room," which is an attempt to emulate the feeling of being within the comfort and familiarity of a room while being outside. One might feel this while standing in front of the School of Jellyfish and walking along Main toward the river, or in front of the Beacon Theatre on the other end of Main. The new trees in front of Key Food break up the long stretch of parking lot which, until now, just rolled on out into Main and left many feeling put off by Beacon's sudden change of scenery.
I like the trees, and I don't think they lost any parking spots.
It borders on good urban design. If you go to Hyde Park you'll see they have all the retail hidden behind trees (like stop and shop). I always thought this was the result of tougher planning boards like they would have in Hyde Park, seeing as how they trade on their historical site value so much.
Also someone told me they are renovating that store, which appears to be true.
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Asked: 2012-12-11 19:41:46 -0500
Seen: 15,711 times
Last updated: Dec 12 '12
Will birds poop on your head as you walk under the trees?
scottlt ( 2012-12-13 15:52:24 -0500 )edit