FILE - This Oct. 22, 2007, file photo shows the general hospital, behind some tourists on the south side of Ellis Island in the New York harbor. The National Trust for Historic Preservation announces its 2012 list of the 11 most endangered historic places. This year?s list includes historic U.S. Post Office buildings nationwide, the historic Atlanta district where Martin Luther King Jr. was born, the boyhood home of Malcolm X in Boston, the hospital complex at Ellis Island in New York Harbor, and the courthouses of Texas, among others. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)
FILE - This Oct. 22, 2007, file photo shows the general hospital, behind some tourists on the south side of Ellis Island in the New York harbor. The National Trust for Historic Preservation announces its 2012 list of the 11 most endangered historic places. This year?s list includes historic U.S. Post Office buildings nationwide, the historic Atlanta district where Martin Luther King Jr. was born, the boyhood home of Malcolm X in Boston, the hospital complex at Ellis Island in New York Harbor, and the courthouses of Texas, among others. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)
FILE - This May 29, 1962 file photo shows a curved ceiling and glass walls of the newly built Trans World Airway's terminal buiding at New York's Idlewild Airport. Today, the historic terminal, which was once on the National Trust for Historic Preservation list of endangered sites has been restored and serves as an entryway to the new JetBlue Terminal. Preservationists are continuing to work with the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey and JetBlue to sensitively reuse the terminal. (AP Photo, File)
FILE - This May 8, 2009, file photo shows Ellis Island's boarded up hospital for contagious disease ward, which opened in 1909 as part of the island's main hospital complex. The National Trust for Historic Preservation has released its annual list of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic places. In the past 25 years, the non-profit organization has listed 234 sites. New York State has made the list 18 times. This section of Ellis Island, where 29 neglected hospital and support buildings are located, has been cited three times, including this year. (AP Photo/Bebeto Matthews, File)
FILE - This undated file photo provided by the National Trust for Historic Preservation shows the World Trade Center Vesey Street staircase in New York. The National Trust for Historic Preservation has released its annual list of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places, which once included the staircase, which is now listed as "saved." Before the 2001 terrorist attacks, the stairs consisted of two granite-clad flights of stairs and an escalator that led from the trade center plaza to Vesey Street. When the towers collapsed, the heavily damaged stairs served as an escape route for hundreds of people. In 2008, the staircase was installed at the below-ground memorial museum being constructed at ground zero. (AP Photo/Robert Kornfeld, Jr. and Richard Zimbler, National Trust, File)
WASHINGTON (AP) ? Hundreds of historic U.S. post offices nationwide face uncertain futures as the U.S. Postal Service downsizes, so preservationists on Wednesday added these American institutions to the list of the country's most endangered historic places.
Post offices will join the list of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places as a group for the first time. The National Trust for Historic Preservation is citing the bureaucratic process for disposing of thousands of post offices, saying developers and community groups interested in rehabilitating the historic buildings end up walking away when they don't get timely or clear answers from the Postal Service.
The group also said New York's Ellis Island hospital complex is threatened, even though it's a popular historic destination, because the facility where thousands of immigrants received medical treatment upon their arrival has been left open to the elements.
Princeton Battlefield, which turned the tide of the American Revolution in New Jersey, also is facing imminent danger from housing development that would change the landscape, preservationists said.
The nation's post offices, though, represent the largest number of sites that could be lost in towns and cities both large and small. Preservationists began getting calls more than a year ago about individual post offices, so they want to work with the Postal Service to help foster a process for adapting and reusing the historic buildings, said Stephanie Meeks, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.
"This isn't about taking on the post office," she said. "Of course we don't quibble with the post office having to do what they have to do to manage their business, but we do want to make sure there's a thoughtful process in place for managing the historic resources."
One developer in Geneva, Ill., walked away from negotiations with the Postal Service after months of work, citing a lack of clear answers from the agency.
Another large group of sites being added to the endangered list includes the courthouses of Texas, with support from former first lady Laura Bush. The state's courthouses were first listed in 1998, but at least 70 of them still need critical repairs. Most are still in use.
Other sites are facing even more imminent threats.
President Theodore Roosevelt's Elkhorn Ranch in North Dakota's Badlands, which inspired his views on conservation, is facing development of a road and bridge project that would "mar" the landscape and "stain Roosevelt's legacy of conservation," the group said.
Three sites from black history also are being added to the list: Joe Frazier's gym in Philadelphia, the boyhood home of Malcolm X in Boston and Atlanta's Sweet Auburn Historic District, where Martin Luther King Jr. was born and later preached.
This is the second time that Sweet Auburn has been among the most endangered sites. It was first listed in 1992 when the area around King's birth home was at risk. Since then, much of the area has been revitalized, but much of the commercial corridor remains vacant and could be wiped out by new development, said Mtamanika Youngblood, president of the neighborhood's Sustainable Neighborhood Development Strategies Inc.
"We fear that if we lose any more ... we will lose the essence of Sweet Auburn," she said, noting that the historic Atlanta Daily World Building and Atlanta Life Insurance Buildings stand vacant, along with the original Southern Christian Leadership Conference Building and others.
In practical terms, the area could also lose its historic district status if its commercial corridor disappears, she said.
"If this place is important enough for people to come halfway around the world to visit ... there should be some civic will," Youngblood said.
Federal and local officials do hope a coming $94 million streetcar project linking the Auburn Avenue district with downtown and the tourist hot spots near Centennial Park will attract businesses to a long-depressed economic area.
Diverse communities are often underrepresented in the preservation of cultural resources. Only 3 percent of the sites listed on the National Register of Historic Places represent diverse communities, Meeks said.
Additional sites being added to this year's list:
? Bridges of Yosemite Valley, Calif. A National Park Service plan would leave three historic Rustic Style bridges in danger of removal.
? Terminal Island at the Port of Los Angeles. This major shipbuilding center where America's tuna-canning industry was born and 3,000 Japanese Americans were held is threatened by long-term vacancy of its historic buildings.
? Village of Zoar, Ohio. This 195-year-old village was founded by religious separatists fleeing Germany but is threatened by the potential removal of a levee that could lead to massive flooding or require demolition of much of the town.
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National trust for Historic Preservation: http://www.preservationnation.org/
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