A new endangered species has received a bit of national recognition, thanks to local preservationists.
The Sunshine Mile corridor — the two-mile stretch of Broadway that’s generally between Park Avenue and Country Club Road — was named this week to the annual list of Most Endangered Historic Places by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
“The Sunshine Mile is a significant commercial corridor and a beloved historic resource for Tucson residents,” said Stephanie Meeks, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation. “Through careful planning and collaboration between Tucson’s city leaders and the community, these buildings can continue to contribute to the economic vitality — and quality of life — for people in Tucson.”
The designation, however, is symbolic. It does not affect voter-approved plans to expand that section of Broadway.
Demion Clinco, the CEO of the Historic Preservation Foundation, helped to get the businesses, homes and other buildings likely to be affected by the street widening on the radar of the Washington D.C.-based nonprofit.
Clinco said he hopes the designation will bring attention to complaints from residents who want to amend the city’s procedures about how it will handle individual properties that may go away without advocates.
“Our goal is not to be an obstruction,” Clinco said.
The city has worked closely with area residents for two years and has reduced the number of buildings that could be torn down from 130 to 27, said Nicole Ewing-Gavin, the interim manager of the city’s planning and development services department.
For example, the early 1950s-era building that until recently housed Hirsh’s Shoes was recently purchased by the Historic Preservation Foundation.
The city worked with Clinco to come up with solutions to take a portion of the property that will allow the iconic building to stand.
The city is discussing an overlay district along the area that could reduce the number of required parking spaces a business needs to operate, Ewing-Gavin said. “We are trying to be as sensitive as we can,” she said.
The city evaluated all the properties in the widening area by standards set in place by the National Register of Historic Places, said Jonathan Mabry, the city’s historic preservation officer.
The community has been able to successfully lobby for individual buildings to be saved, he said, citing the Continental Building at 2343 East Broadway.
The city re-evaluated the property after complaints, designating the building as individually eligible for historic preservation.
