By Matt Blood
Hartford Courant, June 1, 2003

After the Hartford Architecture Conservancy ceased to operate in 1996, historic preservation in the city lost a voice. Hartford's unique architecture began slowly disappearing through neglect, abandonment and demolition.

Concerned about this trend and its impact on our neighborhoods, residents and preservationists formed the Hartford Preservation Alliance in 1998. The alliance advocates for the revitalization of Hartford through the preservation and adaptive reuse of the city's historic architecture.

We have been involved with numerous efforts to stem the tide of demolition by encouraging neighborhoods, property owners and the city to rethink how they approach abandoned buildings. We work with neighborhood leaders to educate them about their architectural resources, and advocate for economic development projects that rehabilitate historic buildings.

Our organization is made up of people who have contributed their resources, talents and interests to accomplish the goals of preserving Hartford's historic architecture.

Buildings with distinctive architecture define our downtown and the neighborhood character of Hartford. The primary focus of the Hartford Preservation Alliance's advocacy efforts is to convince people of the value of neighborhood streetscapes.

Most of the city's neighborhoods are made up of exceptional, but not necessarily extraordinary, architecture. Every building is not a Mark Twain House, but together, neighborhood buildings define the backdrop of our day-to-day lives.

The slow loss of neighborhood buildings, both residential and commercial, has eroded our connection to Hartford's history. Yet there is hope. Efforts are being made to strengthen and rebuild neglected areas of the city. Community development corporations are creating new housing and commercial spaces out of blighted historic buildings.

The Preservation Alliance has actively promoted state and federal programs that aid developers seeking to fix historic properties. We also are trying to create new historic districts in the city, so that even more buildings can qualify for this aid. continued

Our advocacy efforts have included working with local developers on good urban design. As new buildings are constructed on vacant lots, whole streetscapes can come back to life and become dynamic urban spaces. Hartford's neighborhoods have started a slow recovery. Vacant historic buildings that once threatened the quality of neighborhood life are becoming assets that play an important role in creating value, and stabilizing neighborhoods.

The next few years offer important possibilities for preserving historic architecture. We plan to develop more programming that educates the public about preservation issues, and to collaborate with interested parties to affect positive change.

Our advocacy efforts will continue to focus on proper mothballing of vacant historic buildings and placing appropriate buildings and streetscapes on the state and federal registries. We also plan to continue, through a series of recognition awards and celebrations, to acknowledge area projects that exemplify effective and appropriate preservation initiatives. In fulfilling this agenda, we believe that the alliance is contributing to Hartford's quality of life and to its future prospects.

City government, corporations and private developers have long had a history of resorting to demolition as a way of eliminating blight and stabilizing neighborhoods. Unfortunately, the result has been the irreplaceable loss of hundreds of buildings that were the essential fabric of the city's streets and neighborhoods.

The alliance believes that a key strategy for Hartford's future is to recover its former vibrancy by protecting and rehabilitating its historic and architecturally significant buildings. Doing so will help increase levels of homeownership and bring enduring vitality to our city.

As the capacity of our organization increases over the next few years, we hope our efforts will put preservation issues in the forefront when community development is on the agenda.

Matt Blood is an architect and president of the Hartford Preservation Alliance.