Plan for new Atascadero junior high building is not ideal
I don’t like the look of the proposed two-story Atascadero Junior High School building that is to be constructed across the street from the City Administration Building. To be completely honest, I don’t like the thought of building anything school-related on the old school site where Atascadero Grammar School was built in 1917.
It has been a part of the city’s general plan to move the school campus out of the middle of town for a long time. I had endorsed the original school finance plan a few years ago because I thought we’d see the junior high get moved off valuable downtown commercial property.
Atascadero’s first blunder to downtown development came in the spring of 1952 when it was announced that a Los Angeles company was going to build 36 duplexes on lots surrounding the City Administration Building. Most of those single-level homes are still there, with some serving as professional offices and the rest residential.
If we are going to get a major building on the school site, then we need to zero in on the architecture E.G. Lewis had planned for his model city. If you look at the architect’s rendering of the new school building to be tucked between the city hall and Printery, you see it shows a flat roof. I know it is cheaper to build a flat roof, but I think it would be a slap in the face of Atascadero’s civic center property to allow it. The city hall has red roof tiles to enhance the Italian Renaissance appearance. The Printery was supposed to get a tile roof, but Lewis ran out of money; he needed to get the building finished so his printing press could produce advertising brochures, a magazine and a newspaper to get people here.
The original high school was beautiful until the 1950s when the tiled roof was removed from the original main campus building, the clock tower knocked down and the windows changed, creating that big ugly square box that’s there today. The old building is scheduled to come down in the near future, by the way. Then the school district built an even uglier building in front of it several years ago.
The original elementary school had a least a mansard roof that gave the appearance of a full roof with red tiles while still providing a flat surface for the “mechanical” stuff that goes on top of large buildings.
If we can’t persuade the school district to move the junior high out of town to a site near San Benito School, then let’s insist we at least get a building that complements what is there and not a flat structure with just some “token” brick façade.
This story was originally published December 1, 2014 at 12:29 PM with the headline "Plan for new Atascadero junior high building is not ideal."