The Flickr Eminentdomain Image Generatr

Accompanying news story dated August 30, 1979:

“Vera Coking was dealt an unbeatable hand by gambling bosses in Atlantic City who wanted to buy her 22-room guest house which stood in the way of a planned hotel complex, but she turned it down.

“They offered her £100,000 ($212,000) down payment; £20,000 ($42,400) a year for ten years; a hotel suite facing the sea, for life; all the food that she and her 63-year-old husband Joey, could eat; and a new Cadillac each year. Vera refused, preferring to try for a much bigger cash offer but now she may regret her decision because the casino/hotel complex is being built around her modest boarding house which is looking less like a gold mine every day, while Penthouse International continue to build theirs, whether she likes it or not.”

------------------------------------------------

UPDATE: In the 1990s, another developer wanted to buy her house. His name—Donald Trump. He intended to build a parking lot for limousines around his Atlantic City casino and hotel. Despite being offered $251,000 (Trump claims it was a $4 million offer), Coking refused to sell. The city condemned her house, using the power of eminent domain, but with the assistance of the Institute of Justice, Coking fought the local authorities and eventually prevailed.

As for the fate of the home, Coking remained in her house until 2010, when she moved to a retirement home in the San Francisco Bay Area near her daughter and grandchildren. The property was put on the market in 2011, with an initial asking price of $5 million. By September 2013, the price had been reduced to $1 million. The property was finally sold for $583,000 in an auction on July 31, 2014. The buyer was Carl Icahn, who held the debt on Trump Entertainment, owner of Trump Plaza. He subsequently demolished the house on November 19, 2014.

[Details at www.phillymag.com/city/2016/02/08/donald-trump-vera-cokin...]

"The night of "Ocho de Mayo," a date that will live in infamy for Chavez Ravine folks (May 8, 1959). Friends sit around a warming fire with some of those who were evicted from their homes to make way for Dodger Stadium. Mrs. Augustain is sleeping on the cot."

1959. Councilman Roybal, center, confers with members of Arechiga family who are camping out near their home in Chavez Ravine from which they were evicted before it was razed to make room for ball park

Haha a "meadow" of invasive Lespedeza cuneata (I think).

I want you to look at the mowed area at the lower right, then imagine what the vacant lot would look like if all of it were mowed. Next, I want you to tell me whether mowing the vacant lot would improve or worsen its appearance.

-----------------------

In New London, Connecticut, on September 21st, 2021, a view from the north side of Walbach Street, west of East Street, on a vacant lot that was cleared of buildings as part of a failed redevelopment scheme at the center of the 2005 Supreme Court case Kelo v. City of New London.

-----------------------

Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names terms:
• New London (7014213)
• New London (county) (1002714)

Art & Architecture Thesaurus terms:
• Asteraceae (family) (300375557)
• autumn (300133093)
• eminent domain (300055560)
• Fabaceae (family) (300343861)
• fields (land) (300343519)
• lampposts (300101536)
• summer (season) (300133099)
• urban landscapes (300132447)
• vacant lots (300122264)

Wikidata items:
• 21 September 2021 (Q69306183)
• invasive plant (Q3391537)
• Kelo v. City of New London (Q6386411)
• Lespedeza cuneata (Q5364126)
• Long Island Sound Coastal Lowland (Q108829657)
• Northeastern coastal forests (Q7058078)
• Northeastern Coastal Zone (Q108829637)
• September 21 (Q2891)
• September 2021 (Q61312991)
• Solidago (Q212939)
• Southeastern Connecticut (Q7569441)

Library of Congress Subject Headings:
• Goldenrods (sh85055770)
• Urban plants (sh85141312)
• Vacant lot ecology (sh85141689)
• Weeds (sh85145920)

A beautiful office building from 1990 looks out over a shrubland. Plants engage in swarming behavior just like us animals do.

Verily this is a city block in New London, Connecticut, bounded by Chelsea Street, East Street, Walbach Street, and Goshen Street, that was formerly covered in buildings: See this side-by-side comparison of 1991 and 2021 aerial imagery. The proposed redevelopment, and the land seizures upon which it depended, were the focus of a 2005 U.S. Supreme Court decision, Kelo v. City of New London, which held that it was okay for the government of New London to seize the property of one private landowner and hand it over to a wealthier private landowner, for the purpose of increasing the city's tax revenue. So the city government won the case, but then the redevelopment they wanted so badly never even happened!

But anyhow I do enjoy the beauty of green plants.

-----------------------

In New London, Connecticut, on September 21st, 2021, a view from the north side of Walbach Street, west of Smith Street. There is the office building "One Chelsea Street," built in 1990 according to the City of New London's online property database.

-----------------------

Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names terms:
• New London (7014213)
• New London (county) (1002714)

Art & Architecture Thesaurus terms:
• autumn (300133093)
• eminent domain (300055560)
• office buildings (300007043)
• scrublands (300386891)
• summer (season) (300133099)
• urban landscapes (300132447)
• vacant lots (300122264)

Wikidata items:
• 21 September 2021 (Q69306183)
• 1990 in architecture (Q2813053)
• 1990s in architecture (Q74235875)
• Kelo v. City of New London (Q6386411)
• Long Island Sound Coastal Lowland (Q108829657)
• Northeastern coastal forests (Q7058078)
• Northeastern Coastal Zone (Q108829637)
• September 21 (Q2891)
• September 2021 (Q61312991)
• Southeastern Connecticut (Q7569441)

Library of Congress Subject Headings:
• Buildings—Connecticut (sh92001808)
• Urban plants (sh85141312)
• Vacant lot ecology (sh85141689)

Yea we see New London Gneiss of the Waterford Group, formed 596.45 to 577.2318 million years ago (per Macrostrat), during the Ediacaran period of the Neoproterozoic era of the Proterozoic eon of the Precambrian supereon.

The outcrop is at, or near, the site of a house formerly at 8 East St., owned by a Ms. Kelo, on a city block that the government of New London sought to seize in the early 2000s, so it could be cleared for redevelopment. That house and others on the site were the focus of the widely disliked Kelo v. City of New London Supreme Court decision of 2005, which declared that it was totally okay for the city to take Ms. Kelo's house and hand it over to a private developer, in pursuit of dreams that the city's tax revenue might be increased.

All that legal drama happened, the land was cleared of buildings, and then the City's chosen private developer was unable to secure financing for its proposed redevelopment project. So now there's a vacant city block in the middle of the city.

-----------------------

In New London, Connecticut, on September 21st, 2021, at the northwest corner of East Street and Trumbull Street.

-----------------------

Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names terms:
• New London (7014213)
• New London (county) (1002714)

Art & Architecture Thesaurus terms:
• autumn (300133093)
• eminent domain (300055560)
• gneiss (300011438)
• metamorphic rock (300011437)
• Precambrian (300391473)
• Proterozoic (300391474)
• Rhus (genus) (300375433)
• summer (season) (300133099)
• vacant lots (300122264)

Wikidata items:
• 21 September 2021 (Q69306183)
• autumn leaf color (Q1156320)
• Ediacaran (Q188654)
• Kelo v. City of New London (Q6386411)
• Long Island Sound Coastal Lowland (Q108829657)
• Neoproterozoic (Q191935)
• New London Gneiss (Q115987530)
• Northeastern coastal forests (Q7058078)
• Northeastern Coastal Zone (Q108829637)
• outcrop (Q531953)
• September 21 (Q2891)
• September 2021 (Q61312991)
• Southeastern Connecticut (Q7569441)
• Waterford Group (Q115987493)

Library of Congress Subject Headings:
• Sumac (sh85130404)
• Urban plants (sh85141312)
• Vacant lot ecology (sh85141689)

AS IT HAPPENS this outcrop of New London Gneiss on a vacant city block in New London, Connecticut, abuts the former site of a house that was at issue in the widely despised Kelo v. City of New London Supreme Court decision of 2005.

This outcrop of gneiss was supposed to be part of a huge commercial development by now, pumping out tax dollars! That was the City of New London's whole rationale for seizing Ms. Kelo's house and handing it over to a private developer! But all we have is a giant weedlot.

-----------------------

In New London, Connecticut, on September 21st, 2021, a view toward the Thomas E. Piacenti Regional Water Pollution Control Facility, the Fort Trumbull Marina, and General Dynamics Electric Boat, from an outcrop on a vacant lot at the northeast corner of East Street and Trumbull Street.

The outcrop is New London Gneiss of the Waterford Group, formed 596.45 to 577.2318 million years ago (per Macrostrat), during the Ediacaran period of the Neoproterozoic era of the Proterozoic eon of the Precambrian supereon.

-----------------------

Getty Thesaurus of Geographic Names terms:
• New London (7014213)
• New London (county) (1002714)

Art & Architecture Thesaurus terms:
• autumn (300133093)
• cranes (equipment) (300022331)
• eminent domain (300055560)
• gneiss (300011438)
• marinas (water transportation complexes) (300120824)
• metamorphic rock (300011437)
• office buildings (300007043)
• Precambrian (300391473)
• Proterozoic (300391474)
• Rhus (genus) (300375433)
• summer (season) (300133099)
• urban landscapes (300132447)
• vacant lots (300122264)
• water treatment plants (300006225)

Wikidata items:
• 21 September 2021 (Q69306183)
• autumn leaf color (Q1156320)
• Ediacaran (Q188654)
• General Dynamics Electric Boat (Q1325893)
• Kelo v. City of New London (Q6386411)
• Long Island Sound Coastal Lowland (Q108829657)
• Neoproterozoic (Q191935)
• New London Gneiss (Q115987530)
• Northeastern coastal forests (Q7058078)
• Northeastern Coastal Zone (Q108829637)
• outcrop (Q531953)
• September 21 (Q2891)
• September 2021 (Q61312991)
• Southeastern Connecticut (Q7569441)
• Waterford Group (Q115987493)

Library of Congress Subject Headings:
• Sumac (sh85130404)
• Urban plants (sh85141312)
• Vacant lot ecology (sh85141689)

This beautiful frame home on Jeffersonville's Riverside Drive was moved to make way for the new Abraham Lincoln (I65 North) bridge. Location, location, location….. Hey, who took my prime location?

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

I couldn't find a house number on the building, so this is my best guess based on nearby buildings.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.

This building is being condemned as part of a project to move tracks in Michigan City out of the street and add a second track.