Monday, June 17, 2013

A City of the Future



Last Sunday, I took a walk through part of "old" Speedway, 
to search fro some of the original garages that were built 
when the town was started on July 14, 1926.


The track was first opened in 1909 and the first Indy 500
was held in 1911. One of the track's founders, Carl Fisher,
envisioned the Town of Speedway as the nation's
"first horseless city," with paved streets, brick paved alleyways
that provided access to garages that were built
adjacent to each of the new homes.


As far as I can tell, many of the little garages survive 
in various stages of repair. Most of them have 
been sided over, with nearly all having their original
hung doors replaced with overhead doors.




A few still had their original doors, but could also stand
some attention and restoration. The one below
at least had an overhead door made to resemble
the hung doors originally specified by the designer.




This one had been encased in vinyl siding that has been 
allowed to loosen and split from the corner, 
where I could see the dry, gray original wood.


Oh, yeah, when this "city of the future" was laid out, 
sidewalks were not a part of the plans. While steps have 
been taken to rectify this matter, especially in 
recent years, there are still sections of the town
where pedestrians must either stumble along an uneven
curb, or risk being hit by speeding cars.
Even then, plans were afoot, so to speak, 
to make us so entirely dependent on our cars 
we could not safely walk to meet our neighbors. 
Thus, the "Lard Ass Nation" was conceived.

2 comments:

Jim Klenke said...

nice shots, we have some of those old type garages around here. Some look a little small for the texas sized trucks some people drive.

dive said...

Fabulous post, Speedway. History, motorsport and sheds: a classic combination