Neglected Third Street Tourism District Casualty of State Park

As you read this, work on the state’s $50 million upgrade of Niagara Falls State Park, expanding parking, food service and gift shop facilities, is being rushed to completion in anticipation of the estimated eight million tourists who will come to visit Niagara Falls this summer.

Meanwhile, the city of Niagara Falls‘ Third Street “tourism district”, as you can see in these photos, is looking more than a little shabby, with less than a month remaining before the official tourism season gets underway.

USA Niagara, the local subsidiary of Albany-based Empire State Development, highlights on its web sites the “THE REVITALIZATION INITIATIVE OF DOWNTOWN NIAGARA FALLS, USA”, emphasizing its impact on the Third Street “transitional zone between downtown and city neighborhoods to the north and east.”

Back in 2005, USA Niagara and the city jointly spent $3.7 million on streetscape and other infrastructure “improvements” to Third Street, such as “replacement of the water mains, reduction in the size of traffic lanes to allow for widened sidewalks; the planting of trees along the promenade to drive foot traffic; the identification of gateways to the area; and the installation of special markers, new lighting and street furniture.”

“The goal of the Third Street Business District,” stated USA Niagara, “is to create a vibrant, pedestrian-friendly neighborhood, with commercial, retail and residential development elements that will service several market segments and ultimately result in capturing more of the tourist visitation to downtown Niagara Falls.”

It failed.

While Third Street does feature a few small businesses such as a pizzeria, liquor store and a couple of restaurants, and plays host to one or more festivals and events during the peak tourist months, the lofty goals of a decade ago appear largely unmet.

That’s mainly because many, perhaps most of the eight million tourists who come here every year drive into Niagara Falls State Park on the state owned Robert Moses Parkway; the tourists then park their cars on one of over 1500 parking spaces inside the state park, ride the Maid of the Mist, eat at Delaware North food stands and Top of the Falls restaurant inside the park, purchase gifts and souvenirs from one of several shops inside the park, then leave on the same state-owned Robert Moses Parkway, without entering or spending money in the city of Niagara Falls, one of the poorest cities in the state.

The so-called state subsidized USA Niagara Revitalization Initiative was a whitewash, another cruel joke perpetrated on a city that’s been systematically deprived of its waterfront assets by Albany and the worthless local government officials who genuflect to them.

That’s why the “tourism district” is being allowed to sink into disrepair. Why invest time and money sprucing up Third Street when everybody’s in the state park?