Several public activities were relocated this summer
WESTFIELD – Westfield Arts on the Green has become a victim of on-going road reconstruction in the city’s downtown area.
Gerald E. Tracy, organizer of the six-year-old art festival, said Tuesday the event has been canceled but only temporarily.
“We will bring it back next year, probably at a different location because work on the Park Square Green is not expected to be completed until sometime later,” said Tracy.
Tracy said he canceled the event after deciding that no other downtown location was suitable for the art exhibit, a popular downtown event for the past six years on the green during Labor Day weekend.
“It looks like it might be two years before reconstruction efforts are complete in the downtown. So, we are looking at an Arts on the Green event that will utilize parks being re-created at the Great River Bridge for next year,” the artist said.
Tracy said the project would utilize parks on both sides of the Westfield River at the bridge located in the Depot Square area at Elm and North Elm streets. Rehabilitation of the original Great River Bridge is expected to be completed in the summer of 2011.
“The bridge area, when completed, will be a very attractive spot. It could become a premier spot for numerous activities such as Arts of the Green,” Tracy said.
Several downtown public attractions were canceled this year because of the spring start of a $14.4 million reconstruction project involving Main, Broad and Elm streets, including Park Square Green.
The Business Improvement District relocated both its Thursday Farmers’ Market and summer concert series because of the reconstruction project. And, the Chamber of Commerce held its annual July pancake breakfast on the front lawn at South Middle School on West Silver Street.
BID director Lisa G. McMahon said “we received positive feedback that we did not cancel our different events, just relocated them. When you get lemons you make lemon aid.”
Tracy said Church Street Commons was consider as a temporary location for the festival but he later determined it was too small, to support Arts on the Green this year.