SAC Note: If there was a decline in demolitions it is because more residents are getting invloved in their community, so keep it up. Apply the neighborhood theory of playing it forward - help yourself, help others...and write your commissioners and demand stronger historic preservation and a master (comprehensive) plan. Write your state elected officials and demand updates to the Municipal Planning Code, that "bible" the commissioners quote from often...above all else, stop accepting "there's nothing we can do" as the response to quite a bit around here. It isn't acceptable. Be a force for positive change, get involved in your own community today. now read Mike's article. And then write your local papers and say thank you for publishing all the fine editorials, columns, and articles they publish. Lecture over.

LM demolition rate declines for the first time in years
By:Mike Weilbacher 01/25/2007

...The Conservancy and the Lower Merion Historical Society have been tracking the number of demolition permits filed in Lower Merion annually, using this to understand, and even measure, the pressures fueling the longstanding exponential growth in our community's demolition rate.....for the first time since 2001 - when the dot-come bubble burst - Lower Merion's supercharged and skyrocketing demolition rate cooled somewhat in 2006. After a record 38 demolition permits were filed for in 2005, only 31 permits were filed in 2006. And so far in the fourth week of January, no demolition permits have yet been filed for 2007 (though that could change instantly).

.....Before you break out the bubbly, allow me to add a significant wrinkle. This graph specifically excludes the buildings demolished for the construction of Bryn Mawr Hospital's new medical office buildings. In 2006, some 50 private homes were demolished by the hospital on Central and Summit Grove avenues and Old Lancaster Road in 2006; if those buildings were added to the chart, 2006 would have more than doubled the 2005 rate, and the demolition rate would still be growing exponentially. In 2007, as discussed in public meetings this week, another handful of large, older homes on Pennsylvania Avenue will also be demolished as the hospital's plan moves forward, so 2007's rate will also not reflect the removal of these buildings.

Why exclude the Bryn Mawr buildings? For us, it's simply because the hospital's demolitions are a one-time, very special proposition that do not contribute to the general background demolition rate. To understand if local residences are being scraped at a faster or slower rate than usual over time, to get a true apples-to-apples comparison over many years, it seemed necessary to exclude these buildings. After all, if we included these buildings, 20 years from now we'd be putting an asterisk next to 2006's bar on the graph explaining that the high rate that year was accounted for by the hospital's demolitions.

But notice the general trend. Throughout the 1990s, only two or three demolition permits were routinely sought. Then, in 2001, suddenly eight demolition permits were filed, and from there the rate jumps: 14 permits in 2002, 20 in 2003, 32 in 2004 and finally 38 in 2005. So 2006's permit level represents even fewer permits than 2004 - cautiously good news if you are worried about the loss of our historic housing stock. (After all, there are plenty of existing buildings to purchase and live in without demolishing.)

Perhaps this gentle downturn echoes that of the housing market. It certainly doesn't reflect a shift in community values or a change in local ordinances to better protect historic buildings - nothing happened legislatively or culturally to explain the downturn. And while 2005 saw the demolition of a 1771 Quaker farmhouse, perhaps 2006's most notable loss was a stunning 1905 Tudor house on Glenn Road in Ardmore. Also last year, a significant 1791 house was almost sold for demolition, but the Conservancy led a successful effort to steer that property toward preservation, so most of 2006's demolitions were 1950s and 1960s one-story ranches, Lower Merion's most maligned and most demolished style of building.

As it usually does, Gladwyne led the 2006 list of demolition locations, with nine of the 31 buildings demolished, 30 percent of the group. Bryn Mawr, Rosemont and Villanova were next in line: The western portion of Lower Merion is ground zero for demolitions.

The Conservancy and the Historical Society will continue monitoring demolition rates and hope to work with township government, Realtors, homebuilders, civic associations and the community to raise sensitivity to this important issue. And key to this will be seeing what happens a year from now, when we'll know the answer to an important question:

Was 2006 an anomaly, or have we turned the corner on the waves of demolitions rocking our community?

Stay tuned.

Mike Weilbacher is executive director of the Lower Merion Conservancy and can be reached at