David Collins wrote last month in The Day about re-purposing a downtown New London bank building into a restaurant. Such urban creativity revitalized my own fantasy concerning the empty Cohanzie School building on Dayton Road in Waterford.

I pass the vacant school building regularly, its warm devotion to Waterford’s children still resonating. It feels like it has more to give to the community.

Often, on my bicycle, I slow down to admire its handsome architectural symmetry and craftsmanship, and to visualize its rebirth.

I imagine it full of life, like the inspired restoration projects I’ve visited in cities across the country, where spacious old buildings are now wonderful marketplaces of commerce, resurrected with art galleries, book shops, cafes, shops featuring local crafts, and often a background of tasteful, live entertainment.

With a tinge of jealousy, I always wonder “Why not us?” Why is our region so reluctant to embrace progressive, metropolitan ideas?

Hey, it’s true. I got hate mail for suggesting bicycle paths in this column, for heaven’s sake. And how about that monolithic monument to our commerce-killing parochialism: Route 11?

Progressive communities embrace restoration. In cities around the world, old factories become flea markets, churches become theaters and art galleries and old grocery stores are reborn as craft markets and microbreweries.

Our neighbor Stonington is somehow an oasis of unique restoration in small-minded southern Connecticut. Mainly because a former New York lawyer with vision turned an old airport into a vineyard and a Mystic gas station into an award-winning, sophisticated cafe.

Also in Stonington, the 1888 Velvet Mill has been transformed, now home to artists and entrepreneurs, with visual arts, unique crafts, boutiques, creative classes, even fitness spots.

The mill hosts “an award-winning nano-brewery, a wood fired pizza restaurant, an espresso bar, and a new bistro style restaurant garnering rave reviews.” So metropolitan!

Imagine a Cohanzie co-op of this type, where local artisans and craftsmen offer their products, where artists work and interact with the public, and maybe sell a painting or two. A place where school, church and community groups sell their wares, where meeting space is available for local clubs, youth sports groups and classes of all kinds.

Maybe even an entertainment area, especially if the school has an auditorium with a stage, where local musicians, senior groups, etc., might entertain for free during open hours.

Perhaps the annual farmers market could be moved from its awkward Town Hall location to the Cohanzie School’s spacious grounds. Community yard sales, outdoor flea markets and craft shows could spread across the lawn on summer days.

The school’s location is convenient, right off well-traveled Route 85, and there’s parking in the town’s ball field right across the street.

I’m no development expert, but I’m sure there are grants and other funding sources available for such projects. Other cities and towns have succeeded with restorations far larger than Cohanzie School. Why not us?

Exploring the possibilities might end as nothing more than a learning experience, but what better place to learn than a loyal old school begging for one last chance?

But then again, I reached out to the Town of Waterford and the Eastern Connecticut Chamber of Commerce for information. Neither responded, succinctly answering the question “Why not us?”

John Steward lives in Waterford and can be reached at tossinglines@gmail.com.