Tag Archives: building

Plan to save Birmingham’s Powell School on the table today

Powell School post fire. acnatta/FlickrSince we’ve already mentioned The Birmingham News earlier, today a story was posted to their website talking about a possible plan in place to save the historic Powell School building in downtown Birmingham from the wrecking ball.

According to the piece, the proposal currently on the table for consideration by the City Council’s Budget and Finance Committee this afternoon would give the city’s oldest school building to the Alabama Trust for Historic Preservation. The city would give them up to six months to secure a developer and stabilize the structure or else the building would be demolished.

Sam Frazier is presenting the proposal on behalf of the Trust and he’s got personal experience in saving historic structures. He serves as chairman of Birmingham’s Design Review Committee, the National Trust for Historic Preservation advisor from Alabama and a member of the Alabama Trust’s board.

Needless to say that many people in the city are hopeful that the building can be saved, especially when you see how many blog posts and photos exist across the web sharing that sentiment. This list includes the front page of the Alabama Trust’s Spring 2011 newsletter. The school was named for the first president of the Elyton Land Company, the real estate company responsible for the city’s existence.

Photo: Powell School post fire. acnatta/Flickr

Good thing we saved the fire station in July…

Surveying Engine No. 22No, there’s nothing new to report about the status of the former Fire Engine No. 22. located at the edge of the city’s Forest Park and Highland Park neighborhoods. We haven’t heard much about the structure since the approval of its sale to developers who want to open a Walgreens location on the site by the Birmingham City Council.

The agreement moved forward with the provision that if the structure, included on the National Register of Historic Places, could not be saved and used in the project, it would be abandoned.

One of the reasons that the proposed agreement was considered a success was because of a compromise reached due to an agreement between several national drug store chains and the National Trust for Historic Preservation dating from 2000. The fight to save the building was led by local groups including I Believe in Birmingham. Continue reading

Downtown’s former Protective Life building empties

Protective Life BuildingWe’ve heard from several sources that the former home to Protective Life and the Birmingham Regional Chamber of Commerce among others was in the process of being vacated this month. There has been no explanation as to why all of the tenants of the building have been asked to leave. Those of you that have followed The Terminal during the last almost two years know that our first anniversary celebration was held on the top floor of the building on March 14 last year.

We’ll see if we can learn any additional information and update this post accordingly. We’ll also see if we can’t fill you in on where our second anniversary celebration will be taking place next month in the near future.

Photo: bhamterminal.com

UPDATE: Parliament House Hotel imploded this morning

Parliament_0032.jpg

Bob Farley/f8photo

At about 7:15 a.m. this morning, the Parliament House Hotel was imploded on Birmingham’s Southside.

We’ll have images up from the event as soon as they become available.

Click on the image above to view our photo gallery from the event. Feel free to share links to other images or coverage as well. Click on the jump to view additional mainstream media and reader coverage.

Continue reading

UPDATE: Coming Sunday: Parliament House implosion pics

UPDATE: 2.17.2008 – Images are up

UPDATE: 2.16.2008 – Street closing information

Razing the Parliament House

Bob Farley/f8photo

As many of you already know, the Parliament House Hotel is being imploded on Sunday morning at 7 a.m., weather permitting. Check in with us on Sunday morning after 8 a.m. to see pictures from this unique event. You can bookmark this page as we’ll have a link from here to the gallery.