Tuesday, June 28, 2011

UMC House Moves - Note

It seems concrete steps were being taken yesterday to start preparing for UMC (LSU Footprint) house moves.

I'm not holding my breath, but house moves off the second proposed hospital site would be a positive development at this point, following the demolition of so many fine buildings in the LSU Footprint to date.  Thus far, despite preservationists raising awareness since October of last year, not a single building has moved off the LSU Footprint.  It still doesn't entirely make sense given the uncertainty about financing and a business plan, but the alternative would be demolition...under the same set of conditions.

Any house moves should do two things: 1) keep the roofs on buildings and keep buildings intact to the utmost extent possible to reduce damage to the houses once they've moved to new locations, and 2) place houses in appropriate historic context, to the maximum extent possible, with some notice to neighborhood organizations and immediate neighbors of the destination lots.

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