The most prominent memory of my visit the University of Wisconsin-Madison last year was a location that is actually off-campus: State Street. What struck me about this stretch of road was the number of the different stores and restaurants that occupied each and every building.
I thought it was absolutely incredible that there were no large apartment complexes on State Street; it was nothing I had ever seen before. It was just a giant commonplace in my eyes, one that was absolutely integral to the city of Madison.
I was immediately drawn to the availability of food along the street. I especially loved the fact that right next to State Street Brats, there existed a strip of three ethnic restaurants, Husnu’s, Kabul and Buraka. My goal was to dine at all three of them by the end of my freshman year. However, in November, that aspiration was crushed when all of three of these restaurants were demolished to make room for a twelve-story building named “The Hub.”
State Street is not supposed to be a residential area. It is meant to be a street for shopping, eating, drinking and having fun. It is an open street that shouldn’t have stores as tall or as big as The Hub will be.
State Street was a very modest and calm street filled with college students roaming the streets walking in and out of stores. No store or restaurant out-shined another; the most eye-catching part of the street was the Capitol.
But now, a mere apartment building will be the most intriguing piece of architecture on one of the most infamous streets in Madison. That is a ridiculous reality. From the pictures on the Hub’s website, it seems that this building will be made primarily of glass and will also be extremely bright. This means that the Hub will be a very ostentatious and attention-seeking building.
Although one can’t deny that this edifice will be beautiful, it is in the wrong place. Even though there are apartments above the restaurants and stores on State Street, they do not dominate the street; the rest of the street’s occupancies outweigh those apartments. But the Hub will dominate State Street and totally ruin the value and openness that the street currently exudes. By creating a building of this stature, it is demonstrating that the future residents of this complex will feel as if State Street is their property. The confidence this giant building will manifest onto its residents will hinder State Street and the creativity and excitement that runs through it.
There should be no apartment buildings closer than the ones located on North Frances Street. Clearly, Core Campus, the developers of the Hub, do not agree. Being a resident of the Statesider on North Frances Street, I am opposed to the construction of this monstrous building. Not only because the loud noises of this construction wakes me up at 4 a.m. every day, but because residents of the Statesider (that has been here for years) that face State Street should not be forced to have their gorgeous view obstructed by an apartment building.
Those restaurants that were knocked down represented the diverse culture that Madison possesses. And now, the Hub will replace that culture with typical student life and apartment living. The Hub should not be created. However, since the Hub is coming in and Madison has demonstrated that it has no trouble knocking down diverse restaurants, I wonder what else will be changed. What other cool, trendy and ethnic restaurants and stores will be knocked down in order to build mainstream apartment buildings? I wouldn’t be surprised if chain stores such as Costco or Target will start to be constructed and help finish off the demolition of State Street.
Julia Matlin (jmatlin
