Today Real Hartford introduces a new series: Grid, Interrupted. This will be a glimpse at some of a street or block’s history.

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A recent piece in the Courant painted a kind of dreamer’s dream. It reported that the State of Connecticut’s laboratory building, pictured above, is being vacated and is potentially slated for demolition. The Bushnell is eying this spot for condominiums and apartments. Other desired changes to this area: retail and restaurants. A potential change: a parking garage on part of a surface lot and the possibility of a garage elsewhere with (maybe) housing and (maybe) a restaurant surrounding it.

Lovely, ain’t it?

But what the iQuilt supporters have skated around is obvious and simple: no neighborhood is going to exist until all those hideous and isolating surface lots are dealt with, seriously. There have been no concrete promises made to replace surface lots with vertical parking structures. In a 2003 piece by Tom Condon, which is not entirely unlike the one just published by the same newspaper, there was talk of townhouse condos being built on the north west corner of Buckingham and Hudson (still parking lot) and townhouses along West Street. At that time, the Kenneth Greenberg plan was still being talked up. Then, there was no criticism of the abundance of surface lots and The Bushnell went on record saying that it did not want to give up any parking. Even then, there was talk of maybe building a parking garage behind the State building at Capitol Avenue and Washington Street, but the hedging was blamed on finances.

What needs to be said is that we can not afford to continue disrupting the grid with the kind of sprawling surface parking one finds at suburban malls. It may work in Manchester or West Hartford, but it does not work in an urban setting. Until the waffling on these surface lots at Capitol and West stops, there is no reason for residents to believe anyone is serious about transforming this area into a “neighborhood.”

Doubting that this is a problem? Go to the intersection of Capitol Avenue and West Street. Look around. Too lazy to walk or look on Google Street View? Here are two pictures showing you the view:

 

Each corner of that intersection is a surface parking lot. What neighborhood feels unified with that kind of disruption?

The article, glowing about The Bushnell’s dreams for potential development, quotes a city architect claiming this renewal could result in the area rivaling the West End — a statement problematic as much for what it implies as for what it may not fulfill.

This segment of Downtown was not always so desolate. The Courant piece goes back to 1920, but to appreciate this, one must go back even further.

Let’s start with the lot above and the year 1923. After five years of planning, the Mount Sinai Hospital opened at 119 Capitol Avenue, in what had been a mansion taking up a nice chunk of space near West Street. What was originally called the Abrahan Jacobi Hospital had been looking at a space on Love Lane and Westland Street, but this fell through. The facility changed its named and purchased the estate belonging to Morgan Brainard, nephew of Morgan Bulkeley. When Bulkeley died in 1922, his nephew replaced him as president of Aetna; Brainard was also in charge of the Connecticut Historical Society beginning in 1922.

Previous to Brainard’s residence, this was not wide open space. The mansion had other owners, including Orlando H. Miner, C.H. Brainard (one of the city’s highest taxpayers in 1880s), and members of the Porter-Valentine family around the turn of the previous century. The Porter-Valentines also had ties to Aetna. A descendant of Rev. Thomas J. Hooker lived at 119 Capitol Avenue.

Of course, this mansion had its neighbors. mostly residential. Even ten years after the Bushnell opened, land records show that most of the residential units within a few blocks were filled, leaving only a handful of vacancies. If the Bushnell has a dream, it might look back to the 1940s when the nearby area of Capitol Avenue, West Street, Buckingham, and Clinton Street also hosted a barber, a grocer, Smith’s Store House (new and second-hand furniture and appliances), a food shop, stationary manufacturers, a print shop, and an undertaker, in addition to the State offices and churches still in existence.

Before the performing arts center was constructed during the Great Depression (1930), the residential component was more stable. This is not to imply that the Bushnell influenced housing stock; this is just how the neighborhood looked. Additionally, in 1917, the Trustees of Trinity College, Aetna Realty, and Puritan Laundry were in the area. A few years earlier, this neighborhood had insurance companies lining the streets. In the last few decades of the 19th century, this area did not have the small businesses, but was residential with the churches and Trinity College trustees. The State Armory — then called “First Regiment Armory” — could be found at 51 Elm Street, before it was relocated to its present location in 1909. In 1823 Trinity College could be found in the space now used by the State Capitol; it was called Washington College until 1845. The area of “College Hill” was sold to the City of Hartford in 1872.

Before all that, this segment of Capitol Avenue was called College Street for a time, and other area streets’ former names hint of what had been there. Trinity Street had gone by both College Place and Upper Mill Street. Elm Street was previously known as Park Row and Tanner’s Lane. Remember, the Park River is right there, only now, is buried out of sight.

What happened?

After Mount Sinai vacated 119 Capitol for its place in a neighborhood north of Downtown, it became the State Office Building Annex. Among other uses, it had been operating the “Division of Health Services for State Employees” for a time, offering physical exams, immunizations, x-rays, and treatments for State employees. Records show that over 700 State employees were treated at the clinic during its first six months of operation from December 1950 to June 1951. The State of CT Register and Manual indicates that the building served multiple functions, including war veterans’ offices. The Annex stopped appearing on the State record after 1965, but a 1965 aerial survey shows multiple structures still standing in the area between Capitol, Buckingham, West, and Washington/Trinity Street. Now? All surface parking.

You can’t seal up a city in a time capsule. Things change. But when a particular vision is lauded without critical thinking — which includes asking difficult and provocative questions — sometimes those changes are for the worse.