Showing posts with label railroad depot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label railroad depot. Show all posts

Friday, July 31, 2020

From the Archives: Around Vicksburg 1998

Dear Readers, I recently looked through a box of negatives and found a roll of Fuji NGII film from 1998. I remember a gorgeous spring day during which I was testing my new Leica 35mm ƒ/2.0 Summicron lens. I still have this lens and use it regularly. This will be a semi-random look at Vicksburg some two decades ago. (Click any picture to enlarge to 1600 pixels wide.)
Railroad depot, view north, 35mm ƒ/2 Summicron lens, polarizing filter
This is a popular scene that tourists see when they visit the Vicksburg waterfront and view the murals. The Mississippi Valley and Yazoo Railroad Depot was built in 1907 and now houses The Old Depot Museum. The Vicksburg Southern Railroad (VSOR), owned by Watco, operates these tracks for occasional freight to the Port of Vicksburg and to International Paper north of the community of Redwood.
Mulberry Street, Vicksburg 
Lower Grove Street with the Biscuit Company and Velchof's Corner restaurants
Levee Street, view northeast
I took these frames from an apartment on the 3rd floor of the depot. Some young guys were renting the apartment and they kindly let me go out on their balcony. That was before the depot was restored in 2011-2012 (recall how it flooded during the spring 2011 high water). A kidney dialysis clinic occupied the ground floor and the 2nd floor may have been unoccupied.
Former rail sidings at the site where the M/V Mississippi IV is now permanently mounted. 1990 4×5" Fuji 50 transparency, taken on a B&J camera
Since I took these 1998 frames, a number of changes have come to downtown. 10 South Restaurant has been built on top of the bank building. In the lower picture, the M/V Mississippi IV has been permanently mounted on a concrete pad where the old railroad tracks one ran, and the Jesse Brent Lower Mississippi River Museum has been built at 910 Washington Street.
Nice Chevrolet! Corner of Grove and Buck Streets
Ansche Chesed Cemetery, Vicksburg
Anshe Chesed Congregation established this cemetery in 1864 for Vicksburg's Jewish community. In May of 1863, fierce fighting occurred here during the siege of Vicksburg.
Azalea blossoms, Leica 90mm ƒ/2.8 Tele-Elmarit lens
This was a splendid Azalea year, and I could not resist a few "pretty" pictures.

These negatives are from Fuji NGII film. My SilverFast Ai scanning software does not have an NHII profile, so the colors are a bit odd. Resized, they almost look digital, which is not what I am trying to achieve. I think B&W is the more effective way to show the differences between film versus digital capture.

Wednesday, April 15, 2020

The vacant lots of downtown Redlands, California

(Guest post by morangm)

Most of Kodachromeguy's posts here feature abandoned and decaying rural towns in areas that are losing population and economic activity - places that are just no longer needed. In today's post, I'm going to talk about a different situation - decay caused not by decreasing population and economic declines, but rather decay in the midst of rapid growth, caused by self-defeating municipal ordinances.

Redlands, California, is a cute historic town about 60 miles east of downtown Los Angeles.  Although it was originally an independent town settled by wealthy easterners seeking a pleasant climate for retirement and those seeking their fortunes in citrus cultivation, it has long since become attached to the ever-expanding Los Angeles metropolitan area.  This area of California, the "Inland Empire", is one of the fastest-growing regions of the country.  According to a recent demographic analysis by the City of Redlands, 80% of people who live in Redlands do not work in Redlands, and 80% of people who work in Redlands don't live in Redlands.  So, while Redlands fiercely clings to its historical identity, it is no longer a self-contained entity.  Like it or not, it is part of a broader metropolitan community.

In the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s, Redlands voters, alarmed at the rapid growth of the region, adopted some slow growth municipal ballot measures and propositions. These measures, among other, more technical things, limit the number of new dwelling units that can be built within the city limits each year to 400 and cap the height of new buildings.  Redlands is by no means the only municipality to adopt slow growth measures like this, and it is exactly these types of restrictions, adopted by many communities across metropolitan areas, that have contributed to urban sprawl and worsening traffic congestion.  If you don't build up and in, you have to build out.

Redlands has a small but relatively lively and pedestrian-friendly downtown area which spans for about 4 blocks along State Street, with some activity in the surrounding blocks.  Unfortunately, despite the region's overall economic growth, the area immediately west of downtown has declined in recent decades.  The Redlands Mall, built in 1977, was placed squarely in the middle of what was once State St., bulldozing many historic buildings and effectively cutting off the main downtown corridor from the other end of State St.  The I-10 freeway cut the city in half, blockading the northern residential areas from downtown. Additionally, the freight and passenger rail corridor ended service at some point, and various industrial and warehousing businesses closed up.

The slow growth restrictions in Redlands meant that redeveloping these central areas of town was not economically viable for developers.  The Redlands Mall has sat abandoned for 10 years (which doesn't sound like much, but remember this is one of the fastest-growing regions of the country we're talking about!).  There are many other vacant lots and abandoned buildings that no one is willing to invest in.  Developers just can't turn a profit redeveloping a downtown area in California if they can't build upwards.
Redlands mall
The abandoned Redlands Mall
West State Street
West State St, the part cut off from downtown by the Redlands Mall, with the Chamber of Commerce on the left.
Abandoned warehouse or packinghouse
Abandoned warehouse (possibly a citrus packinghouse?) right next to downtown
Vacant lot
Vacant lot and parking lot downtown. The backside of the abandoned warehouse is in the background.
Empty dead end
Empty dead end downtown with Studio Movie Grill (formerly the Krikorian Cinema) in the background
Abandoned house
Abandoned house abutting the highway (in the background)
Unused parking lot
Unused parking lot currently being utilized for construction storage. This will probably become parking for the adjacent rail station. I think this is the site for the newly-planned parking garage.
Rail corridor
Empty land and the newly-graded rail corridor
Boarded-up historic trolley
Hey, I found a trolley!
The Los Angeles commuter rail system, Metrolink, is currently expanding its service out to Redlands, revitalizing the old abandoned rail corridor and the historic Santa Fe depot.  As part of this effort, the City of Redlands got a grant to develop a really great transit-oriented development plan to guide redevelopment efforts for the area around the three new rail stops, which encompasses the Redlands Mall and other vacant and abandoned areas in the downtown core.  City staff and hired consultants spent over a year developing this long-term plan for walkable, bike-friendly, mixed-use development.  They held a series of public workshops to learn what the community wanted and to solicit feedback on the plans.

The plan, called the Transit Villages Plan, lays out new zoning for the plan area, allowing buildings of 4 stories on average (with some sections of up to 5 stories allowed for architectural features) in the central part of downtown, with building heights tapering off as you get farther from downtown.  The plan also specifies various architectural requirements to maintain the character of the town and prevent ugly big square boxes from being built, etc.  It seemed like a good plan!  It would help us to redevelop the decayed areas of downtown, encourage environmentally responsible and sustainable development patterns, accommodate necessary and desirable growth in a controlled manner, and ensure that we maintained the charm and character of the city.

However, the City's vision for this new denser, mixed-use development couldn't come to fruition with the existing voter-approved slow growth restrictions in place.  So, the City put on the March 2020 ballot a new measure, Measure G, which would remove the old slow growth restrictions for the area within the Transit Villages Plan area (so, not the whole city, but just the downtown core).

Redlands went nuts!  In the month or two preceding the Measure G vote, a vigorous public debate broke out in the local newspapers and social media.  Although response to the Transit Villages Plan at the community workshops had seemed largely positive, there was immense pushback to Measure G.  NIMBYism took hold. People didn't want to encourage more development in Redlands, didn't want to welcome new apartment-dwelling neighbors, and didn't want their views of the mountains obstructed by taller buildings downtown.  But the debate was wild.  Measure G's actual text was technical and confusing, and the City did a poor job of proactively explaining what it meant in lay terms and even explaining how the urban planning process works, what zoning is, what the existing measures were, etc.  By the time the City finally released an FAQ that laid out clear information, the conspiracy theories had already made the rounds, people's emotions had already been roused, and the local Tea Party had organized in a serious way to oppose the measure.

Measure G failed miserably. About 65% of voters opposed it.

So what does this mean for the vacant lots and abandoned buildings of downtown Redlands?  It remains to be seen.  The City will have to redesign the Transit Villages Plan to conform to the old slow growth measures.  Will developers be willing to invest in these properties given the limitations?  We don't know.

Further confusing the problem is that the State of California has been aggressively pursuing legislation to increase the housing supply across the state, precisely because municipal slow growth measures like those in Redlands are driving up housing costs and encouraging sprawl.  Some state legislation actually removes municipal new housing unit limits, so even without Measure G, parts of our slow growth limits are moot.  The state is also requiring communities to provide large numbers of new housing units over the next several years.  It's unclear to me exactly how this works, but my understanding is that if a City's zoning code does not conform with state requirements on housing provision, the City has no grounds to say no to a developer proposing housing units in whatever form.  Thus, we may end up with denser high-rise development downtown anyway, but it won't be subject to the Transit Villages Plan's careful architectural guidelines. We may be stuck with whatever the developer wants to build with no local say in the matter.  We might also end up bulldozing our few remaining orange groves on the outskirts of the town and turning them into housing developments, and people will build Granny flats in their garages or backyards.  And if we don't conform to the State's requirements, we risk losing state funding for things like road construction.

So, the future of Redlands remains pretty uncertain for the moment.  The way I see it, the failure of Measure G seems fairly self-defeating.

To be clear, there is some activity happening among all the vacant lots.  The new Redlands Packing House District shopping center has been successful, Escape Brewery moved into the old Rondor building (a former trolley depot), and there's a new market-style eatery in the works in another old packinghouse.  But none of this helps the housing situation, and it's not the walkable mixed-use development we envisioned in the Transit Villages Plan.
Redlands Blvd
Redlands Blvd just west of downtown. Perhaps the now-empty part of downtown will eventually look like this?
Further reading:
Because Kodachromeguy always does this: All photos in this post were taking with a Sony Xperia XZ2 Compact smartphone.  And for the record, Redlands almost never has this many clouds in the sky.

Sunday, December 8, 2019

Small Towns in Mississippi: Holly Springs

Holly Springs is the county seat of Marshall County, Mississippi. It is near the border with southern Tennessee and is southeast of Memphis. It is in the hill country east of the Mississippi Delta, but its early history was intertwined with cotton cultivation and processing.
Holly Springs Depot, from Cooper Postcard Collection, Mississippi Department of Archives and History.
The post card from the Mississippi Department of Archives and History shows cotton bales stacked near the railroad depot.
The depot, with its distinctive towers is still standing and in good condition. I was there late in the day and the building was empty; I am not sure who uses it. The 1800s brick shed still has railroad equipment in and around it.
Mississippi Industrial College, from Cooper Postcard Collection, Mississippi department of Archives and History
For years, I had wanted to visit Holly Springs to see the remains of the Mississippi Industrial College. According to Hill Country History:
Mississippi Industrial College was an historically black college founded in 1905 by the Mississippi Conference of the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church under the leadership of Bishop Elias Cottrell (1855-1937).  Bishop Cottrell’s goal was to create a college for African Americans and provide them with liberal arts education and industrial training. Mississippi Industrial College’s campus was located on a 120 acre lot, across the street from Rust College, a competing historically black liberal arts school.

Classes began at the College in January of 1906, and in May the school already had over 200 students.  By 1908 Mississippi Industrial College had 450 students.  Mississippi Industrial College was one of the most important black colleges in Mississippi for many decades, until the end of segregation resulted in increasingly low student populations. The college closed in 1982 and remained empty.  During the 1990s, the Holly Springs Police Department and other businesses moved into the newer of the buildings, but they eventually abandoned the property as well.
The once-handsome buildings at the College have been deteriorating for three decades. One of the more modern structures housed the police department and some other city offices for a few years, but I think all campus buildings are empty now.
Preservation Mississippi wrote about the deterioration of the Carnegie Auditorium in 2010. Consider, at one time, the auditorium could seat 1000 people. In a small college in a rural area! The builders had lofty ambitions that they could bring the arts and culture to their students and members of the surrounding community. As of 2018, the building is structurally unsound and dangerous. (The color image above is a digital file.)
Sadly, there is not much left to explore at the site. The historic buildings are unsafe. Notice the stone slab steps.
On Rte 7, we came across an old-fashioned Texaco station, complete with its horizontal stripes on the roof above the pumps. Someone is using the property as a repair shop and storage depot for old trucks.

That is all for Holly Springs. The town was not too inspiring photographically. It suffers from serious poverty and decay. And the historic college is is very poor condition. The black and white photographs are from Kodak TMax 100 film, exposed at EI=80 and developed in Xtol developer. I used my wife's 1971 Pentax Spotmatic camera and scanned the negatives with a Plustek 7600i film scanner.

Monday, May 27, 2019

On the Dixie Overland Highway, Historic US 80 - east Louisiana (LA-01)

Mississippi River bridges at Vicksburg, with I-20 on left and US 80 on right, 2005 during low-water (Rolleiflex 3.5E camera)
The historic Dixie Overland Highway crossed the Mississippi River just south of Vicksburg on the Old Vicksburg Bridge. Then, it headed almost due west towards Tallulah, Monroe, Shreveport, Dallas, and, eventually, San Diego.
1996 aerial photograph of Mississippi River bridges, view west towards Louisiana (Kodachrome film, Nikon F3 camera) 
The Vicksburg Bridge & Terminal Co. built the Old Bridge during 1928-1930. It featured a single railroad track and a dual lane highway. It was open to vehicle traffic until 1998 and has been closed since then except for special events, like the annual Bricks and Spokes bicycle ride. Kansas City Southern still runs many trains a day across the bridge. The Interstate 20 bridge, on the left in the photographs above, opened in 1973 when I-20 was under construction.
There is not too much to see in the little Louisiana town of Delta. US 80 heads west past farm fields and some forest land. The Kansas City Southern railroad tracks parallel the highway.
Former depot, Mound, Louisiana, Kodak Ektar 25 film, Rolleiflex 3.5F camera, 75mm ƒ/3.5 Planar lens
Mound was a farming community with a depot and a general store. I photographed the depot in 2005, but it has since been moved to Lake Bruin (it has been preserved). I also have photographs somewhere of the general store. Today, the Vicksburg-Tallulah regional airport is just north of US 80. There are some nice homes on Rte 602 between US 80 and I-20.
Scott Field, Tallulah, Louisiana (Fuji Velvia film, Leica M3 camera)
Just east of Tallulah, the historical Scott Field is within sight of US 80. This was one of the original stops for the young Delta Airlines in the 1930s, and the terminal reflects typical 1930s airport architecture. The field is now used for crop-dusting aircraft and this handsome building (with zinc roof tiles) has been restored.
Snyder Street, Tallulah, Louisiana (Fuji GW690II camera, 90mm ƒ/3.5 lens)
We reach Tallulah, a mid-size Louisiana farming town. Sadly, the downtown is pretty rough. The strip was formerly Snider Street, which paralleled the railroad tracks. Today, trains roar by and do not stop, and many of the stores are closed or collapsing. There must have once been a depot, but I do not know where. I have photographed Tallulah before. My wife and I occasionally bicycle on LA 602, which takes us through Tallulah on a wide swing through farm fields and forests.

This ends out short ride on the Dixie Overland Highway. In the future, I will to explore US 80 further west as it crosses central Louisiana.

Thursday, October 26, 2017

Railroads of Greece 6: Abandoned Steam Trains, Myloi

Myloi is the final resting place for old steam locomotives. The town is on the west side of the Bay of Naufplio (Nauplion), which is at the north end of the Argolic Gulf in southern Greece. The narrow-gauge Peloponnese railroad passes through town. The main line to Athens comes in from the north via the town of Argos. Heading south, the rail line runs along the coast and then turns west and ascends the mountains to eventually reach Tripoli, the main town in the central Peloponnese.
Not much is happening at the rail yard now. Not long ago, many of the track beds were overhauled and new rails laid, as shown by the clean crushed rock in the second photograph. But after spending significant funds on upgrades, the Greek national railway system abruptly stopped rail service on the narrow gauge system in most of the Peloponnese. What an amazing bike and hike trail this would make.
The real reason to stop in Myloi is to look at the old steam locomotives, many of which have been abandoned for decades. I have no idea why they were parked here rather than sold for the scrap iron.
Asbestos cement is dripping off the boilers.
More old locomotives are parked among the huge eucalyptus trees. I do not know the types or manufacture, but there are web pages that have inventoried lost locomotives around the world.
This is one of the water tanks that once supplied water to the locomotive tenders. The need for water to generate steam was a major logistical problem in the steam locomotive era. Today, a diesel locomotive only needs diesel fuel and it can run for days.
A family was living in the old train workshop, possibly immigrants. They had bicycles and laundry.
One diesel-electric unit was abandoned on a siding.
What do you do when you are finished exploring trains? Well, you go to the taverna and eat fish and squid, of course. These small seaside restaurants do an amazing job - and the ingredients are locally sourced. None of this processed crap full of artificial ingredients and salt that comes in on a Sysco truck.

Please click the link to see black and white photographs of the Myloi rail yard. 

Most images are digital from my Fuji X-E1 digital camera.