ALONG CENTRE STREET, `GOLDEN GHETTO' AT A CROSSROADS
Author: Joe Heisler, GLOBE CORRESPONDENT

Any other neighborhood in the city might be thrilled to have West Roxbury's Centre Street business district. Anchored on one end by a Star Market and at the other by a new Roche Bros. Supermarket, with two national drugstore chains and nearly a half-dozen banks and scores of small shops and restaurants wedged in between, the winding commercial district is a destination for shoppers from solidly middle-class West Roxbury and surrounding communities.

Yet for every success seems to come a failure; for every sparkling new Roche Bros., the neighborhood loses a Decelle, a longtime clothing and apparel outlet whose New Jersey-based owners last month announced the store would close this summer. And for every new Starbucks Coffee or Irish Cottage gift shop, there is a Hanlon's, a venerable family-owned shoe store that closed two years ago, or a Value Village, a popular second-hand shop that also shut its doors.

City Councilor John Tobin, who lives in the neighborhood, is painfully aware of the dichotomy. Recently married, Tobin says his bride - a California transplant - simply "can't live" without a Starbucks coffee every day. The councilor, on the other hand, still prefers Dunkin' Donuts or a cup of joe from Anna's Donut Shop.

"When Decelle's made its announcement, I told my mother they should have visiting hours at Crosby and Lawler's [a local funeral home] - it is that much a neighborhood institution," says Tobin of the clothing store. "It is frustrating because there is money here. There is no good reason a neighborhood in the $400,000 [for a single-family home] range can't have a business district that reflects that. But the mindset of many residents here is a reluctance to change."

The district's star-crossed reputation for retail business has led some local officials to dub Centre Street as the "Golden Ghetto," an unflattering moniker accepted by many local residents.

The label isn't accepted by Mary Mulvey Jacobsen, president of the West Roxbury Business and Professional Association.

"That [Golden Ghetto] is ridiculous," scoffs Jacobsen. "Could we use more and better stores? Absolutely. But that is an unfair characterization. I can't think of a single neighborhood business district in the city that has not changed. The new Roche Bros. is like a mecca, and there are still thousands of people coming to Centre Street to shop."

Many of the changes in the business district have less to do with the community than with the economy and industry trends, Jacobsen says. The Decelle closing, for instance, was corporate driven, she said.

Jacobsen admits the Decelle closing is a setback - one that could adversely affect the association's annual Sidewalk Sale Days in June, which draws thousands of shoppers to the business district. But for every opportunity lost, another is created. She points to the three-story Decelle building and the former CVS as two prime locations for new businesses.

Spurred on by criticism, Centre Street merchants and property owners recently signed on with Main Streets, the city-sponsored neighborhood revitalization program championed by Mayor Thomas Menino. But even that was controversial, becoming an issue in the 2001 campaign to elect a new District 6 City Councilor. West Roxbury was one of the last neighborhoods in the city to do so.

"Could Centre Street be better? Certainly - but we are still in much better shape than many other areas of the city or state," says Shirley Walsh, who chairs the West Roxbury Main Streets board. "The great success of Main Streets so far is our market survey, where for the first time we have engaged the residents and asked what they want in the business district. We also have a better understanding of the commercial base, the square footage, etc., so when trying to grow the district, these are things we can take to the bank."

What residents want, according to Walsh, is more retail business, including clothing, shoes, accessories, and home goods; also, a bookstore, more ethnic restaurants, sporting goods, and a small theater or other types of entertainment for families with children.

What they also want, Walsh says, is for something to be done about traffic and pedestrian safety. "I have a father who is a senior and two teenage daughters - it is not a nice place to cross the street. Something must be done; it can't be ignored."

Therein lies the rub at the center of the seemingly endless neighborhood debate over what Centre Street is and what it should be. Ever since 1978, when the city changed Centre Street from two to four lanes, the neighborhood has been questioning the wisdom of the move.

The winding 2 1/2-mile roadway, with multiple lights, numerous crosswalks, and busy intersections, has made Centre Street a traffic nightmare, one which many local residents avoid by traveling side streets. A series of highly publicized pedestrian fatalities over the last decade has added to the controversy.

Boston is currently in the middle of a $4 million improvement to the roadway, including raised crosswalks and better pavement markings. Threatening to throw a monkey wrench into the city's plans, however, is a petition drive started earlier this year by a group of local residents asking Menino to change the street back from four to two lanes.

Gwynne Morgan, president of the Highland Neighborhood Association, says city planners are preoccupied with moving traffic along Centre Street - traffic, she says is largely suburban commuters looking for a shortcut - to the detriment of pedestrians and local residents. She said changing Centre Street from four to two lanes, similar to changes made on Harvard Street in Brookline and Massachusetts Avenue in Cambridge at Central Square, would calm vehicular traffic and improve the flow of pedestrians.

Morgan said she was rebuffed when she attempted to raise the idea with city officials three years ago during the planning process for reconstruction. Calls to the City of Boston Transportation Department were referred to Department of Public Work Commissioner Joe Casazza.

Casazza said he has no specific recollection of the series of meetings conducted by his department before the start of reconstruction. But he said there was never any attempt to sidestep the issue, and that the plan adopted was a compromise between competing neighborhood interests..

Tobin says reconstruction is too far along to consider a redesign. "No disrespect intended, but the time for that conversation is past," he said. "We have already spent over $1 million on sidewalk and street improvements."
 

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GLOBE STAFF FILE PHOTO JOHN TOBIN
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