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Midwest National Trust Midwest Regional Office 407 South Dearborn St., Suite 710 Chicago, 111. 60605 (312) 353-3419 Years of scuffling over Chicago's deserted Navy Pier have ended with plans to create museums, theaters, cafes, perhaps a marina and parks on the 1916 structure jutting 3,000 feet out into Lake Michigan (PN,' March 1984), But no "festival mar- ketplace" of shops will nudge its way into this historic complex. City council nixed such a $60 million plan submitted by the Rouse Co. in 1984. Then a Mayor's Task Force devised their own ideas about how to bring back the Pier's more vital days, when it had its own streetcar line, dance hall, theater and restaurant. City council backed up the recent Task Force report with $15 million for structural improve - merits, but Task Force coordinator Irene Sherr says another $50-t6=$100 million is needed for the project, which will take place over many years. Contact her at (312) 744-0796. Why is Kansas City's 1910 YMCA (and - its 1913 annex) coming down? Here in the early 1900s staff developed the space -sav- ing "Kansas City Locker System," now used the world over, boys paid five cents a week to use the gym, and world -travel- ers bunked down in 12 -by -12 guest rooms. But a local developer bought the bin'Iciing in 1981, and the Y left two years ago.: Now the developer wants to vel the brick landmark for parking lEie'll a iDoff if someone with monegshoft ptopropose rehab, but right now the situation is "a stalemate," according to an official st the Historic Kansas City Foundation: Contact the Foundation at (816) 4711 3Nl. Residents of rowXy 124owa,hhomic, districts now own the privilege of rah' =i g ` their own taxes. A 1985 amendmeatto state law allows property owners.in his- toric areas to vote fora tax hike#o fund such improvements as instpUmgreprodue- tion streetlamps and repavingto enhance' the old ambience. The so-called Self -Sup- ported Municipal Improvement Districts (SSMIDS) are usually used to. fund new construction, not preservation, says.Tack Lufkin of the state's Office of Historic Preservation. He usually desig a 4sina'Y sbrifud auto' plants, but in this case architect= Albert Kahn (1869-1942) did a brick -and -steel airport hangar for clients Henry and Edsel Ford. Built in 1927and still -muse, the Lansing Ill., hangar recently made the National Register of Historic Places. Kahn's factories are known for expenses of glass, and hishome forairpianes proved just as enlightening. with 1"y-l8rfoot - structures 1n town not iootea ay the xsrit- ish, thanks to the Anglican mitre atop its steeple and the royal coat. of arms above the altar. It was built in 1726 by master builder Richard Munday; following plans by Sir Christopher Wren. In other words, impeccable credentials for 260 -,year-old Trinity Church in Newport, R.I. But with its graceful tower leaning 16 inches to the National Trust MidAtlantic Regional Office 6401 Germantown Ave: . Philadelphia; Pa. 19144 . (215) 438 2886 Eighteen stories and US rooms worth of elegance will soon check out of Philadel- phis. After 82 years as the grand hotel, the Bellevue -Stratford will shut its doors in April. The ornate downtown hostelry, infamous as the site of the 1976 outbreak of Legionnaires' disease that killed 26, was a long-term money loser that even a major facelift in 1979 could not reverse. Some blame the hotel's demise on the city, which has stalled plans for a nearby con- vention center. Others say competition from newer hotels:killed the Bellevue, which once boasted" Turkish baths, a library and a rose garden on the roof. The French Renaissance -style building will be reborn as an office complex with irestau- rants, shops—and; yes, a small luxury hotel. - Classrooms will become living rooms in conversion of Pittsburgh's Latimer School to apartments named,; appropriately, the School House. Situated in the Deutchtown historic district just north ,pf downtown, groups:. vvmi Lite iseilp U1 a i0.NW r4atlullal Trust grant, North East Kingdom Com- munity Action, Inca (NEKCA), a New- port, Vt., community group, will study convertingthe 1908prison: Aftercomple- t.ion of the feasibility study comes the difficult matter of funding the project, says NEKCA program planner Margaret V. Nicely.-. the 1898 yellow -brick and sandstone school is the first large-scale rehab in the neighborhood, claims Philadelphia de- veloper Historic Landmarks for Living. The $10 million project includeWrestora tion of the original grand staircase graced by delicate wrought -iron railing' which rises through all five stories of the build- ing, The School House, set for eoinpletion early this year, is Landmarks's first Pittsburgh project. They sue for the, view in Washington, where the D.C. Preservation League and the Committee .of 10Q sued in January to protect a vista. Chief defendant is de- veloper Giuseppe Ce�chix whose proposed high-tech trademart Techworld would include a six -story "bridge" over Eighth Street, blocking much of the view of two landmarks: the National Portrait Gallery and the former Carnegie Library. The Eighth Street vista, part of the original L'Enfant plan for Washington, is the only designated vista on the city's list of land- marks. The suit also charges Techworld violates D.C.'s stringent building height limit. At the request of Mayor Marion Barry, the groups attempted without success to hammer out a compromise with Cecchi, whose other Washington works include the Watergate complex.