I've been going to Hardwick's for about 30 years. They are located at Roosevelt Way and 42nd St. NE in the U District. They are just about the last of their kind, a real hardware store. If you can't find something anywhere else, go to Hardwick's and they will have several of the item. Narrow aisles, tall shelves, all kinds of bins of loose stuff. They sell not only new stuff but also used. You just can't imagine how many items are in this store without having been there.
The whole area south and southwest of the U. has changed in recent years. Seen from I-5 approaching from the south, it looks like a row of canyons. A great many of the single story, single family buildings that were there have been turned into multi-story apartment blocks. I watched University Ford disappear a number of years ago. It's all tall buildings now. Hardwick's is one of the few single story buildings within a couple of blocks; they are dwarfed by multi-story buildings all around. I keep thinking every time I go down there, "I wonder if I'm gonna find them gone when I get there." Not yet, quite.
However, today I talked to one of the employees. He informed me that the building has been sold to developers and will be gone within a year. Of course all the development in the area ("highest and best use" basis for taxation, among other dynamics like voters going for every give-away under the sun) has caused their property taxes to be staggering. Then there is the issue with retrofitting an old brick building to contemporary earthquake standards which is very costly and impractical.
The owners of those looming, fancy, new multi-story buildings, they have no problems paying taxes on them. They fill the buildings with fancy tenants and gouge the bejeepers out of them for rent. It's the Seattle way. One of the drivers of homelessness is that there no longer are two-buck flophouses. Those old buildings have either been converted to "lofts" or demolished for new construction.
My dear old dad had a saying for this, it was, "So this is progress?? Who needs it?"
The whole area south and southwest of the U. has changed in recent years. Seen from I-5 approaching from the south, it looks like a row of canyons. A great many of the single story, single family buildings that were there have been turned into multi-story apartment blocks. I watched University Ford disappear a number of years ago. It's all tall buildings now. Hardwick's is one of the few single story buildings within a couple of blocks; they are dwarfed by multi-story buildings all around. I keep thinking every time I go down there, "I wonder if I'm gonna find them gone when I get there." Not yet, quite.
However, today I talked to one of the employees. He informed me that the building has been sold to developers and will be gone within a year. Of course all the development in the area ("highest and best use" basis for taxation, among other dynamics like voters going for every give-away under the sun) has caused their property taxes to be staggering. Then there is the issue with retrofitting an old brick building to contemporary earthquake standards which is very costly and impractical.
The owners of those looming, fancy, new multi-story buildings, they have no problems paying taxes on them. They fill the buildings with fancy tenants and gouge the bejeepers out of them for rent. It's the Seattle way. One of the drivers of homelessness is that there no longer are two-buck flophouses. Those old buildings have either been converted to "lofts" or demolished for new construction.
My dear old dad had a saying for this, it was, "So this is progress?? Who needs it?"