This column completely blows past issues of race and economics. Vinyl siding is cheap and practically no maintenance. I need to repaint my house every 7 to 10 years at a cost of $9k. I can afford it but not everyone can!

Historic preservation is often used as a tool to keep working class and poor families out of communities. Without a recognition of the immensely increased cost of maintaining these properties, we’re just complaining that we don’t like how they these houses look. I’m not comfortable telling people that they need to repair their yankee gutters or sell their house to someone who can. A commissioner on the Landmarks Commission told someone who was distressed by the cost of repair they wanted her to do “That’s one of the joys of owning an historic home.” I’ll never forget how rude, obnoxious, and callous he was to her.

Housing is for people to live in and not anonymous authors to drive by and think they’re pretty. This is Homeowner Association Brain on steroids wanting to control the aesthetics of everyone else’s property.

Of course it would be better if all these older houses were restored to their former glory but don’t blame what happened on “developers” when it was working and middle-class homeowners doing the math and not being able to keep up with the maintenance costs of homes with sagging floors, peeling and rotting siding, etc, etc. They made choices that were best for their families and what they could afford.

Edit: To put a finer point on it, Historic Preservation requirements can be a good thing but are often an impediment to affordable housing. Cities and neighborhoods are for people, not buildings. When we place the aesthetics of buildings over the needs of our neighbors, we’re losing the point of what it means to be part of a community.

Edit 2: I’ve reread this a few times because I’m too salty over it. The author does acknowledge some of my complaints but mostly in the photo captions without really exploring them. Where this gets me is where it’s trying to lay blame and the implication that if someone just cares about historic homes enough all would be well. There are policy implications here that can have deleterious side effects on affordability and keeping the vibrancy we want in our communities.

Good article but even better response from you. Thank you for this, it was enlightening.

Author also romanticizes 19th century housing. A lot of Newark homes were financed by building and loan associations that had...questionable...methods. Others were built by big developers or in conjunction with corrupt trolley companies. Not pictured were the 3-floor, 6 family homes that were crammed full of immigrant families and were never intended as anything more than a cheap copy of the refined middle-class housing the author is so high on. And, even if we're just talking aesthetics, even in their heydey Newark neighborhoods were mostly eclectic mixtures of wooden victorian's that many observers criticized in comparison to the classic brick rowhomes of Philadelphia or Brooklyn.

great take :) i fully agree

The houses criticized were the Forest Hill ones you mean ? Or the Newark row homes ? Cause the Newark ones are lovely to me, surprising anyone would speak low of them. They aren’t as grandiose as the cities you mentioned but definitely have that small Jersey charm to them.

Not really the rowhomes like you see on James Street. Moreso if you stroll any street in Roseville or Clinton Hill there are usually just a mix of 2-3 story detached wooden houses. The eclecticism vs. uniformity led to criticisms, as did their wood construction. The three-floor tenements were more harshly criticized. In 1913 the city funded a housing study that suggested the city build more detached single family homes instead of higher density housing.

Interesting. Where did you find this information ? I’d like to learn more

Agreed if the author is so upset about vinyl siding they should advocate $20k facade grants for newark homeowners of all income levels. That’s how much it would cost to tear off the vinyl on a house and redo with wood like materials like hardeeplank on top of adding insulation.