What you saw is going to be the world headquarters of GTech. Yes the building will be ugly and out of place. Next to where the building is being built, in the past few years, the X Games have taken place in the Waterplace Park area. I remember looking out one of the windows from a building in your picture at the top of the page. During the day you would see bungee jumpers going off a structure resembling those involved in the construction of tall buildings. In the years after that Gravity Games came to Providence. During the summer months, a local radio station promotes a Summer Concert Series in the Waterplace Park. Not sure if you walked around Waterplace Park, or noticed things floating in the river. Those floating objects are part of Waterfire. From www.watefire.org: WaterFire, Barnaby Evans’ award winning fire sculpture installation on the three rivers in downtown Providence, has been praised by Rhode Island residents and international visitors alike as a powerful work of art and a moving symbol of Providence’s renaissance.