Neighborhood Preservation Workshops

Information and Support

The Alliance’s Neighborhood Preservation Workshop program brings information and support to underserved communities throughout Boston with the following goals:

  1. To engage residents and business owners in Boston's neighborhoods in learning and teaching about local historic buildings and places, to educate them about the array of tools available to help them care for these assets, and to support them as they take action to ensure their preservation, redevelopment, and/or revitalization.
  2. To offer communities support in integrating historic preservation into community development and planning processes.
  3. To provide a forum for residents and business owners to voice their needs and priorities regarding historic and cultural resources and to foster connections between communities and the agencies and organizations that can work with them to achieve their goals.

In 2008, the Alliance and Historic Boston Incorporated (HBI) jointly received a $150,000 Partners in the Field grant from the National Trust for Historic Preservation. With this grant, and generous support from The Beal Companies, Gale International, George Lewis, Massport, and Trinity Financial, the Alliance formalized our workshops.

The Alliance has worked in the following communities:

Highland Park, Roxbury

The first series of Neighborhood Preservation Workshops took place from January-April 2009 in Roxbury's Highland Park neighborhood. This workshop series engaged neighborhood residents and representatives from eight planning and preservation agencies and organizations. The workshops included an overview of Highland Park's architectural and landscape history, selection of the neighborhood's “preservation priorities,” and identification of action steps to move these priorities forward. A comprehensive report on these priorities and action recommendations was completed in summer 2009.

A copy of the Highland Park Preservation Priorities Report Plan can be found here.

East Boston

The Alliance and East Boston Main Streets co-sponsored a walking tour of the Maverick and Central Square areas of East Boston in September 2010. During the fall of 2010, the Alliance managed a series of focus group meetings with residents and business owners throughout East Boston. This work culminated in  a neighborhood-wide meeting in December, and the preparation of a Preservation Priorities Report in early 2011. The Alliance worked in close partnership with East Boston Main Streets and Historic Boston Incorporated and collaborated with neighborhood associations in order to solicit information regarding buildings of historic, architectural, social or cultural significance that the community would like to see better preserved, maintained or cared for.

A final Preservation Priorities Report will be available in January 2012.

Upham's Corner, Dorchester

The Alliance partnered with Upham's Corner Main Streets to hold a "mobile workshop" in Upham's Corner in October 2009. The workshop drew residents from the area and opened communication channels between the neighborhood and the historic preservation community. The Alliance has returned to Upham's Corner and its surrounding residential neighborhoods in 2011 to complete a Neighborhood Preservation Report.

A final Preservation Priorities Report will be available in January 2012.

Allston

In collaboration with Allston Village Main Streets, the Alliance coordinated a mobile workshop in May 2010 that brought together local residents to tour, discuss and strategize about a number of historic properties in the neighborhood. Participants learned about the area's preservation challenges and successes and shared with the sponsoring organizations and each other their goals for the future protection of and investment in historic buildings and open spaces. The Alliance has returned to Allston in 2011 to complete a neighborhood Preservation Priorities Report.

A final Preservation Priorities Report will be available in January 2012.

Questions/Comments

For more information on the Alliance's Neighborhood Preservation Workshop Program, please contact us at 617-367-2458.