It’s been nice to take a vacation from local political blogging. Happpy 4th of July everyone out there in web-land.

I did work on my art blog, trying to spiff it up a little bit and blog on it a little bit.

And as I’ve been enjoying Newburyport in its very quiet state on the long 4th of July weekend, I realized that I live in what one could call 1950’s “infill.”

Where I live used to be part of a large field near a fire station. And sometime in 1950’s, someone bought the property from the City of Newburyport, put a road through it and plopped in 3 little houses, capes to be exact.

So, I live in 1950’s South End infill. And for some reason I find this to be somewhat ironic.

The street on which I live has evolved over the last 10 years. You could call it “infill” I guess, but I like it.

The family next door grew and expanded their cape. And I thought it was great.

And I expanded my little cape.

And the garage on the street recently got turned into a very nice cape indeed.

And none of this bothers me.

All the changes were gradual, seemed intrinsic and organic to the existing neighborhood. And I think, although all the modifications changed the neighborhood, I liked it before and I like it now. It’s just different, but it’s still the same neighborhood.

Earlier (and I don’t know exactly when “earlier” was) there was infill, but it didn’t seem as offensive as it does now. It was gradual, and some wasn’t so good, but some of it of it even made the neighborhoods much better places in which to live.

So when did “infill” become a “dirty word?” It certainly is not perceived as a positive thing in Newburyport, Massachusetts any more.

I think “infill” began to be a dirty word when it started to change the intrinsic value of the different Newburyport neighborhoods. When it no longer seemed gradual. When it seemed like Newburyport was being descended by building projects and everywhere you looked it seemed like something else just went up.

I’m still thinking about Bonnie Sontag’s and Sue Grolnic’s post on the positive aspects of infill. It seems as if at some point we turned an infill corner. And it seems as if in Newburyport, when it comes to infill, our “luck” has changed.

Mary Eaton
Newburyport