Almost two years ago I took pictures of some demolition that had happened on Washington Street. The old Retro Replay location and a couple of other buildings were torn down in April of 2023. At the time it was reported that the land was being cleared for construction of an apartment building named “The Altair”. But in the two years since, there has been no action on the land. The foundations of the demolished buildings were left to sit in the sun.

I was starting to wonder if the project had failed. So many other projects around town seem to be announced, and maybe get a little work done, and then dry up and get forgotten, leaving an empty weed-covered lot behind. This project almost felt that it was going that way.

But then in January 2025 the fences went up and heavy equipment arrived on the site. The project was back on! I guess it just took that long to get the building permits approved. Now they have begun digging into the land and preparing to lay utilities and building foundations.

The project isn’t notable just because it replaced a couple of retail shops, or because it’s fairly close to downtown. This project actually spans the entire block, minus the Jack in the Box on the opposite corner. It’s a total of 5 city blocks, so it’s a pretty sizeable apartment complex. It’s supposed to comprise 207 apartments across 5 buildings. But what’s really notable about this project is that it’s being built on the site of the old Virginia and Truckee Enginehouse.

In 1873 the Virginia and Truckee Railroad was a few years old and in need of better facilities. They built this large stone building on the outskirts of town. It was where the locomotives were parked when not in use, and it also had an extensive machine shop and carpentry shop capable of doing almost any repairs to the railroad. The Railroad was housed in this shop right up until operations ended in 1950. After the railroad went out of business, the street grid that we know today went in on the old railroad land, hemming the shop in on Stewart Street. The building was sold, and for years was used by a variety of other industrial businesses like automotive shops.

By the 1980s the building was abandoned and falling apart. After a spate of vandalism, including a couple of fires, the owners of the building knew they had to do something with what had become a local eyesore. Requests to preserve the building as a historic landmark went unheeded. Instead the building was demolished in 1991.

It was a big loss, but it proved to be even more senseless by the fact that ever since then, the land has sat empty. Most of the time it had a For Sale sign on it. Environmental cleanups were done to remove some of the hazardous chemicals that were left behind after decades of railroad work. The town surrounded the land, and the empty lot was mostly forgotten. Some people remembered what used to be there, but newcomers came to town with no knowledge that this was ever anything but an empty lot. Still, it sat unused. A few ideas were floated here and there for what to do with the land, but nothing ever came of any of it. Eventually it had been over 30 years since the enginehouse was demolished, and it was really feeling like the land was cursed.

But that changed when the Altair was announced. It seemed like a project was actually going to get built on this land, one with enough steam behind it to be seen to completion. But over the last year or so, with not so much as a shovel being seen on site, it was starting to feel like the curse was back on, and this project had died too. But this new work sure makes it looks like it’s going to be completed this time.

This is historic land, but sitting unused wasn’t doing it or the town any good. Now the land will have a purpose again. You can debate if housing is the best use for this piece of land, and I’m sure it will reignite more arguments about the housing crisis. But any use is better than it being vacant and full of weeds. The demolition of the old enginehouse won’t be forgotten by some people, but at least now you can no longer say that it was demolished just to become a permanent empty lot.