Support WFW's Request to Serve Alcohol on the Common this Summer!

A reminder that tonight at 7 pm, the Worcester Parks and Recreation Commission will hear WFW's request to serve alcohol as part of Movies on the Common 2012.

If you, like us, are of legal drinking age and are in favor of setting aside a small portion of the Common as an area where attendees can choose to go (or not go for that matter) and enjoy a beer or wine during the bands and/or movies this summer, please make plans to attend this evening and speak in favor of our request.

Site Plan for Movies on the Common 2012 Showing Proposed Location and Size of Beer & Wine  Garden

Worcester State Hospital Clock Tower, Take II

Below is a re-post of a comment I made to my original post on the subject on 3/6/12:

The symbolic opportunities that come with incorporating ruins into the clock tower monument intrigue me. A symbol of our collective failure to save the entire structure (this in itself is an important chapter in the history of this building). A symbol of our society's ongoing struggle to treat those with mental illness, the ruins themselves reflecting its history and symbolizing, together with the new buildings behind, our ongoing battle to help all who struggle with mental illness to become productive members of society. I really like the idea of somehow incorporating the clock tower and the ruins into some sort of "reflecting garden" dedicated to those that have battled mental illness. Ideally we would incorporate the natural environment, itself a symbol of healing, hope and renewal, into this garden of ruins. The interplay of the built and natural environment would make for a unique and special place.

from MA HHS Blog

Worcester Film Works Gearing Up for Movies on the Common 2012

There is a planning meeting scheduled for tomorrow night, Thursday, March 29, 2012 at 5:30 pm at the Printers Building, 44 Portland St., 3rd. Flr. (offices of Davis Publications).

New volunteers are welcome! 

Visit www.WorcesterFilmWorks.org for more details.

Worcester State Hospital Clock Tower

Congratulations and thank you to Preservation Worcester and other local preservationists for their work in saving the Clock Tower at the former Worcester State Hospital.

from Preservation Worcester website

I was hoping that the surrounding Administrative Building could have been saved along with the Clock Tower, but I would agree that the Clock Tower is indeed the most important element - driving home from Boston on 290, I know I am home when I see the Clock Tower in the distance.

Although it seems to be growing on me, I am still having a hard time imagining a free standing clock tower without the surrounding building:

from Preservation Worcester website

It looks naked to me! I'm sure those who remember the entire complex think that it looks naked with just the Admin Building and Cock Tower.

I wonder if there is some way that we could retain some portions of the Admin Building as a ruin? Can we retain some pieces of the building's structure and avoid the temptation to 'clean-up' the lower part of the Tower too much? Ideally, a future visitor to the site would see the ruins and the 'messy' lower part of the Tower and be able to easily read that the Tower is just a piece of something that was much larger. Perhaps lower portions of some of the walls of the Admin Building could be retained so visitors could walk through the 'rooms' of the former building. And if I put on my engineering hat for a minute, retaining some of the walls abutting the tower may help structurally support the Tower itself, thus reducing the expense associated with reinforcing the Tower alone.

Food Truck Festival Coming to Worc. This Summer

The Worcester Food Truck Festival at Elm Park

Saturday, July 14, 2012 from 12:00 PM to 4:00 PM (ET)

Worcester, MA

I hope they invite the hot dog truck that sets up shop there the other 364 days of the year!

Item to watch - Elsewhere on their website they mention a beer garden at the Worcester event. The Summer Nationals was just turned down in their request to sell alcohol at Green Hill Park, will we see another request to review the current "no alcohol in city parks except for the Common with special permission" rule?

Worcester Auditorium/Courthouse Reuse - Becker College's New Worcester Campus?

I'm completely making this up, but it is kind of fun to imagine what might be......



2012 - The Design Building at Becker College's Worcester Campus

Image from Becker College website.

2017 - The New Design Building at Becker College's Worcester Campus @ Lincoln Square

Cropped image of "Worcester Memorial Auditorium, Worcester Massachusetts, July 2009"

by John Phelan, used under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.

Happy Holidays from TIOW!