Saturday, September 15, 2012

Grain Elevator: Game Over

If I thought anyone read this blog on even a semi-regular basis, I'd probably stop making little posts about the century-old grain elevator in my town.

But I don't think anyone does, so I'll keep on making the posts. What the hell.


Somehow, they've saved the damned thing. Somehow the city council approved a measure to buy and restore the rickety old grain elevator to the tune of 1.5 million dollars – or up to that amount, according to an article in the paper.

So the city now owns it, and must come up with a plan to use it for something. Its previous, private owners had said they would demolish it if that was the only way they could sell the parcel of land on which it stands.

"I'm excited for the community's vision to come together for what we want the grain elevator to become," the mayor said, although exactly what it will become, I think, is anybody's guess.

I've been strangely intrigued by the fate of this building, and have followed developments over the last six months or so. I'm very pleased they've found a way to save it.

On a recent late summer morning I took the picture above. The original was in color, but I saved it as B&W and tweaked the result with editing software.

One vision of what it could become appeared in the local paper as a rather idyllic artist's rendering (left).

I don't know what happens next, but before any sort of restoration can take place the building must be stabilized and "rehabilitated." I get the stabilizing part, but I don't know what "rehabilitated" means. That's what the local newspaper keeps saying, though. Apparently a local firm has backed out of an agreement to fix up the old thing.

After running the same old photograph over and over and over, the way newspapers do, somebody finally dug up another vintage picture of the grain elevator, which I include below.


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