A run-down alley is transformed with micro-shops

Press Bay Alley on farm-share pickup night. Photo by Simon Wheeler, The Ithaca Journal

A pair of young developers have created a new public space in downtown Ithaca, New York, by tearing down some dilapidated sheds and opening up six tiny retail shops in a small alley, now called Press Bay Alley, according to an article in The Ithaca Journal.

Urban Core LLC, a partnership between John Guttridge and David Kuckuk, bought The Ithaca Journal building that runs between State and Green streets. The Journal is still an operating daily newspaper, but the paper has downsized and its printing operation was moved to Johnson City. 

Urban Core converted the back of the building, on Green Street, to a retail store, Life's So Sweet Chocolates, which manufactures its chocolates in nearby Trumansburg. Across the alley from the shop, the developers tore down the paper's former sheds and put up six 188-square-foot retail spaces in a utilitarian single-story building with glass-panel, roll-up cargo bays. The alley was repaved with concrete. 

In nice weather, the shops can open everything up to the public space. Even when the cargo doors are shut, the retail spaces are still flooded with light.  Each bay rents for $450 per month including utilities and wireless internet, the Journal reports. The project is a good example of Lean Urbanism.

The first tenants are Boxy Bikes, selling electric-powered bicycles, and Amuse, selling American homemade goods -- the latter takes up two bays.  

The alley is also used for quasi-public events. When a community-supported agriculture (CSA) operation delivers produce on Thursdays, they do so in the alley. Press Bay Alley was not an official venue for the town's Ithaca Festival, but it hosted activities and became a pass-through between two venues -- and it was nearly as crowded as the official locations. 

“We are doing what we refer to as dragging civilization westward a block,” Guttridge told the Journal. “What we’ve created is an opportunity to have that sort of vibrant city-center feel in a corner of the city that has been essentially derelict for a period of time.”