The remains of Six E-Comm Square fills the building’s lot on Broadway on Aug. 6, 2018, in Albany. The building, which was owned by a state authority, was demolished after its roof collapsed.

A view from State Street in Albany looking west toward the Capitol.

In many ways, state government has done a number on its hometown.

That may seem a strange claim, given that Albany without state government is Utica or another grim upstate city. But while there can be little doubt the state has invested massively in Albany, many of those investments have done as much harm as good.

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The most obvious example is Empire State Plaza, a $2 billion folly that in the 1960s ripped out the city’s heart for a soulless monument to gubernatorial ego. We can only imagine what Albany would be if the money had been spent improving the existing neighborhood instead of displacing thousands of residents and hundreds of businesses.

The two other big state projects of that era, the W. Harriman State Office Campus and the University at Albany’s uptown campus, weren’t as destructive but neither did they make the city’s center more interesting or vibrant. Like Empire State Plaza, they are modernist islands apart, cold and dominated by parking lots.

Maybe we can dismiss those mistakes as........

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