Repeating the folly of its 1960s predecessor, which destroyed Union Station, the City Council rejected the proposed Munjoy Hill Historic District, rationalizing the rejection largely on an uncertain economic impact.

In 2007, then-Gov. John Baldacci named Muskie School professor Richard Barringer head of the Governor’s Council on Maine’s Quality of Place. In a report, the Governor’s Council recognized historic preservation as key to quality of place and our lively arts and historic buildings as Maine’s principal advantage in today’s economy, stating, “We must learn to think of (these) as the basic infrastructure of Maine’s future prosperity.”

The basic infrastructure of Munjoy Hill’s future prosperity is endangered. With the destruction, or major alteration, of every historical building, our quality of place, and the Hill’s ability to function as an economic driver for Portland, are lessened.

In “City by the Sea: A Photographic History of Portland, Maine,” author John R. Moon said, “One of the great things about the city of Portland is that you can still walk about town and see many of these wonderful 19th century buildings 100-150 years after they were built.”

Think Portsmouth’s Strawbery Banke, Newburyport or Marblehead, where their tourist economy is based on quality of place, then think Fort Allen and Munjoy Hill.

The Historic Preservation Board made a convincing case, endorsed by the Planning Board, and the council’s rejection opens the floodgates to substantial erosion of the Hill’s middle-class housing and destruction of its sense of place. Union Station folly all over again.

R. John Wuesthoff
Portland

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Letter to the editor: Rejection of Munjoy historic district echoes earlier error