Preservation Idaho - The Idaho Historic Preservation Council

2007 Heritage Homes Tour

Hays Street Historic District

Hays Street, part of the original portion of Boise City, was platted in 1885. Mainly built up before 1912, the street was predominantly populated with one to two story, single-family dwellings. However, Hays Street also included St. John’s Cathedral and several duplexes. Styles seen on Hays Street include the Queen Anne style as well as the Craftsman and Colonial Revival. Due to the variation in the size and uses of the homes in this area, these styles are either well articulated, high style examples designed by architects such as Tourtellotte and Hummel or Wayland and Fennel, or more mixed, vernacular versions built by contractors. Also due to this mixture of housing, Hays Street was home to a mixture of residents and included a Supreme Court Justice, business owners, prominent realtors and those of more humble, lesser known histories. This mix of house styles and sizes produced a beautiful, if eclectic, neighborhood unified by the regular pattern of street, sidewalk and street trees provided by the city.

As the North End grew up to the north and the downtown area continued to spread to the south, Hays Street became a busy connector of the two areas. The street provided a transition between the heavy concentration of commercial and office enterprises of downtown and the lighter residential uses of the northern neighborhoods and a way to travel from one to the other. The traffic became increasingly heavy, the buildings aged and eventually the area was threatened by neglect and the pressures of urban renewal. By 1950, offices were added to the neighborhood. Owners split larger single family residences into small apartments, sometimes enclosing porches to provide more room. Other structures were demolished to make room for modern structures or for parking.

In 1982, historians recognized the value of this street and several blocks around it and wrote a National Register Nomination of the Fort Street area. This area, also called the Near North End, became a source of concern for the Boise City Historic Preservation Commission (HPC) as well. The HPC surveyed and nominated the Near North End as a city historic district. However, due to property owners’ concerns regarding the constraints this would place on their investments, this district failed. In response, the HPC made the district smaller, encompassing Hays Street and a small area around it. This time, the nomination was successful, and the Hays Street Historic District became a local district in 2004.

Today, the area still faces certain threats. Due to the desirability of this area, properties on Hays Street are currently sought-after. However, because traffic can be heavy, some parts of Hays Street have difficulty in attracting families, rather than businesses. Also, because many modern homeowners crave large houses, inappropriate additions and developments are still a concern. Fortunately, any exterior change that occurs in the District must first be approved by the Historic Preservation Commission. This provides a powerful protection to Hays Street and has aided in the sensitive rehabilitation of many structures in the last three years. With this protection and with the attention garnered by the National Register Nomination and tours like this one, Hays Street will continue its renaissance in a way that is both productive and sensitive to its historic integrity.

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