Lowell, Massachusetts (Part 19)

Part 19 - Leftovers 1 - 2008

I had about 40 pictures leftover with no common thread, so I'm dumping them into two pages. As of right now, this is the last photoset on Lowell I'll be doing, with a few more pages on some other places.

Where to start...

The Pawtucket Gatehouse and the School St Bridge from Varnum Ave. The Franco-American school behind it. Cameraphone picture.

This fishladder under the dam is designed to get fish upriver to spawn. I guess it doesn't work as well as they had hoped, so they built a fish elevator next to it. Not sure how well that works. Either way, Lowell used to be a major Native American, then colonial, fishing ground, and the Industrial Revolution put an end to that. The river is coming back slowly, it is swimmable today, but I'm not sure I'd eat the fish. There are a lot of heavy metals and stuff on the bottom of that river still I'm sure. And people actually fish out of the canals, which must be far more polluted.

While we're in Pawtucketville, here's a picture by U-Lowell North Campus looking up between two really nicely maintained apartment buildings. I was here because I went to see the damage resulting from an arson fire in another apartment block at Aiken and West Sixth and needed to stop at Dunks on my way to work. I'm not too hopeful, but I hope they can rebuild the burnt building. They had just redone them a few years ago I believe. At least nobody was hurt...

Sunrise Plaza on the Lowell/Dracut line, Bridge Street. This sign, if I had to guess, dates to the opening of the plaza in the 50s. The Demoulas' Market Basket in here is something like the second or third one built which I guess is impressive in a way. The other end of this plaza is anchored by an abandoned Ames, and the whole thing is being demolished and rebuilt soon. I hope the sign stays...

Jump from the northernmost point in Lowell to the southernmost. It's rare to see a Wang so big that it doesn't fit in the frame well - daunting really. Much like people had trouble saying "Fleet Center" or "Tweeter Center" (both since renamed AGAIN), Crosspoint, now housing a Motorolla plant and other things, will always be Wang to me.

Abe Lincoln in Lincoln Square - corner of Chelmsford, Lincoln, Liberty, and Temple. Also formerly Hale, where this woman is standing. My dad grew up around here and remembers this monument being elsewhere, and Hale Street not being a dead end for cars.

The Highlands do actually have a pretty good hill. Why do people box in their porches?

This trolley is up on the hill above the Lord Overpass. I don't know why.

Leaving Chelmsford Street for South Lowell. This is the Six Arch Bridge over the Concord River. Well - four of the arches. This bridge dates to the 1830s and is apparently the oldest railroad bridge in at least Massachusetts, being original to the Boston and Lowell Railroad, which began running in 1835. That makes the railroad one of the oldest in the country and was steam from the beginning. The railroad bed was originally granite the whole way which made for a very rough ride, but was considerably faster and could be run year round. It didn't take long for the railroad to put the old Middlesex Canal out of business. The bridge is still used for freight and the MBTA commuter line.

The top of the bridge. The overpass in the distance is 495. The wooden trestle on the left was added at some point and has clearly since been decommissioned. Its purpose today seems to be to obscure the view of the bridge from Billerica Street, meaning you have to walk on an active rail line and over to the other side to actually get a picture of the bridge. There are a lot of abandoned tracks in Lowell, including an entire yard that is visible from the commuter train. In a day and age where diesel prices are skyrocketing, the loss of all these trains, which are more efficient than freight trucks, is unfortunate.

The famous Spaghettiville Bridge over Gorham Street. While the Prince Spaghetti plant is currently abandoned, and the city and state are getting involved in figuring out what to do with it, the bridge serves the purpose of giving us all a chuckle, carrying the trains over Gorham Street, and being a surprisingly low obstacle for trucks. In the last two months, an eighteen wheeler from North Carolina got stuck in it, and a car-carrying truck turned one of its cars into a convertable trying to pass under. Note the LOW CLEARANCE sign in yellow. Also note the hubcap stuck in the sign. Wonder how that happened...

Underside of the bridge. My favorite part of being under this bridge is waiting underneath it in a car for the light at Moore Street to turn, and having an idling freight train above you drip God-knows-what onto your car. For a bridge in Lowell, this one looks pretty sturdy!

Sacred Heart Church on Moore Street. This was my church when I was little, and was one of the many closed by the Boston Archdiocese. The church that it merged with is a 1960s looking octagon place. I can see why they closed this place - can you imagine the heating bill? My mom used to always comment on how the morning sun hit those red slit windows in the back just right during mass, giving parts of the altar an erie red glow. At least all the stained glass has been removed or covered up...

The old Butler School on Gorham Street. I don't think this 125 year-old building, which I guess is currently used for school storage, has much longer to live. I think it's kinda ugly so I'm not sure I'll miss it.

Gallagher Square, the intersection of Gorham, Thorndike, and Central. The building at the fork in Thorndike and Gorham clearly used to be stores; it's apartments now. This part of the city is really pedestrian unfriendly due to the design of this intersection and the termination of the Lowell Connector right behind it. I guess they are going to be putting signals here soon - hopefully that'll make it easier to walk through.

Superior Court from South Street. This view used to be blocked by Saint Peter's church. I think the red building was the rectory? The court is on its last legs - it'll be moved in a few years to another location near downtown.

Dana's Luncheonette, near the other intersection of Gorham and Central (and Appleton, and Middlesex...). Although I've never been in here, they've been around so long my grandmother used to go here when she was young. The building they are in must predate the Civil War, and could easily be 20 years older than that even. 1830 wouldn't even surprise me. Jen said she went in and they have a sign inside that says "NO BROWSING." They're also basically never open. Not aching for business, are we?