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Herald Street

In our new photo, the Herald Garage lies in shadow, which probably improves its appearance. We're on Herald Street near the corner of Shawmut Avenue in the South End, looking north toward downtown. On the right, beyond the fence, is a particularly dismal stretch of the turnpike/railroad corridor, its airspace a tangle of power lines.

The old photo shows the same block about 1900. We can pinpoint the date by a poster for McClure's magazine, which was serializing Rudyard Kipling's Kim. As so often is the case with old photos, it's the garrulous, congenial signage that most appeals. The buildings are like cartoon characters with dialogue balloons. "CROCKERY," shouts one sign. Another announces "THE FAMOUS New England's Favorite Clothing House" with "The Largest Variety of Superior High-Class Clothing." Park Square Garden offers "Maine Sportsmens Exhibit!" with "over 500 living animals." Even the streetlight talks to us: It says "Castle Street" just below its hood. (Herald Street was West Castle then.)

The 400-car concrete garage of today was built in the mid-1960s, as part of the Castle Square housing development. It was conceived as a bulwark to protect the residents from the noisy turnpike corridor. Architect Samuel Glaser tried to give it a mod look, with bold cantilevers and sculpted panels, but today the concrete is spalling, and the garage looks terrible. It's now operated by New England Medical Center. The owner is Boston developer Ronald Druker. Druker, best known for his Heritage on the Garden complex on Boylston Street, has no plans for the site. "If the world grows up around it," he says, "and there's a higher and better use, then something might happen."

That may depend on the future of the Massachusetts Turnpike corridor. A recent study by the Boston Redevelopment Authority, working with citizens and with urban designer David Dixon, has proposed an air-rights development over this stretch. If that ever happens, says Dixon, the area will be "Candidate Number One" for housing.