At a sometimes-rowdy hearing last week, the Providence City Council listened to arguments for, and mostly against, the approval of the city Planning Department’s Comprehensive Plan, which could lead to rezoning by early 2008.
Since the plan was introduced, one of the biggest concerns has been whether mixed-use zoning is appropriate for the Allens Avenue industrial corridor. The plan says the businesses located there are essential to the regional economy, but that the “land area reserved for industrial uses … is currently more extensive than the demand for heavy industrial, water-dependent uses and activities.”
It continues that some land could be used for open space, recreational maritime facilities or “residences and public access combined with revenue-generating, water-oriented activities” to make the area more accessible. Future zoning categories could include “port,” to be used solely for industrial uses, as well as “waterfront mixed-use.”
The opposition to the rezoning has been led by a group of eight business owners who last month formed the Providence Working Waterfront Alliance.
Jose Cabral, an employee at Promet Marine Services Corp. and a PWWA member, said the industrial corridor is a place where inner-city residents can find quality jobs.
“The people of Providence have their jobs close to home,” he said. “We don’t need waterfront condos. We need these jobs.”
Another PWWA member, Julie Gill, acting director of the Oil Heat Institute of Rhode Island, spoke against rezoning, saying that oil and gas storage capacity along the waterfront is already at a critical level.
“Capacity is now less than one-third – down almost 69 percent — from what it was just 20 years ago, while the state population has increased more than 10 percent in that same time period,” she said.
Sprague Energy Corp. is the only waterfront terminal where emergency fuel can be brought into Providence, said Managing Director Elizabeth Hernberg.
In favor of the Comprehensive Plan are developers such as Patrick Conley, owner of the recently developed Conley’s Wharf at State Pier No. 1 and the adjacent parking lot and dock. A South Providence native, he said current zoning along the waterfront allows vacant buildings and “toxic and dirty” industrial processes.
The businesses along the Allens Avenue corridor north of Thurbers Avenue have not been “good for the economic development of the city,” he said. And the zoning, he added, “hasn’t been good for the people – the people are blocked from their waterfront.”
“If the new plan goes into effect, you’re going to have a walkway that will run along that river. You’ve got the ferry already and you’re going to have cruise ships,” said Conley.
Thomas Valleau, executive director of North Atlantic Ports Association of Portland, Maine, said that city also struggled with public access and mixed-zoning issues for its industrial corridor.
“In their minds, they see beach umbrellas and public access,” he said. “I urge you to think beyond that, to think big economics.”
The citywide plan, which is based on an ongoing series of neighborhood planning charrettes, is an attempt to involve community goals into the city’s future. Those charrettes aren’t yet completed in all neighborhoods, said City Planner Thomas Deller, but the planning department is now seeking approval because the city has been without a comprehensive plan – which is required by law – since May.
If city council approves the plan, as the planning department is urging, much of it will remain in draft form until all the charrettes are completed by February 2009, including the one scheduled for June 2-6, 2008 in South Providence. •
