September 3, 2004
Who’s Killing the Great Trees of Perryridge?
Driving down Perryridge Road the other day I noticed it was littered with dead leaves, unusual for this time of year. Looking up at the (mulberry?) trees that line the street, I saw that they all seem to be dying, every one of them. I am told that our town’s tree department is looking into the matter but, so far, hasn’t a clue (or none that they cared to share with me, as they didn’t return my call). It would be a real shame to lose these trees, as they give the street quite a bit of its charm. It’s probably not true that the hospital is to blame, but given the sour relationship between that institution and its neighbors on Perryridge, it would be fun if it were.
27 Rockwood Spur
Not many houses came on the market last week but this was a notable exception. Jean Crocco (Putnam Associates)’s listing is an old 1905 carriage house that has been totally renovated and added on to, tastefully. Its beauty remains, but the house is completely modernized, offering a rebuke to those who feel compelled to tear down anything built before 1995. Asking price is $3,895,000.00, which brings you one and a half acres, six bedrooms including a guest bedroom suite a root cellar dug into a hillside, one corn crib and a horse stall for an unspecified number of horses. You want more, too late: as noted below, the Conyer’s Farm property, which had room for fifty horses or so, has been sold.
On the Other Hand
The New York Times reports that the president of the Royal Institute of British Architects has proposed an “X” designation for those buildings that are simply too ugly to tolerate. He’d use taxpayers’ money to encourage the razing of the most egregious offenders and, while I deplore Socialism, I think that’s a good use of funds for the Brits. Here in the land of free enterprise, where there are many, many candidates for an X rating (including a number of monstrosities still under construction), I’d think we could make this a private undertaking. Something like the Land Trust in reverse, where town benefactors can contribute toward buying up and tearing down architectural follies and builders’ excesses. I’ll ante up the first five dollars.
Market Conditions
Although it seems as though everyone in town with somewhere better to go has done so, the market is not completely dormant. Fifty or so new listings showed up last week and, more important, twenty houses went to contract at prices ranging from $15,500,000 (97 Clapboard Ridge) on down. Sales were even more impressive, including the eighty-acre sale in Conyer’s Farm for $45,000,000, 93 Doubling Road for $9,450,000 and 29 Round Hill Club Road for $5,550,000. The Conyer’s Farm property went on the market on June first and went to contract August twelfth, closing just thirteen days later. Nice to have that kind of pocket change hanging around.
Road Rage
The proposal to close part of Tod’s Point to through traffic on Saturdays has generated the usual letters of protest from those claiming to represent the “frail and the elderly”. I disagree. Five days a week, drivers are free to cruise all around the point while they take in the scenery and bounce bicyclists from their way. It seems reasonable to turn those same roads over for a few hours on weekends to everyone else. Just as they are on Sundays, the beaches would remain accessible under this expanded program; it is only the loop drive that would be off limits. Boat owners who need to reach their craft and handicapped drivers would be permitted entry while everyone else could drive only as far as the beach parking lots. The park is far more crowded, even in winter, than it was in the 1960s and some accommodation of competing uses makes sense. Besides, judging from the silver hair I see on many of the walkers, joggers and bicyclists at Tod’s, this town’s population may be elderly but it’s not particularly frail. The senior citizen “advocates” who claim that old folks need Buick Roadmasters to see the Point are probably insulting many of their would-be constituents. For those who insist on the right to sit in their car and do nothing, I suggest they head out to I-95 on any afternoon and take in the view of the car in front of them.
Driving down Perryridge Road the other day I noticed it was littered with dead leaves, unusual for this time of year. Looking up at the (mulberry?) trees that line the street, I saw that they all seem to be dying, every one of them. I am told that our town’s tree department is looking into the matter but, so far, hasn’t a clue (or none that they cared to share with me, as they didn’t return my call). It would be a real shame to lose these trees, as they give the street quite a bit of its charm. It’s probably not true that the hospital is to blame, but given the sour relationship between that institution and its neighbors on Perryridge, it would be fun if it were.
27 Rockwood Spur
Not many houses came on the market last week but this was a notable exception. Jean Crocco (Putnam Associates)’s listing is an old 1905 carriage house that has been totally renovated and added on to, tastefully. Its beauty remains, but the house is completely modernized, offering a rebuke to those who feel compelled to tear down anything built before 1995. Asking price is $3,895,000.00, which brings you one and a half acres, six bedrooms including a guest bedroom suite a root cellar dug into a hillside, one corn crib and a horse stall for an unspecified number of horses. You want more, too late: as noted below, the Conyer’s Farm property, which had room for fifty horses or so, has been sold.
On the Other Hand
The New York Times reports that the president of the Royal Institute of British Architects has proposed an “X” designation for those buildings that are simply too ugly to tolerate. He’d use taxpayers’ money to encourage the razing of the most egregious offenders and, while I deplore Socialism, I think that’s a good use of funds for the Brits. Here in the land of free enterprise, where there are many, many candidates for an X rating (including a number of monstrosities still under construction), I’d think we could make this a private undertaking. Something like the Land Trust in reverse, where town benefactors can contribute toward buying up and tearing down architectural follies and builders’ excesses. I’ll ante up the first five dollars.
Market Conditions
Although it seems as though everyone in town with somewhere better to go has done so, the market is not completely dormant. Fifty or so new listings showed up last week and, more important, twenty houses went to contract at prices ranging from $15,500,000 (97 Clapboard Ridge) on down. Sales were even more impressive, including the eighty-acre sale in Conyer’s Farm for $45,000,000, 93 Doubling Road for $9,450,000 and 29 Round Hill Club Road for $5,550,000. The Conyer’s Farm property went on the market on June first and went to contract August twelfth, closing just thirteen days later. Nice to have that kind of pocket change hanging around.
Road Rage
The proposal to close part of Tod’s Point to through traffic on Saturdays has generated the usual letters of protest from those claiming to represent the “frail and the elderly”. I disagree. Five days a week, drivers are free to cruise all around the point while they take in the scenery and bounce bicyclists from their way. It seems reasonable to turn those same roads over for a few hours on weekends to everyone else. Just as they are on Sundays, the beaches would remain accessible under this expanded program; it is only the loop drive that would be off limits. Boat owners who need to reach their craft and handicapped drivers would be permitted entry while everyone else could drive only as far as the beach parking lots. The park is far more crowded, even in winter, than it was in the 1960s and some accommodation of competing uses makes sense. Besides, judging from the silver hair I see on many of the walkers, joggers and bicyclists at Tod’s, this town’s population may be elderly but it’s not particularly frail. The senior citizen “advocates” who claim that old folks need Buick Roadmasters to see the Point are probably insulting many of their would-be constituents. For those who insist on the right to sit in their car and do nothing, I suggest they head out to I-95 on any afternoon and take in the view of the car in front of them.
posted by Chris Fountain at 8:42 AM
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