Collinsville Demolishes Post Office for Parking Lot

shimmy · PostJun 25, 2014#12014-06-25T15:25+00:00

Collinsville has decided to demolish it's old downtown post office after consolidating operations in Eastport Plaze. The old post office is currently in the process of getting demolished for a parking lot. http://www.bnd.com/2014/04/21/3171866/c ... chase.html

It's strange and discouraging for me to see a post office relocate from the traditional, older center of town to the town's office park. Collinsville in recent years has really tried pushing it's downtown, or "Uptown", as a nice, Midwestern small town Main Street district, but their planning seems stuck in 1960's urban renewal. Work continues on the widening of Illinois Route 159 straight through downtown and the rest of town and now the city has begun tearing down buildings for parking lots. As someone who grew up 3 blocks from the old post office and Main Street Collinsville, I'm thinking more and more that any possible return to the Metro East for me will be to Belleville or Edwardsville.

I found out about this yesterday when I called home and today I saw it posted on the city's facebook page ( https://www.facebook.com/pages/City-of- ... n=timeline ) with a very enthusiastic response.

dweebe · PostJun 25, 2014#22014-06-25T15:43+00:00

shimmy wrote:Collinsville has decided to demolish it's old downtown post office after consolidating operations in Eastport Plaze. The old post office is currently in the process of getting demolished for a parking lot. http://www.bnd.com/2014/04/21/3171866/c ... chase.html

It's strange and discouraging for me to see a post office relocate from the traditional, older center of town to the town's office park. Collinsville in recent years has really tried pushing it's downtown, or "Uptown", as a nice, Midwestern small town Main Street district, but their planning seems stuck in 1960's urban renewal. Work continues on the widening of Illinois Route 159 straight through downtown and the rest of town and now the city has begun tearing down buildings for parking lots. As someone who grew up 3 blocks from the old post office and Main Street Collinsville, I'm thinking more and more that any possible return to the Metro East for me will be to Belleville or Edwardsville.

I found out about this yesterday when I called home and today I saw it posted on the city's facebook page ( https://www.facebook.com/pages/City-of- ... n=timeline ) with a very enthusiastic response.

While not exactly the same, it looks like the Richmond Heights post office by 40/64 and Big Bend will be torn down and incorporated into a beautiful strip plaza.

I like Collinsville's downtown; but I'm really afraid of what will happen if/when a full highway 159 gets brought through town. So what's the status on that?

shimmy · PostJun 25, 2014#32014-06-25T18:29+00:00

159 is pretty much done through downtown and work has now progressed farther north. It claimed 2 or 3 buildings either on or right off of Main Street and a number of storefronts, which granted were under-utilized, and created another new parking lot in the process. When the city council voted on 159 years ago they had two options, either swing it around town or bring it straight through. They chose the latter with the reasoning that more cars = more commerce. The problem is those cars just fly through town now and really create a barrier, think 70 on a smaller scale, on the eastern end of downtown Collinsville and all the way through. To be fair, Ashmann's Pharmacy is really the only business that I would ever visit on that side of 159 anyways (the rest are some pretty rough bars a block farther down), but it still creates a pretty significant disruption.

PostJun 26, 2014#42014-06-26T17:01+00:00

This is embarrassing.

i,Iive,to,draw · PostJun 26, 2014#52014-06-26T18:36+00:00

Growing up in the Metro east, as i teenager in the second part of last decade. The metro east is hopelessly backwards when it comes to urban planning, and sustainable economic development. The largest city in St Claire county Belleville IL, is even debating tearing down there downtown's signature building for a Plaza. Just don't look to economic or urban Trend setting from the metro east.
https://www.facebook.com/savethemeredithhome

shimmy · PostJun 28, 2014#62014-06-28T15:44+00:00

Belleville is usually the most progressive in terms of urban development of any city in the Metro East. Though, they have made some huge mistakes. They had a blossoming art theme going downtown a few years ago until, I hear, the city wanted to be more of a "quaint historic" type of town rather than an art town. Like there aren't enough of those in the first place.