West River was the first of several redevelopment areas in the city. Beginning in 1956, demolition and reconstruction began on a seventy-six-acre parcel wedged between the routes of Interstate 95 (not yet built at the time, but in the planning stages) and State Highway 146 (the major route to the northwest). The area had developed historically as a largely small-scale, though densely packed residential neighborhood with more than the usual complement of industrial operations – thanks, largely, to its adjacency to the main rail line connecting Providence with Boston. Several churches and schools, as well, were located here. While a couple of nineteenth-century complexes were not demolished, most of the land was cleared and made available for light manufacturing or commercial development. Immediately to its south, the Randall Square area was the site of several dense industrial complexes. Largely underused or vacant, like so many in Providence by the late 1960s, this group of buildings became the object of scrutiny for imaginative redevelopment, along the lines of San Francisco’s Ghirardelli Square, begun just a few years earlier in 1964. Fire struck on a large scale in 1970, and the complexes were destroyed, with only two small buildings surviving. Two different methods of urban clearance, with two different results.
– 2003 Guide to Providence Architecture
The aerial photos from 1951 to 1962 are shocking. An entire neighborhood of many streets and structures just disappears with a loop road like so many other industrial parks. Who lived here and was forced out? Where did they go? What were their stories? We’d love to know more but history of them seems scant.
The post office, meanwhile, while being important for being chosen to be the first automated post office in the country dubbed “Project Turnkey” was instead, a turkey. The automated systems failed and required 1500 employees to keep it running, 100 more than the office started with. The building is impressive but the technology was not ready at the time.
This was my original neighborhood. Lived on Polk St and went to Immaculate Conception school and church. Great neighborhood. Nicely diverse. Wished I could have stayed there.
My last name is Randall why is it called Randall square in Providence Rhode Island