The Failure of Bison Preservation in Illinois and South Park

The City of Buffalo should be ashamed of the way the Illinois Street and South Park Avenue debacle ended. A real, authentic piece of our city’s canal-era history has been lost. Since the early days of the preservation movement in this city, the successes (the Guaranty Building) and the failures (the Larkin Administration Building) have become an integral part of our city’s culture.

The most recent preservation successes of this century that have led to our city’s renaissance have been frequently used by the Brown administration as evidence that the city is in good hands, and Mayor Brown is a champion of preservation.

The loss of the Blacksmith building was preventable, like so many other historic pieces of the city fabric lost in recent years to neglectful demolition. The mayor and all levels of city government bear responsibility and should be absolutely ashamed of how this unfolded.