Plans to remake Lower Main Street were well underway in 1969, when this photograph was taken by Buffalo Evening News photographer Merrill Matthews. The 38-story Marine Midland Center—Buffalo’s tallest structure by its opening in 1972—is under construction. Two blocks of buildings earmarked for urban renewal by the city had been cleared by 1968. A single building, not yet demolished, is visible where the tower plaza would soon be located. In the place of what County Executive Tutuska called a “rundown, disheveled, unkempt, and neglected area,” the 528-foot-tall tower and partially submerged parking facility replaced the complex disorder of a historic waterfront. Taking cues from the Pan Am Building in New York, Skidmore, Owings, & Merrill designed Marine Midland Center to span Main Street. Vroomb-Shhh,” the sculpture by Ronald Bladen, would soon dominate an empty plaza outside its lobby doors. It is difficult to believe that Robert Scheu, then-CEO of Marine Midland Trust Co., could have imagined that his modernist landmark would be all but empty today.

Image courtesy of The Buffalo History Museum. Used by permission.