What's the oldest turnpike service plaza still in use?

[GCrites]

There's also a difference between a building that is 50-60 years old and one that is over 80. If it's that old, you'll try to keep it because of the historic value. Just look at New York, New England, and Washington.

True, but eventually those 50-60 year old buildings become the over-80 ones, and then where are we? Imagine how many turn-of-the-century buildings (Beaux-Arts, City Beautiful-era) were razed in the 50s and 60s because they were old enough to be outmoded but not yet old enough to be historic, or at least nostalgic. And yes, in many cases that was because they were truly decrepit and it wasn't seen as practical (or necessary) to save them, but we do now find ourselves wishing we could have some of that building stock back.

It makes me wonder, although we'd all probably love to bulldoze all those horrid Brutalist eyesores from the 60s-70s with their crumbling, moldy concrete façades and their cold, desolate plazas–yet will there be a time not so long from now when we'll admire them as aesthetic triumphs of an earlier age, and spend millions to preserve and restore as many of them as we can?

Exactly. There's already renewed interest in mid-century architecture (but not Brutalism yet) and furniture. The furniture was just old crap when I was a kid in the '80s but there was still a lot of it around. The retro curve on everything varies. Cars hit the retro curve around 25 years old (remember when muscle cars were just "used cars") whereas most video games that are between 5-15 years old are valueless.

The fact that no old turnpike service plazas are left is a microcosm of how willing Americans are willing to dump anything that isn't new enough or old enough to be cool.

[kkt]

Then again, not everything that's old has historic value.  Some old one-room cabin isn't valuable just because it's old.  Usually the greatest examples get preserved, which also leads to a tendency to forget how bad things were for lots of people.

[Pete from Boston]

There's also a difference between a building that is 50-60 years old and one that is over 80. If it's that old, you'll try to keep it because of the historic value. Just look at New York, New England, and Washington.

True, but eventually those 50-60 year old buildings become the over-80 ones, and then where are we? Imagine how many turn-of-the-century buildings (Beaux-Arts, City Beautiful-era) were razed in the 50s and 60s because they were old enough to be outmoded but not yet old enough to be historic, or at least nostalgic. And yes, in many cases that was because they were truly decrepit and it wasn't seen as practical (or necessary) to save them, but we do now find ourselves wishing we could have some of that building stock back.

It makes me wonder, although we'd all probably love to bulldoze all those horrid Brutalist eyesores from the 60s-70s with their crumbling, moldy concrete façades and their cold, desolate plazas–yet will there be a time not so long from now when we'll admire them as aesthetic triumphs of an earlier age, and spend millions to preserve and restore as many of them as we can?

Exactly. There's already renewed interest in mid-century architecture (but not Brutalism yet) and furniture. The furniture was just old crap when I was a kid in the '80s but there was still a lot of it around. The retro curve on everything varies. Cars hit the retro curve around 25 years old (remember when muscle cars were just "used cars") whereas most video games that are between 5-15 years old are valueless.

The fact that no old turnpike service plazas are left is a microcosm of how willing Americans are willing to dump anything that isn't new enough or old enough to be cool.

That's a reach.  First of all, highway rest areas weren't built to be beautiful or to last 100 years.  As pointed out upthread, anyone with any experience in the matter will tell you there is a very high cost involved with renovating that often is eclipsed in ROI by building anew.  If you're going to tell me that there is great enough intrinsic cultural value in a utilitarian cafeteria building that now acts as a food court, and that such value merits putting more taxpayer money in with less return than starting over, I would suggest you lobby for the extra investment to save these places.  I assure you even the preservation community would ask you to stop distracting from more pressing needs.

Hell, even I salivate over finding a grocery store that still has vestiges of the 1970s or earlier to it.  But I don't think it reflects poorly on us that our commercial structures follow the demands of the market.

I admit there were some gems of rest areas out there, that in some cases probably would have been nice to incorporate into new structures, but on the whole, not a lot was lost other than a few people's objects of sentimentality. 

It's too bad this site went down and then was reborn with almost no content: 

http://recentpast.org/

It had a lot of good examples at one time of distinguished vernacular postwar buildings, but it's mostly gone now.  The old site is at archive.org, but without the photos that were its true treasures.

[Crazy Volvo Guy]

All the talk about the old Charlton plazas has me missing the old Charlton West.  I remember when it had a Burger King.  As worn-out as that place was, it was one of my happy places, because any time I was there, we (family and I) were on our way to see Grandma Wassell, and that was always overshadowed by nearly uncontainable excitement, at least on my part.

And I remember the fire at Charlton East, and the temporary trailer, before it was finally rebuilt from the ground up.  I never had the same feelings about Charlton East as I did about Charlton West; east meant going home, back to reality.

Ahh, to be a kid again, and to still have all beloved family members still living...