Bloggin’ on the Edge

Posted by Scott Spielman at 4:54 PM | Comments

Just when you think you’ve heard the last about the Historic Wayne Theater, the plan pops up for another encore.

Here it is, on the cusp of being slated for demolition, and now a subcommittee of Wayne planning commissioners has been formed to look into the property.

The concept is that if it is torn down, the city of Wayne will have to pay for it in one way or another. Since it was built to last—more than 80 years and counting—and allegedly contains materials like asbestos, it will probably cost more to demolish it than it would to bring it to a ‘white box’ condition and preserve it for future development.

It’s an interesting debate and I applaud the planning commission for wanting to get involved in it. In fact, I applaud them for doing anything other than rubber-stamping site plans.

In talking about this, though, I found out something else that struck me as rather alarming: there’s no specialized zoning in place there to dictate what will come after the structure is demolished. Here’s a structure that has been vacant for 20 years, that city officials have been vexed with for at least half that time, and yet nobody has taken a proactive step to plan for what comes next. McDonald’s could buy it and throw up a restaurant in the middle of town. This is despite pressure (which came in part from me) to update the city master plan and try to be proactive about the future.

I still lean toward preserving the structure. I think it has more potential than the Village Theater in Canton, or the Penn Theater in Plymouth. I think the city should accept the property, do the minimal repairs needed to keep it safe and save it as an economic development tool.

Sure, it would require a long-term investment from the city, but that investment would be negligible at first—and it’s in the heart of the downtown!!!!!

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