My "Downtown Durham" Letter

published in the Dover, NH Foster's Daily Democrat, August 25, 2006

extra commentary by Timothy Horrigan, August 27, 2006

[I added extra extra commentary on April 29 & May 1, 2008 about subsequent developments,. including the Mill Plaza Study Comittee report and the train station/ UNH Dairy Bar renovations. --Tim]



On August 22, 2006, my local daily— Foster's Daily Democrat— wrote what I thought was a misguided and negative editorial about town-gown relations in Durham, NH, the home of the University of New Hampshire.  I happen to live in downtown Durham, which has a walkable downtown with a wide range of shops and services. It is largely free of national chains, aside from Rite-Aid, who recently bought out a regional drugstore chain, Brooks Pharmacy, which has had a store in Durham since the 1960s. (Also, the Gibbs Oil station has a Dunkin' Donuts counter in the back.)  The editorial writer seems very upset by the fact that Burger King left town— over 15 years ago!  (In all fairness to Burger King, UNH did play some role in driving them out of town.  The old store was a small facility in a strip mall next to the local grocery, right across the street from the picturesque campus, and Burger King wanted to tear down the market to build a big ugly fast food hut with a drive-through and lots of signage and lighting.)

The town library has been a matter of some local controversy for some years: the town library's collection was for many years housed inside the main UNH library. A temporary town library was established in the 1990s and a permanent library is still several years away at best. But there was no particular reason for the paper to be addressing this issue in August 2006: this seemed to be merely a pretext for attacking those mean ol' liberals at the University.

I am a resident of Durham, and I feel the need to address a couple of the factual points you raised in your August 22 editorial which painted a false picture of life in Durham. It is true that the University has been expanding in recent years, but this expansion has in fact made life better, not worse, for the townspeople. The relationship is by no means perfect, but it is a good one. (The Durham-UNH town-gown relationship is better, I might add, than that between our state's other world-class university, Dartmouth College, and its two host communities, i.e., Hanover and Lebanon.)

First, you complained about the demise of a Burger King which "once served residents and students." The space where the Burger King was located was in fact taken over by a much better (and locally owned) fast food joint, the Bagelry. Second, you complained about a local merchant who "tried to sell art supplies" until UNH competed with her. You probably are referring to Jackie Strauss, the founder of the Outback (who was herself the spouse of a UNH professor.) This store in fact still exists and is well into its fourth decade, and still sells art supplies, although it has evolved over the years into more of a gift and novelty shop. Art supplies are also sold at an even more venerable local establishment, Town & Campus.

I do agree with you that the town does need a new library. The temporary facility behind the Durham marketplace is woefully inadequate. Once again, however, you misstated a crucial fact. Townspeople are in fact still do have easy access to the Dimond Library (although there is not much parking nearby): local residents are still allowed to use the UNH libraries.

Timothy Horrigan
7A Faculty Rd
Durham, NH 03824
ph: 603-868-3342

See also:

Main Street; Durham, NH; December 6, 2005

Main Street, Durham, NH; December 2005

  [April 29 & May 1, 2008] Durham's downtown has undergone some changes since I wrote this letter almost two years ago, and even bigger changes are likely if the Mill Plaza Study Committee's recommendations get implemented. The Mill Plaza (also known as Mill Road Plaza, 5 Mill Road and the Shop & Save Parking Lot) is an old strip mall which was built between 1967 and 1969: it consists of two fairly ugly buildings with a dozen or so storefronts and about 6 acres of asphalt on the banks of College Brook. The site used to be the Chesley Farm, which was the town stable in horse and buggy days— Chesley, as in Chesley Drive, a dead end street which has been threatened with being turned into a back entrance to the mall for lo! these 40 years.

In 2007, the Committee was created with help from the American Institute of Architects, who want to use this as a pilot project for "green" urban development. The committee's work went well, and its report was released in the spring of 2007, with the outlines of a plan for a "village street" development. This would combine the existing stores with class A office space, a inn, the relocated town hall, and a new town library. (The Public Library is what started the chain of events which led to the Mill Plaza plan's creation. As for Chesley Drive, it will still be a dead end street: the new back entrance to the mall will come out by Madbury Road & Main Street.

cover of "A New Village Center: Durham's Vision for a Redeveloped Mill Plaza



One of the current Mill Plaza's anchor stores went out of business while the committee was doing its work: a locally owned dollar store called Zyla's. Several other businesses on Main Street have shut down as well. The most important store was Houghton's, the local Ace Hardware outlet. (Houghton's, however, does still have stores in nearby Lee and Newmarket.)

Downtown Durham now no longer has a complete range of goods and services. Most hardware items are now no longer available without an out-of-town journey on your fossil-fuel powered vehicle, although several downtown stores do still carry light bulbs, extension cords, batteries, etc. (In fact, it is even still possible to buy fans and alarm clocks as well.) The venerable Tin Palace restaurant and the Durham Copy Center have also gone dark. The Outback, whom I mentioned in my letter, still exists but it has downsized and now shares its storefront with Hayden Sports, which is a UNH-themed T-shirt emporium. The venerable Town & Campus seems to be struggling, but it did become a Staples college store affiliate, which does introduce another ubiquitous chain to our town. (So far T&C's still retains its old funky character, for better or worse.)

Most of these changes are just due to normal evolution. Durham Copy was a family-owned business, for example, where no one from the next generation wanted to keep the store going (and which took a big hit a few years back when they had to start paying for the intellectual property in their main product, "course packets" of reprinted articles.) The Tin Palace had a kitchen fire right before Saint Patricks Day 2007, was closed all spring and almost all summer, and never really got going again. Hayden Sports outgrew its original another space, and took over the Outback's space next door, etc. Zyla's demise, however, was inexplicable (because the store used to be quite busy) but it did follow several months where the owners stopped buying new merchandise and at the end they even stopped cleaning the store. No one was shocked when the store quietly shut down altogether— in fact most of the former customers had long since stopped going to the store since there was nothing worth buying there anymore. The Houghton's shutdown was the big shocker, because the store was busy, well-stocked and well-staffed right up to the end. They even loaded in new spring garden items right before the last day, which was Friday April 11th.

In all probability, there will in fact be tenants to occupy the retail spaces in the new Mill Plaza, when and if it gets built. The study committee went well (and it helped defuse a lot of the opposition which would have sprung up if a plan had suddenly been presented unilaterally to the townspeople.) It is a little unclear whether the financing will be available, thanks to the collapse of our nation's economy. The ownership situation is also somewhat murky: the plaza is currently owned by a mysterious New York City-based entity called "Colonial Durham Associates" who in the past generally treated the plaza simply as a cash cow.

The Dunkin' Donuts, which I mentioned in the intro, has expanded and moved across the street. The counter in the back of the Gibbs Oil has been replaced by a shop in back of a new Irving Bluecanoe.

On the other side of the town center, the Durham-UNH Amtrak station is being renovated. Even though there is virtually no public parking, Durham is one of the more popular stops on the Boston-Portland Downeaster route. (For years there was absolutely no parking at the site aside from about a dozen short-term metered spots. Eventually the Town of Durham acquired a lot which was formerly a warehouse, and put in a small commuter parking lot. However, the passes are supposed to be for regular commuters only, and not daytrippers or vacationers— unless you are a Town of Durham resident who is willing to apply at the Police Station (which is not in the village center.) The procedures for getting such a pass are very unclear. The lot usually has cars on it, even during non-commuting hours.

During the years (approximately 1967-2001) when there was no train service to Durham, the old train station was repurposed as the UNH Dairy Bar, a popular lunch and ice-cream-cone joint which was popular in spite of extremely non-customer-oriented management and mediocre service (and no parking.) The management of the Dairy Bar refused to adjust to the return of train service and in fact festooned the outside of the building with a hodgepodge of incomprehensible and insulting signs which failed to actually inform travelers that the ticket machines were in the lobby of the Whittemore Center Arena (a full city block from the train station) and that there were portapotties in back of the train station you could use when the ones inside the Dairy Bar were inaccessible (which was most of the time.)

In the summer of 2008, the old train station will finally be turned back into a train station. A new wing is being added to the lovely old building with a waiting area (and ticket machines) and the Dairy Bar is being totally rebuilt (and placed under new management.) The end time for this project is gradually being pushed back: first the completion date was March, then April, then May, and now (as of May 1,2008) it is "Mid June 2008." But it looks like it will be a great facility when it is completed in August 2008. The new train station will be an intermodal facility: i.e., it can double as a bus station when and if intercity busses return to Durham. C & J Trailways provides excellent hourly service from the Seacoast Region to Boston, but you have to go to Dover or Portsmouth to catch a bus.

See also (the last five items are PDF files):


The Forgotten Liars by Timothy Horrigan