Liberty Theatre

The address is 726, per county registry of deeds and city assessment documents and maps. It’s still there building and all- it’s not torn down, it’s crumbling in some spots but it’s still there.

The city owns the property and is trying to sell it, hopefully someone decides to save the property from demolition and renovates it: any use is better than demolition.

The auditorium was still standing when Google’s and Bing’s satellite views were made, but it was in very rough shape. In fact there is shrubbery growing on the roof! In Google’s satellite view I actually thought the building had been demolished, the growth along the edges of the roof is so thick. Some of them appear to be young trees.

If this building hasn’t been at least stabilized since those pictures were taken, I can only imagine how bad its condition must be by now. Once large plants have taken root on a building’s roof, its collapse is very near. I doubt that there’s much hope for the Liberty Theatre’s survival.

The Street View was “updated” too far from the theater’s entrance. Left click on the photo, then click the street arrow to move one or two turns up the block, then click the right arrow in the compass rose at upper left to pivot to a more direct view of the theater front. You can also left click on the photo and hold the button down, then move your mouse to pivot the view to either side, or up or down.

It’s possible to get decent views of most theaters, but a lot of pages have been updated with inferior views, and in some cases with no view of the theater at all. Many CT users who have updated the views seem to be unaware of the finer points of Street View’s workings (not surprising, since those workings aren’t explained anywhere on the page, and not everybody is familiar with the application.)

I’m not sure why it’s not working for you, Ron. As long as the “Update” button hasn’t already been used, and thus removed, I’ve always been able to reset the street views to the correct location. It might be a browser issue. I’ve only ever reset views using Opera, so I don’t know whether or not there are other browsers that don’t work properly with the Update feature.

I’ve been able to move some street views up to a mile or so (unfortunately, these moves always leave the pin icon on the map in the old location.) But I’ve noticed that there are places where Google’s street view camera just didn’t go, and some places where there is a disconnection from one block to another. A couple of times I’ve been able to “take an alternate route” around a disconnection, getting access to a particular block from the opposite direction.

These situations are especially common in small towns, where the camera truck didn’t travel every street, and in old cities with very irregular street layouts. If the views you’ve been trying to move have been in such locations, that might be the problem. I’ve had to update several small town theaters with views from an intersection down the street, simply because Google’s camera truck didn’t cover the block the theater is on. It’s usually not a very good view, but it’s better than none at all.

I think Ken must have adjusted and reset the view for the Liberty early this morning. It was farther away last night.

If you move the street view down Charlotte Street, just past the brick apartment house, you can see the side wall of the Liberty’s auditorium with the large plants growing from the roof. If I lived in that house next door, I’d be reluctant to use my side yard for fear that a big chunk of the wall of the theater would collapse onto it. I’m surprised that the local authorities haven’t condemned the auditorium and ordered its demolition.