Time’s up, and another hole in the streetscape and urban fabric is due for Ouellette Ave. 1567 Ouellette featured here, last May.
This past Thursday, the Windsor Heritage Committee, had a meeting to deal with the request of a demolition permit request for the property. The committee was tasked with deciding whether to either a. take no action and allow the 60 day waiting period to take course; b. recommend designation, or c. pass a motion of no objection to the demolition request, allowing the property owners to proceed in advance of the 60 days period.
The resolution of the Heritage Committee is then passed on to council, who then choose to accept the recommendation of the committee or they can make their own motion. Over the years the City Council has been mostly supportive of the actions of the committee, usually taking, and accepting the recommendations put forth by the committee.
A motion to designate the property was put forth, after much debate, a vote of 3-2 saw the motion fail. As a result the fate of the building is essentially sealed.
From the Windsor Star – November 7, 1964
A view of the James H. Sutton Funeral Home, which took the property and expanded it into to the form that’s mostly there today.
From the Windsor Daily Star – October 23, 1954
Ernest Wilby, second from left is referred to as the “dean of local architects and former professor of architectural design at the University of Michigan”, as seen in this picture from the 1954 OAA conference in Windsor. On an unrelated note the OAA conference returned to Windsor in 2010.
While promises were made to “continue to market the site”, I would be willing to put money on it, that nothing will ever be built on that site. The only future use for that land I can see is a parking lot.
So, welcome to Windsor, where historic buildings are demolished at an alarming rate. If you hear any strange sounds in Walkerville, coming from St. Mary’s Churchyard, that’s probably Ernest Wilby rolling in his grave.
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You know the what’s really tragic about the loss of our heritage buildings? We couldn’t build anything as beautiful as 1567 Ouellette today no matter how hard we tried. That’s how incompetent the construction business in Windsor is.
The really sad part of it, to me, is that it sat vacant for so long without anyone purchasing it. Were the owners asking too much, or was there no interest? I don’t know, but one thing is obvious: nobody showed enough interest to go ahead and buy the place and the current owners were not interested in putting any money into it to keep it in good shape. So, what’s left?
Which brings up a question — what happens if the building is designated, but the owners do not put money into it? Does it just sit, rotting away? Is it possible to force owners into spending money to repair a building? If it is not possible, how long is the building allowed to decay before something has to happen? Would it not reach a point where repair becomes almost impossible, or simply prohibitively expensive?
Probably not in downtown, but they are building more beautiful ones in Windsor near Roseland like along Gundy Park. There was a really cool Victorian looking mansion done in bradstone with turrents at Dougall Ave and Beale St, I believe, that was built in the past year. There’s been a whole slew of new mansions built along Riverside on the way to Sandpoint Beach.
It’s sad that downtown is loosing a mansion this nice, but on the other hand, what are you going to do with it? It’s just been sitting there vacant with insane tax assessments. Who wants to live a mansion that stored thousands of dead people? They should never had let it become a funeral home.
What I don’t get is, why is there a moratorium on knocking down boarded up buildings in Sandwich like those on Indian Road where they’ve tried to get demo permits for years and were denied, yet here they just expedite it here. There should at least be some consistency in the process. If you’re gonna require a plan of new development before handing out demo permits in Sandwhich, then the same reasoning should be used here.
It’s scary to think we are at a point in Windsor where a vacant lot is more valuable to an investor than one with a building on it, historically valuable or not.
From what I know this building was structurally sound. Sure it needed updates, but there is NO way that building a new building on a greenfield site is cheaper than renovating this. Even if the price was comparable, who would rather have a stucco box in a sea of parking than this?
Oh.. and I hope that at least the leaded glass and other architecturally valuable elements are salvaged, I know lots of folks in my neighbourhood who would install those leaded glass windows on their homes, myself included.
Well, that sucks.
Has there at least been any talk regarding donating the interior, windows and brickwork to Habitat for Humanity at least? Is there even a salvage store in the city that takes stuff like this?
there seems to be a double standard here in windsor as far as developers goes and for a developer to buy just a vacant lot it saves him the money of having to tear down the building it’s too bad another piece of windsor’s past is falling vitim to the wreckers ball
I’m tired of speculators coming here and buying property only to realize their “business plan” was fallen woefully short. Perhaps they spent too much for the building or asking too high of rent. These are failed business plans because they should have done their due diligence.
Instead our community suffers because we lose yet another building and have yet another vacant lot. Our downtown will continue to look like a gapped-tooth whore.
I think it is sad that those who voted against protecting this building sit on the heritage committee. Perhaps those board members shouild check themselves and realize that EVERY building of character in this city needs to be preserved because we don’t have much left.
Shame on them!
Major bummer. Especially since it’s sitting next to such a great example of a re-purposed building.
I was through the property a little over a year ago and sadly it was in a very poor state both inside an out. We estimated 2-300,000 in updates needed, significant water damage and feral cat intrusions…not to mention outdated plumbing and wiring….I didn’t feel safe walking on some of the 2nd floor. The truly sad part is someone let it get to this stage.
Instead of complaining on the internet about it, why don’t us citizens do something about it?
There’s power in numbers. Unfortunately Canadians in general are too lazy to ever do anything about it, which has led municipal, provincial, and federal governments to WALTZ ALLLLL over us.
If there was ever a time to do anything, the time is now. I’m sure many people who frequent this site are prominent members in the community, get something together, and I’ll be the first to join.
I was thinking maybe it could be used for student housing now with the universtivy deal.
Shawn M is has been rtied but Windsorites are so apathetic I doubt most would come out again.
Aaron, I can’t see that happening. Remember that students still need to get to the main campus and still want to be part of “campus” life. Therefore they will stick around the UofW on the west side.
Well it’s official there’s an article in todays star june 8 the wreckers ball will be swinging very shortly
tristan please don’t use that word repurposed it’s one of those catch words the mayor and council pick up and kill just like the word proponent they’ve pretty well wore that out too
Shawn thats a great idea and i’d be right their on the front line next to you …but you and me both know once king eddie gets an idea in his head he pushes ahead with it regardless of what people say look at what he’s done to the people who live in the ghost town near the bridge he wouldn’t even let them have their 10 minutes at a council meeting to state their case
dave gap toothed whore …thats funny!!!
I live on Ouellette. We have enough vacant lots. That building, however, does not deserve any designation other than those who may have attended funerals there. Don’t TOUCH Anderson Funeral Home BTW.
Drove by today (July 21) and all that’s left is a pile of rubble.
That sucks. Thanks for the update Jennifer. I live right around the corner and didn’t even see it.