Three new houses are being constructed on the west edge of Way Park where the Northfield Hospital used to be. One is a Rice County Habitat for Humanity house for Troy and Laura Simonson and their six kids (right, photo from the RCH site). Click the center photo to see all the local organizations and companies who are helping to build the house. And see this Northfield News article from last November when the Simonsons were selected as the next Habitat family.
Left: Steven Schmidt Construction is building a house on 1st Street, adjacent to the park.
Right: Northfield Construction is building a house adjacent to the Habitat house. See Ray Cox’s recent blog post for more details.
Thanks to Jane McWilliams for the email tip on all this activity.
So I’m a little-bit unclear. Wasn’t this parkland before?
Sean… the particular parcels of land in question here were not formerly Way Park land… while they were part of the complex of properties assembled over the years in this locale as the “Hospital” they were not part of the original WAY PARK given over to the Hospital by the city in the 30s. They were, private housing sites adjacent (in most cases) to the Hospital lands and through the years were purchased by the hospital, intended for a variety of hospital related uses, as they came on the market. When the recent Way Park decisions were made by the Council to restore the park land, the Hospital was allowed to retain these specific residential sites for Re-sale, to defer some of the hospital’s costs for site evaluation (environmental) and demolition of the principle hospital building.
Thanks for the background on Way Park, Victor. Your encyclopedic knowledge of Northfield city matters is much appreciated by this blogger… and maybe others. 😉