Threatened: Massachusetts Shovel Factory
By Margaret Foster | Online Only | Dec. 2, 2008
Under the proposed plan, several buildings on the Ames Shovel Works campus will be demolished, the Long Shop (right) will be cut in two, and new floors will be added to other 19th-century buildings.
Credit: Chris Milford, Friends of Historic Ames Shovel Works at North Easton
In North Easton, Mass., an affordable-housing loophole may lead to the partial demolition of a state landmark.
The Ames Shovel Shop complex, whose founders commissioned the town's H.H. Richardson-designed library and memorial hall, is now in jeopardy. The new owners of the Ames Shovel Shop Complex, local developers George and Robert Turner, want to tear down some of the 15 historic buildings on the site for a 182-apartment and office complex.
"All of us who have looked at the proposal were horrified," says Jim Igoe, president of Preservation Massachusetts, which named the Ames Shovel Shop to its list of the state's most endangered historic places in October. "These are not your throwaway buildings."
On Jan. 9, Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Ian A. Bowles will decide whether or not to order an environmental impact review of the developers' proposal, a move that might delay any demolition.
The developers, who plan to add several stories to some of the historic buildings, say that it's not the first time the Ames Shovel Shop has been altered. "The insides of the buildings have been totally gutted," Robert Turner told the Boston Globe.
What You Can Do
The National Trust for Historic Preservation's Northeast Regional Office has been providing advice and support to Ames Shovel Shop advocates. You can make a difference by writing to: MEPA Office, Secretary of Environmental Affairs, 100 Cambridge St., Suite 900, Boston, Mass., 02114
Although the eight-acre complex, which includes nine granite buildings constructed between 1852 and 1907, is listed on the state register and is also part of a National Register-listed historic district, a Massachusetts law known as Chapter 40B may allow the Turners to tear part of it down. The law, passed in 1969, says that a project that includes 20 to 25 percent affordable housing units can skirt zoning and landmark laws. If the Turners move forward with their plans, it will be the first time a developer has used the law to demolish a state landmark.
"More and more people are finding out about 40B and are getting very annoyed. In Easton, people call it 'the developer's relief act,'" says Fred Ames, whose family sold the Ames Shovel Works in 1972. Ames and two brothers founded Friends of the Historic Ames Shovel Works at North Easton this fall.
Overshadowed for years by the nearby Richardson buildings, the factory had "sort of disappeared from everybody's consciousness," Ames says. "The developers have in a way done us a favor. Everyone is quite interested now in these buildings and how they could be used."
Ames' group has suggested an alternative plan that calls for preservation-based redevelopment and can therefore take advantage of historic tax credits.
Preservation Mass has received "numerous" calls from concerned residents of the town of 23,000, according to Igoe.
"There doesn't seem to be anyone who is trying to stop development; it's just a matter of doing it with some sensitivity and some appreciation for the architecture," he says. "It's the core of the town. Demolition or alteration of these buildings is really going to change the character and center of this lovely community."
Read more about the proposed development
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