Willard's Alley Renewal Project Maps

Collection — Case: Flat File Drawer 13

Identifier: MSS 2022.0003

Staff Only

Scope and Contents

This collection comprises a selection of fourteen maps prepared by the firm of Raymond and May Associates, Planning and Urban Renewal Consultants of Pleasantville, New York on behalf of the Village of Catskill. These maps illustrate a plan to convert Willard's Alley, a small neighborhood off Main Street, into a municipal parking lot as part of a broader plan to revitalize the business and commerical section of the east side of the Village of Catskill in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Dates

1959

Biographical / Historical

The removal of Willard's Alley, a small predominantly African-American enclave, was part of a broad revitalization effort that targeted low-income neighborhoods along streets in the commerical and business section of the east side of the Village of Catskill. This effort largely coincided with the development of the Hop-O-Nose low income housing project and the removal of buildings along and behind main street to create parking for increased automobile traffic. The effects of this relatively recent phenomenon are grappled with in an article prepared by Professor Theodore Hilscher for The Hudson River Valley Review, Volume 24, no. 2, Spring 2008.