Coast Guard station set for demolition
The historic Coast Guard station on Milwaukee's lakefront will be torn down by late March and an open-air picnic pavilion will be built nearby by August, under a timetable released by Milwaukee County.
With no last-minute angels appearing with the millions of dollars it would take to restore the dilapidated but historically significant 1916 building, demolition plans are proceeding, county Parks Director Sue Black said.
The Prairie-style building near McKinley Marina was abandoned in 1971 and turned over to Milwaukee County in 1987. It holds a city landmark designation and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
The county did everything it could to save the structure, a process that took more than three years, said Supervisor Lynne De Bruin, chairwoman of the county parks committee. Loonsfoot, a Native American group, had been selected to try to raise the money to save the building and convert it to an American Indian cultural center. The group failed to raise any of the $3.6 million it was seeking for the restoration by a July 2007 deadline.
Other groups expressing interest after that also failed to raise any cash, De Bruin said.
"We really have passed the point of no return," she said. "It has to come down. It's not safe."
No objections were raised to the demolition Tuesday when Black gave the parks committee an update.
A contractor to raze the station will be selected Thursday, and the demolition is slated to begin Feb. 25. The demolition still needs approval from the city Historic Preservation Commission, Black said.
The county also plans to demolish and replace the failing seawall adjacent to the station, starting in April. Construction of the picnic pavilion will start in late May, but design plans will be discussed at three public hearings. The final design will be based on public input.
The budget for the demolition of the station and construction of the pavilion is $400,000. The seawall job will cost $1.1 million.
An old steel and concrete footbridge spanning a channel that leads to a boathouse attached to the Coast Guard station will be kept.
Almost nothing else can be salvaged from the old station, because it's so badly deteriorated, Black said. A fire burned much of the interior, and the building floor, inside trim and structural timbers are too badly rotted to save, she said.
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