Back in October 2015, the Postal Service sold the historic 1937 Saunders Station post office in Richmond, Virginia. At the time, the sale price was not made public, but as discussed in this previous post, there was reason to wonder if the sale made sense financially. Turns out, the sale makes hardly any sense at all. A reader of STPO … Read More
Historic Reno NV post office to become major retail outlet & food marketplace
A major retailer may soon be coming to downtown Reno. And officials say it’s going to be a big game changer for the area. The national retail chain will be going on the first floor of the former Main U.S. Post Office off Virginia Street. “We’ve tried to slowly release information and keep that secret, almost like a speak easy is … Read More
Historic Bethesda MD post office to become fitness center
The new yoga and fitness studio that will eventually call the historic Bethesda U.S. Post Office home is setting up a temporary pop-up studio at the Bethesda Crescent building at 7475 Wisconsin Ave. Bridges Fitness & Yoga owner Alain Cohen said in an email Monday the business plans to use the pop-up studio to teach a range of classes and to inform … Read More
Richmond’s historic Saunders Station post office sold, finally
After trying to dispose of it for over four years, the Postal Service has finally sold the historic 1937 Saunders Station post office at 1625 Broad Street in Richmond, Virginia. The Postal Service apparently got ahead of itself and began renting space for the new location of the post office back in 2011, when it originally expected to sell the … Read More
Life-threatening mold closes historic post office in Richmond, CA
While it’s not uncommon for the Postal Service to close a post office after it discovers some mold in the building, it’s cause for concern when the building is a historic structure. Does the Postal Service have plans to abandon the building and sell it off? That’s the question surrounding the closure this week of the 80-year-old post office in … Read More
Under lock and key: The New Deal post office art of Palm Beach County
Three New Deal post offices in Palm Beach County, Florida, feature important murals painted in the 1930s. But one of the buildings isn't serving as a post office anymore, and the art is "under lock and key." The former Palm Beach post office buidling on N. County Road now serves as the offices for billionaire real estate tycoon Jeff Greene, who purchased … Read More
Sale of historic Princeton post office moves forward
The sale of the historic Palmer Square post office in Princeton, New Jersey, is moving forward. Earlier this week the Princeton Packet revealed that the post office would be relocating a few blocks away to a former West Coast Video building on Nassau Street. The Postal Service will share the leased property with a 7-Eleven. The move will take place … Read More
Historic Plant City post office discontinued, headed for sale
Earlier this week, the Postal Service announced that the historic post office on Reynolds Street In downtown Plant City, Florida, is being discontinued. It’s the first such discontinuance in over 16 months. The Plant City post office has been closed since June 2013, when the Postal Service shut down the 1935 facility for an emergency suspension due to deteriorating conditions, … Read More
The Post Office in Black and White, 1935-1944
For many photographers, taking pictures of post offices is a passion, and for good reason. Our country has are over 32,000 post offices, and they come in all shapes and sizes and vintages. Many of them may seem rather modest and nondescript at first glance, but in the eye of a collector, there's always something interesting to see. Many post offices … Read More
When public buildings were revered
The Boston Globe has a great op-ed piece about the legacy of the New Deal and the loss of the Union Square post office: “Today, the Union Square post office and Moffett’s patriotic mural have been sold, as the US Postal Service embarks on a liquidation program to reduce its $20 billion deficit. The building was purchased for $2.75 million … Read More
Did the Postal Service forget it owns the historic Lindsborg post office?
The Postal Service has closed the post office in Lindsborg, Kansas, because of concerns about the air quality. Apparently some black mold was discovered in the basement. That’s not too surprising considering that it’s an old building that dates back to 1936. The news reports don’t mention the phrase, but presumably the office was closed for an “emergency suspension.” Under … Read More
Regarding the sale and preservation of historic post offices and their art: An open letter to the Inspector General
Last summer, the USPS Office of Inspector General announced that it was doing an audit investigation on the preservation and disposal of historic post offices. The audit was due out in October, but the release has been postponed until later this year. The audit announcement itself has been removed from the OIG’s website, but there’s an archived version with … Read More
The plot thickens: An OIG solicitation, the Palmer Square Post Office, and the CBRE-LCOR connection
There were a couple of interesting developments this week in the story about how the Postal Service and its real estate broker CBRE are handling post office lease deals and the sales of postal properties. On Christmas Day, the USPS Office of Inspector General posted a solicitation notice looking for a supplier to do an analysis of the fair market value … Read More
Bronx post office interior gets landmark status
The Landmarks Preservation Commission on Tuesday granted landmark status to the interior of the main post office in the Bronx. The exterior was designated a landmark by the commission in 1976. But the interior remained unprotected, and preservationists worried about the fate of famous 1930s murals by Ben Shahn and Bernarda Bryson Shahn as the United States Postal Service intends to … Read More
Harlem’s College Station post office may be sold and “relocated”
The Postal Service has announced plans to close and sell another historic post office. The College Station post office on 140th Street in in Harlem was built under the New Deal, and it’s been serving the neighborhood since 1937. It looks like 2014 may be its last year of operation. As usual, the Postal Service says it plans to open a … Read More
LA Times: Berkeley making the rounds to save its historic post office
LA Times: "Plenty of communities have resisted the U.S. Postal Service's sweeping real estate sell-off, battling to keep open historic buildings that speak of bygone civic grandeur and to guarantee old-fashioned mail service for the public. Few have succeeded. But this is Berkeley, home of the Free Speech Movement and protracted protests over civil rights, Vietnam and more. So when the … Read More