Buffalo Rising has several new stories for us about developments on Niagara Street:

Stitch Buffalo will be moving into 1215 Niagara Street. Thanks, Rich Products, for supporting this wonderful organization!

Additionally, the owners of Crescendo have purchased the building across the street at 1485 Niagara Street. We look forward to seeing the designs for this project!

It’s hard not to get excited about the construction happening at the Mentholatum Building, formerly Garret Leather and now owned by Ciminelli. Buffalo Rising published the history of the building this week. Fascinating!

1660 Niagara Street – Public Paddlesport Launch

At the February meeting, Leah Pabst, a Project Manager at Buffalo Niagara Riverkeeper, provided us with a status on the progress being made on the 1660 Niagara Street Project. 

Riverkeeper and the Site owner, The Buffalo Niagara River Land Trust, are partnering to administer this project, which is currently entering the New York State Brownfield Cleanup Program (BCP).  The BCP process will take approximately one to two years to complete, and after this, the site will subsequently be developed into a public access paddlesport launch, with multiple tiers of habitat restoration over the majority of the site.  Pollinator meadows in the upland area of the site will provide valuable habitat and maintain a natural aesthetic, while the shoreline areas of the site will have riparian and emergent habitat restored in the vicinity of the paddlesport launch area.

BAT, as in Buffalo Alternative Therapies.

We asked owners and operators, Craig Labadie & Neilie Fabian, a few questions about their Niagara Street business:

What four words describe your business?

Affordable Restorative Accessible Inclusive

Describe the work you do:

Providing affordable acupuncture for everyone

What brings you to Niagara Street?

Community, accessibility, diversity of the west side and fantastic, invested landlords

What are you noticing in Buffalo that needs more attention?

The positive impact of immigrants, greenspace and community to Buffalo’s resurgent popularity.

What is your favorite number?

1315, these days…

A man who calls himself “Peatonito” and dresses as a wrestler, pushes a car as he performs for AFP showing an example of his routine in the streets of Mexico City on April 21, 2015. Peatonito is a character who resembles a superheroe trying to raise drivers’ awareness so that they respect crosswalks in the streets of Mexico City. AFP PHOTO/ Yuri CORTEZ (Photo credit should read YURI CORTEZ/AFP/Getty Images)

What does it take to get drivers to respect the law? Patonito came to Buffalo in 2014, all the way from Mexico City, during the CNU conference and took traffic in his hands on Niagara Street, helping people cross the busy, busy street!

Residents and businesses in the Niagara Street corridor are concerned about the excessive speed of traffic and blatant disregard for traffic laws. We’ve seen many crashes and near misses. While we look forward to the traffic calming that will be part of the new street design, enforcing traffic laws now was a topic at our recent general meeting and follow-up board meeting.

Police Chief Barba and Chief Gramaglia met with us and agreed to have increased monitoring. They recommended calling #311 to report issues with traffic (311Buffalo app can be downloaded for more convenient submissions).

We are sending letters to City of Buffalo Department of Public Works requesting more traffic lights at intersections including Lafayette Avenue and Bird Avenue. Constituents are encouraged to do the same.

We are also seeking flashing lights that display the speed of vehicles. This serves two purposes: it reminds drivers that the speed is 30mph on the street and, secondly, records statistics.

How lucky are we in WNY to be perched on the Great Lakes? How important is it to be stewards of our special location? Vision Niagara takes that responsibility pretty seriously on several fronts. We are working to preserve open, publicly accessible green space along the Niagara Street corridor. We participated in Green Code forums to protect our coastline. We support green infrastructure where possible. AND we organize clean-ups of Broderick Park.

Our first one this year is Earth Day, April 22nd from 10:00 am to noon. We’ll have snacks to keep you going! Sign up through our good friends, Buffalo Niagara-Riverkeeper. Meet us at the shelter – you’ll see our banner. Location is the base of West Ferry Street, continue down One Robert Rich Way, turn left after the bridge to get to the shelter.

Volunteers will also receive free admission and a beer ticket to Community Beer Works Anniversary Party beginning at noon, just down the street at Jersey & 7th!

We are thrilled to have sponsors and helpers! Buffalo State College, Rich Products, West Side Neighborhood Housing, Buffalo United Front, East Side Bike Club, CBW, and Bootleg Bucha!

Niagara Street is part of the “Boom in City Living” as reported recently in The Buffalo News. Apartments like the one pictured above at the Crescendo offer lots of amenities in restored, historic buildings. Next up: the Mentholatum just a few blocks down the street. Ciminelli is steaming along with renovations. The corridor is becoming transformed before our eyes!

Affordable housing projects are in the mix, too. Shoreline apartments, near Niagara Square, are under construction. And Regan Development Corporation is renovating the former Buffalo Milk Factory, projected availability Fall 2017.

This guy couldn’t join us but he greeted us at the door of Rich Products where we had our February general meeting on February 1st. Many thanks to Rich’s for the lovely meeting rooms and, oh, those fresh baked cookies!

The bulk of the meeting was used for planning events for 2017. We’ve got history tours, bike tours, foodie events and clean-ups for the corridor in the line-up. First up: Earth Day at Broderick Park! We’re delighted to be collaborating with West Side Black Rock Neighborhood Housing Services, Black Rock Riverside Alliance, Buffalo State College, Rich Products, Buffalo-Niagara Riverkeeper, Sewer Authority, Yelp, and AHA! Wow!

We’ve got a short survey for you! And you can get on our mailing list for our monthly newsletter! Lot’s going on here on Niagara Street!

This month’s interview is with Andy Szuba andAimee Buyea from Sugar City!

What four words describe your project?

Andy says: Volunteer, Community, Inclusive, Art

Aimee adds: all-ages arts and cultural space

Describe the work you do and the impact you’re trying to make:

Sugar City is Buffalo’s only legal, DIY, volunteer-run, all-ages performance venue. Accordingly, all events at Sugar City are drug and alcohol-free and end before 11pm. Our goal is to provide an accessible and alternative space to share and create art and community projects based on participatory culture and a do-it-together attitude. This organization focuses itself on the exhibition, performance, and creation of art for those who cannot obtain space from traditional sources. Events and initiatives include, but are not limited to music, films, poetry readings, a zine library, meeting space, art gallery, workshops, and more. We want to break down the barriers of what is and isn’t “art” because in some way everyone is an artist.

What brings you to the Niagara Street Corridor:

Aimee: We found an awesome building that works for our needs and have the support of a great landlord, Bill Breeser.

Andy: We made our Niagara St location our new home after seeing the potential of the NSC. Considering the amount that has happened in the two years we’ve been there, we can see we made a wise decision.

What are you noticing in Buffalo that deserves more attention?

Accessibility. We can’t wait for the Niagara St re-construction to reach our block. Our neighborhood needs more walk-ability, bus shelters, traffic calming and bike racks!

What is your favorite number?

19-it is the address of our original home at 19 Wadsworth ST

Imagine transforming a vacant lot on the corridor into a public green space with an incredible view of the Black Rock Canal and Niagara River. Proposals and renderings were developed nearly five years ago by graduate students at UB School of Architecture and Planning under the guidance of Professor Hiro Hata. As part of their proposal, they envisioned a narrow, linear park along the canal. A pedestrian bridge over the Beltline and highway could be the connection.  This would be a game changer for the corridor, not only for residents who have little access to parks within a short walk, but also for developers who are investing in the rehab of historic buildings like the Mentholatum building… think New York’s High LIne Park.

Vision Niagara has a proposal in the works to take over the parcel at 1318 Niagara Street, a DEC clean-up site, as a first step of this vision. Stay tuned!