Zombie Renovations Are ComingLandlords are claiming that work completed decades ago is grounds to take a building out of rent regulation. What’s a tenant supposed to do?
Ikea Buses for All — Even Recovering Heroin Addicts!Stuy Town laundry thieves are being surveilled, Carroll Gardens raccoon cheerleaders speak out, Ikea bus riders forego affordable design for methadone, and much more, in our ‘Ruby Tuesday’ boroughs roundup.
Greenpoint Gets a Thematic Swimming PoolA tourist treat in lower Manhattan, a vomit victim in Prospect Heights, and a paucity of pedagogy in Tribeca … all in our daily boroughs report!
neighborhood watch
Long Island City Gets a BreakdownNaked butts in Prospect Heights, Pope dreams in Mott Haven, and a touching tale of man and squirrel out of Prospect Park. What other fun-size borough bites await in our daily Neighborhood Watch?
A Biggie Biopic Grows in BrooklynA movie in Clinton Hill, a murder in Carroll Gardens, Obama faces popping up all over Brooklyn, and more in our daily roundup of neighborhood news.
neighborhood watch
You Can Still Get That Good Unsafe Feeling in DumboDumbo fights gentrification, a guy in Queens fights the parking authority, and pretty much everyone fights change in our daily roundup of neighborhood news.
neighborhood watch
That Amazing House From ‘Moonstruck’ Is Still Up for Grabs, Only Now It’s Cheaper!Brooklyn Heights: The sale price of the Cranberry Street house where they filmed Moonstruck has dropped from $5 million to $3.95 million since early 2006. That’s still très Cher! [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
Coney Island: Astroland opens Sunday … possibly, for the second year in a row now, for its last season before major Coney development begins. [amNY]
East New York: It’s “the new Harlem,” did you know that? So if you’re bitter you didn’t buy uptown twenty years ago, you’ll want to buy here, where cribs are going for up to $300,000. [NYDN]
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The Army Occupies East 103rd Street; Residents DispleasedEast Harlem: There’s outrage over a new Army recruiting center on East 103rd Street, on the heels of Army promo teams here this summer that included gals in camo midriffs and short shorts. [NY Latino Journal]
Jackson Heights: Starbucks is here! Gentrification officially begins! [Curbed]
Northwest Bronx: So many parks are being repaired here that there’s no place for the massive youth baseball league to play this spring! [Norwood News]
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‘Queen of Delancey Street’ Killed in AccidentDumbo: From the offices of “legendary” Brooklyn Paper editor (and self-encourager) Gersh Kuntzman comes news that he’s auctioning off his ankle cast, signed by (self-encouraging) beep Marty Markowitz, with proceeds going to Markowitz’s Camp Brooklyn. The bid’s up to $41! [eBay]
Jamaica: Sure, Jamaica Center may look a bit rough, but you can still haggle over prices here, and find great real-estate deals posted to trees! [Queens Crap]
Lower East Side: RIP to Josephine LaPlaca, the 83-year-old “Queen of Delancey Street,” who was struck dead by a car Wednesday night at the dangerous intersection of Delancey and Allen. [Gothamist]
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Battle Over Randalls Island Playing Fields Wages OnBedford-Stuyvesant: Here’s an arty do-it-yourself interpretation of the glassy standard bus shelter that’s taking over the city. No surprise this is for the bus that goes to Williamsburg, where all those arty DIY kids live! [Bed-Stuy Banana]
East Harlem: Locals are still waging a legal battle against the city’s plan to take $52 million over twenty years from top private schools like Dalton and Spence in exchange for the schools’ use of most of the Randalls Island athletic fields during peak after-school hours. [Newsday]
Forest Hills: Sure, that mini-mall on Austin Street is pretty hideous-looking, but it still has a Thai restaurant, a Greek restaurant, a creperie, a skater shop, and a comic-book emporium, so let’s stop complaining about its ugliness and count our blessings! [Queens Central]
neighborhood watch
The Bike Shelters Are Closing InBushwick: Recently, a bunch of so-called freegans built a mountain of thrown-out breadstuffs here to protest food waste. Yum. [WildGreenYonder]
Long Island City: The long-anticipated bike racks with sleek shelters have arrived, absolutely essential for … uh … not burning your butt on a sun-soaked banana seat? [Curbed]
Lower East Side: The Streit family wanted $25 mil for their Rivington Street matzo factory (which’ll likely go condo), but it looks like they may get more. That’s a fact we’ll leave unleavened by humor. [Vanishing New York]
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Ditmas Park Manse Finds a Fixer to Up ItDitmas Park: Remember that beautiful, dilapidated mansion on the market for $1.75 mil that New York featured a while back? It just sold for $1.55 mil. Happy fix-up, somebody. [Ditmas Park Blog]
East Village: Gentrification haters have two fun protests tonight — one of the imminent Cooper Square Hotel, another of a local shoot for SATC ripoff Lipstick Jungle. [Vanishing New York]
Greenpoint: Chuck, fuck, but definitely not marry. That’s how Miss Heather feels about the daily papers that rip stories off from her posts (like last week’s one about sneakers hanging from phone lines) without crediting her blog. Girl, you gotta change that scatological blog title … yeah, even for the gutter mouth Post! [Newyorkshitty]
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Children Banned From Hotel Chelsea LobbyChelsea: Children have been banned from the lobby of the Chelsea Hotel, reportedly because a rude kiddie called a maid a bitch. [Living with Legends]
Flushing: Angry residents have stopped the LIRR from cutting down trees along the rail line, which they did to keep wet, slip-slidey leaves off the tracks. [Queens Chronicle via Queens Crap]
Greenpoint: It’s getting ugly between outspoken hood blogger Miss Heather and commenters who appear to be linked to 110 Green Street, the noisy condo-in-progress that Miss H. and other locals hate. [Newyorkshitty]
Gowanus: Brooklyn parrots have landed in Thomas Greene Park — and they’re so cute! (Though the linked photo, while of a Brooklyn parrot, wasn’t taken in Gowanus. Aw.) [Gowanus Lounge]
Prospect Heights: Locals cleaned up the hood this weekend while socking it to Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner. [Atlantic Yards Report]
Times Square: Thankfully, there’s plenty of places on Seventh Avenue where you can buy computers, cameras, luggage and … galerie? What’s galerie? [East Village Idiot]
Upper West Side: The line outside the Delacorte for tickets to tonight’s free 40th-anniversary staging of Hair is out of control! [Newyorkology]
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Social Unrest on G PlatformGreenpoint: Long waits for the G train are breeding angry calls for socialized medicine. Plus, who impaled these poor tomatoes? [Newyorkshitty]
Downtown Brooklyn: A bunch of Morgan Stanley employees were caught on camera cornholing in Cadman Plaza Park yesterday. [McBrooklyn]
Dumbo: Yep, Dave Walentas — and a few other big local developers — went down in the dunk tank last night at a fund-raiser to preserve the hood’s brick streets. [Brownstoner]
Harlem: Columbia has bought a site to build new homes for people its expansion will displace, but the folks in question weren’t consulted beforehand. [Columbia Spectator]
Prospect Heights: The hood may get landmark status, which some locals hope will protect against the ripple effects of the massive ongoing Atlantic Yards development. [Atlantic Yards Report]
Washington Heights: Police broke up a coke ring run out of a deli. God, imagine snorting blow with a slice of rolled-up salami… [NYS]
Williamsburg: The city wants to kick out La Marqueta’s food vendors to make room for affordable housing, but locals doubt they’ll benefit from the new units. [amNY]
Trying to Get to Know Your East Village Neighbors? Don’t.Carroll Gardens: Fussy organic types will be delighted to hear that a McDonald’s may be coming to Court Street. Meanwhile, the Blessed Mother visited controversial development site 360 Smith Street. [Curbed and Gowanus Lounge]
Greenpoint: They don’t appreciate being serenaded beneath their windows with a guitar at 1 a.m. around here. Funny, that. [11222]
East Village: It’s sweet when people move here from Virginia and invite their neighbors in for cookies. They’ll learn. [East Village Idiot]
Harlem: Less-than-accurate tour-bus guides are dissing the hood right into their megaphones … even while they plug the H&M there. [NYP]
Prospect Heights: Who is scamming area yard-salers by asking them to break his fake $20 bills? And just when this nabe was getting hot. Tsk, tsk. [DailyHeights]
Roosevelt Island: The winged progeny of Central Park West celebuhawk Pale Male may be roosting here. Talk about generational downward mobility. [Roosevelt Islander]
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Buttoned-Up Gowanus? Now That’s a Theoretical Rendering.Bushwick: Hoo-boy. We’re worried that this very outspoken gentrifying gay blogger — “The Ghetto Gauntlet”? “Shitbag bodegas”? — is cruising for a serious, Bushwick-style bruising. [Bushwick]
Gowanus: Only more shocking than this rendering of a massive glass tower planned for Third Avenue and 6th Street is its imagining that, in the near future, people in this skanky/hip hood will be wearing suits and ties. [Gowanus Lounge]
Harlem: A very angry-sounding Katrina two-year-anniversary rally is planned for 125th Street this afternoon. [Uptown Flavor]
Meatpacking District: How could we have missed that the spike-heeled Carrie Bradtrons who’ve overrun the meatpacking district have their very own blogger? (And we love that she thinks area designer Thom Browne might be straight. Come on, girl. The guy wears short shorts.) [Stilettos on Cobblestones]
Prospect Heights: In a nice match, newcomers here sound about as unpretentiously boring and nondescript as the neighborhood itself. [Daily Heights]
Tribeca: Area landlords are saving on exterminator dollars by recommending that their tenants let loose “Gecos” [sic] on insect invaders. As in the salamander-type creature that’s the car-insurance mascot. Yes, it’s come to that. [Curbed]
Willets Point: Did the city encourage blight in the decrepit Iron Triangle area of the Bronx in order to evoke eminent domain and gentrify it? One columnist thinks so. [NYO via OuterB]
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It’s Grass, Not Garbage, That Attracts Rats in ChelseaBrooklyn Heights: If only the kids around here could reference MC Hammer correctly. [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
Bushwick: Gentrification is forcing frustrated superintendents to gussy up their own threatening signs. [Newyorkshitty]
Chelsea: Blame the rat infestation in the park on Ninth Avenue on the plant liriope. It provides excellent cover for burrows. [Blog Chelsea]
Cobble Hill: The home of the Independence Community Foundation is gone; look for six-story apartment building at 182 Atlantic, instead. [McBrooklyn]
Coney Island: Want to work at a karaoke bar? One here is hiring. [Kinetic Carnival]
Dumbo: Folks are moving into the J Condo and paying $300 to $350 a month for parking spaces. [DumboNYC]
Park Slope: The Fifth Avenue dog run has too many overexcited dogs. [Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn]
Prospect Heights: The Buildings Department blamed water damage and Forest City Ratner for the Ward Baking Co. collapse. [NYDN]
West Bronx: Neighbors proved a point to gangs and drug dealers at last night’s “National Night Out.” [West Bronx News]
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Hookers Don’t Bow to Brooklyn GentrificationBoerum Hill: OMG, there are still hookers here? It seems so, but new euphemisms from the yups include “sex care workers.” We love that. [Gowanus Lounge]
Chelsea: A bank may occupy one of the first-floor biz units of the Chelsea Hotel, under new corporate management. What’s next? The eviction of the age-old Dan’s Chelsea Guitars store? [Living with Legends]
Coney Island: Will the kiddie rides in Wonder Wheel Park be next to go? [Gowanus Lounge]
Cypress Hills: The criminals-posing-as-cops vogue spread to this sketchy Brooklyn hood, where five thugs faking an NYPD drug bust tied up folks and picked their apartment clean. [Gothamist]
East Village: Even in a holiday week with barely any passengers, the L train will still screw you. [East Village Idiot]
Greenpoint: Word drifts back our way that an area bookseller was hurt that we tittered over her announcing an “adults only” Harry Potter party. Didn’t she kind of set herself up for that? [Newyorkshitty]
Prospect Heights: Residents are still waiting for that Atlantic Yards ombudsman who was promised to the community two months ago. [Atlantic Yards Report]
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Splasher Sighting at Dumbo Gallery?Carroll Gardens: With little legal recourse at this point, desperate locals are circulating this petition demanding that out-of-scale development stop at once. [Gowanus Lounge]
Dumbo: Was the duo trying to set off a stink bomb at an art opening last night actually the Splasher, or is that too obvious? [Gothamist]
Financial District: Has a little Greek church been bribed into not squawking that the forthcoming Chase tower’s cantilevered middle will block all its light? [Curbed]
Harlem: So it looks like Trump won’t be building at 110th and Central Park West after all … “for now,” that is. [NYO]
Prospect Heights: A man slept this week in the window of a Dean Street art gallery to make a statement about the controversial Atlantic Yards project soon to happen across the street. [Brooklyn Paper]
West Village: As though its chattering, chain-smoking 12-steppers don’t make enough ruckus out on the sidewalk, the gay community center on West 13th will enjoy a $50-million expansion. [365gay via Kenneth in the 212]
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Scary Alpha Girls Terrorize Prospect HeightsBayside: No one’s angered residents of this pricey enclave more than violation-collecting developer Tommy Huang. [Queens Chronicle via Queens Crap]
Brooklyn: It’s the third annual Tour de Brooklyn on Sunday; register to bike through Park Slope, Sunset Park, Bay Ridge, Dyker Heights, and Kensington. [Streetsblog]
Chelsea: What’s more disturbing about this poster ad of hot torsos — its antigay graffiti or that the torsos lack navels? [Towleroad]
Dumbo: Beware of attack dogs, poison, and deflated balloons if you’re thinking of living in the new luxury Bridgeview Towers. [McBrooklyn]
East Village: Will Cabrini Stuyvesant Polyclinic become an eatery, a dormitory, or a condo? Only developer Herbert Hirsch knows … and he ain’t sayin’. [Villager via Curbed]
Greenpoint: How can you protest this grocer’s $1.75 ATM fee when you get to watch a Bruce Lee clip while you wait for your money? [Newyorkshitty]
Prospect Heights: Set It Off meets the Bratz gang in this chilling tale of local marauding female tweens. [The Brooklyn Paper]
Rego Park: A developer says his new $550 million residential-retail complex will be an “architectural landmark.” How scared should we be? [Queens Times Ledger via OuterB]
Williamsburg: Preservation-minded hipsters (and the bands they listen to) will rally Sunday to save the Domino Sugar factory. [Waterfront Preservation Alliance via Newyorkshitty]
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Secret Art Pops Up in DumboBrooklyn Heights: The elevators at the Clark Street subway stop have broken down 400 times over the past two years, trapping riders inside more than twenty times. [NYS]
Clinton Hill: There’s a vacant lot for sale on Greene and Grand. Please don’t do something awful with it. [Clinton Hill Blog
Downtown Brooklyn: Dumbo realty mogul David Walentas’s new condos at the old McKim, Meade & White–designed 110 Livingston are 85 percent sold. [Brownstoner]
Dumbo: French artist Space Invader has managed to slip at least two of his mosaics on the Brooklyn Bridge and elsewhere. [Dumbo NYC]
Lower East Side: What you missed at the East Side Bike Polo invitational over the weekend. [Razor Apple]
Nolita: For a little while longer at 11 Spring Street, you can still see the art on the interior walls. [Just Another White Guy via Curbed]
Prospect Heights: According to this breakdown, parts of the Atlantic Yards project will not be fully built until today’s newborns are already in college. [Atlantic Yards Report]
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When Demolished Buildings AttackDumbo: Neighborhood maps distributed by Two Trees Management show 77 retail outlets, up from a paltry 23 in 2002. [Brooklyn Eagle via Dumbo NYC]
Long Island City: The New York Blood Center’s got swank new digs here, but at least one local would prefer a real hospital. [Queens Chronicle]
Park Slope: The Department of Transportation is considering a new traffic safety plan for 9th Street, but residents and cyclists are clashing over it. [Streetsblog]
Prospect Heights: After the Atlantic Yards demolition caused debris to rain down on Pacific Street, local politicians want construction to halt. [The Brooklyn Paper]
Tribeca: Miffed residents want to know why plans for a massive sanitation garage were moved from the West Thirties to their area, within a stone’s throw of new luxury housing. [The Villager]
West Village: Folks are massing against megadeveloper Related’s bid to turn sleepy Pier 40 into an entertainment complex they jeeringly call “Vegas on the Hudson.” [NYS]
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Natives Frighten Yuppies in Carroll GardensBedford Stuyvesant: CW11 hired graffiti artists to paint billboards for Everybody Hates Chris. They didn’t hire the other graffiti artists to bomb the ads. [Razor Apple]
Carroll Gardens: Old Brooklyn and new Brooklyn walk into a bar. New Brooklyn gets scared and leaves. Back to the Zombie Hut. [Brooklyn Record]
Clinton Hill: So it looks like a greenhouse, but it’s made of metal tubing. What is this place on Emerson for? [ClintonHillBlog]
Flatbush: Depressed that that blast of spring is fading away? Take heart … the cherry trees are starting to blossom in Brooklyn Botanic Garden. [Gothamist]
Harlem: Yet another New York Sports Club may come to the area, this time at 115th and Fifth. [Uptown Flavor]
Kingsbridge: In a few weeks, the city will have racked up $1.5 mil in fines for putting off the building of that dang filtration plant in Van Cortlandt Park. Ouch. [NYP via West Bronx Blog]
Prospect Heights: Old parapets are falling on the demo sites that will be the Atlantic Yards complex. [Curbed]
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Robert Moses’s BQE Dream HouseBrooklyn Heights: It was bound to come to this: Bar bocce is now cutthroat and competitive. [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
Central Park: The Claremont Riding Academy is closing because of a lack of business. The stable has been on the west side of the park since 1892. [NYP]
Cobble Hill: Part of Mayor Bloomberg’s long-term plan for the city calls for covering nine blocks of the BQE to create additional space for housing. [NYP]
Dumbo: Artist Jane Walentas, wife of theatrically lampooned area megadeveloper David, wants to put her restored carousel in the new Brooklyn Bridge Park. [NY1 via DumboNYC]
Fresh Meadows: Queens councilmember Tony Avella was among 75 who massed Saturday to protest a new building that violates just about every code in the book. [Queens Crap]
Greenpoint: The line of demarcation between Greenpoint and Williamsburg is formed from waste. [Newyorkshitty]
Harlem: South Harlem will get its first veterinary clinic this summer on 112th and Frederick Douglass. [Harlem Fur]
Prospect Heights: Demolition began at the Atlantic Yards site today, and so did the protests. [The Brooklyn Paper]
neighborhood watch
Hipsters on a RampageChinatown: In a fit of ironic violence or violent irony, a hipster mob (including, reportedly, Neckface) trashed an empty building slated for demolition. [
neighborhood watch
Downtown Graffiti Goes CommercialChelsea: Maritime partiers, take note: The Frying Pan, that “legendary party vessel,” has moved from Pier 63 a few blocks north to 66. [Curbed]
Downtown Brooklyn: City Council is in no rush to hold hearings about the future of the Duffield Street homes that may have been Underground Railroad stops. [The Daily Gotham via Gowanus Lounge]
Dumbo: Local megadeveloper Thomas Arden is the subject of a new adaption of the 1739 play Arden of Feversham, now titled The Lamentable Tragedie of a Dumbo Real Estate Mogul. [The Real Deal]
Greenpoint: Vice’s online video channel will run a new exposé on the toxic sludge that lies beneath the ground here and in Williamsburg. [VBS.tv via A Brooklyn Life]
Nolita: Seven graffiti artists are painting a fake subway car on Houston and Lafayette as guests of Adidas, much to anti-graffiti councilman Peter Vallone Jr.’s dismay. [Razor Apple and Newsday]
Soho: Has the city’s plan for a bike lane on Houston Street been quietly abandoned? [On NY Turf]
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Giant Chain Store Priced Out of East VillageClinton Hill: Somebody lose a cat around Green and Washington? [Clinton Hill Blog]
College Point: The area will be the site of a new, 30-acre state-of-the-art police academy that will replace the cramped, LBJ-era facility in Manhattan’s Gramercy district. [NYS]
Dumbo: Bunnies get a bridge view at tomorrow’s Brooklyn Bridge Park Spring Fling Egg Hunt. Hop to it! Just don’t mention Easter. [DumboNYC]
East Village: The Barnes & Noble at Astor Place will close at the end of the year, making Manhattan too expensive even for giant chain stores. [NYP]
Norwood: Jenny from the block … across town? J.Lo went home to the Bronx this week — just not the side of the borough she’s actually from. [Norwood News]
Prospect Heights: The Atlantic Yards brouhaha has lent new oomph to the push to get the area, chock-full of Romanesque Revival architecture, landmarked. [Gothamist]
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Greenpoint DIY Just Got EasierAstoria: Some days, it just smells like crap around here. [Astorians]
Clinton Hill: Forgot your Seder supplies? Catholic St. Joseph’s College is offering $1 Seders-in-a-box, with the necessary prayers and ritual items. Also good for Holy Thursday celebrations. Coming soon: kosher communion wafers. [Clinton Hill Blog]
Coney Island: No matter how nice the design, Thor’s proposed 40-story towers will look ridiculous on Coney Island. [Gowanus Lounge]
Dumbo: It’s up to you to decide what will happen to the Pearl Street Triangle. Or you can at least take a survey about it. [Dumbo Improvement District via Dumbo NYC]
Greenpoint: It’ll be easier than ever to make your own merch with the new Staples on Morgan and Meeker. [Racked]
Prospect Heights: There are naked men jogging or roller-skating through the hood, apparently. Very seventies. [Daily Heights]
Washington Heights: Drug agents bust an apartment cultivating 700 marijuana plants with stolen electricity. [WNBC via Gothamist]
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How Bad Is Your Post Office?
Brooklyn Heights: Did Tim Robbins move in? There was a spotting on Henry Street. [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
Harlem: If your kids don’t say “I Want!” to you enough, take them to the new toy store on 120th and Lex. [Harlem Fur]
Kensington: After a YouTube clip of a Harvey Fierstein–voiced crazy going, well, postal at the notoriously dysfunctional P.O., some other dissatisfied customers chimed in. [Gowanus Lounge]
Lower Manhattan: In a process akin to finally removing a tumor eating at New York City’s soul, demolition of the 9/11-contaminated Deutsche Bank building finally begins. [Downtown Express]
Prospect Heights: A dozen residents could lose their apartments to make way for one family’s need for a five-bedroom house. [The Brooklyn Paper]
Williamsburg: (Well, the Williamsburg Bridge, that is.) Fresh off this gushing Village Voice profile, street artist Deuce 7 drops a new stunner. [Razor Apple]
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Will Gramercy Succumb to High-Rise Condos?Clinton Hill: Cops will respond to the recent spate of thefts and break-ins around here, but only if you actually report them. [Clinton Hill Blog]
Gramercy Park: How long will it take for the abandoned buildings at 23rd Street and Second Avenue to go high-rise condo? [This Is What We Do Now]
Prospect Heights: Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project starts to become real as demos proceed within the project’s footprint — save those lots whose owners have filed suit, that is. [Atlantic Yards Report]
West Village: From top loin to Thom Browne? Yep, it looks like Barneys might be opening a new store in the meatpacking district’s former home of Western Beef. [Curbed]
Williamsburg: Government environmental honchos want City Councilman Tony Avella to know that everything is all right with that oil oozing out of the ground at North 11th and Roebling. How reassuring. [Gowanus Lounge]
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Prospect Heights Does More Than Just Hate Bruce RatnerEast Village: Beloved St. Brigid’s Church has been spared the Catholic archdiocese’s wrecking ball yet again — at least for a few more months. [The Villager]
Fort Greene: The landlord at 20 Grand Avenue is trying to evict its creative-type tenants from the 60,000-square-foot, commercially zoned warehouse. [Brownstoner]
Harlem: What’s that weird plant hanging from the wall at the cute new florist shop on 123rd and Freddie Douglass? It’s a staghorn fern, duh. [Harlem Fur]
Prospect Heights: Opponents of the Atlantic Yards project flew into action last week … to help find an activist’s black Lab, Lady Day, after she was dognapped. Is Ratner involved? [Brooklyn Paper]
Upper West Side: If this condo tower gets built above West-Park Presbyterian Church, the poor folk inhabiting subsidized units will have to use a different entryway — and stay out of the gym. [NYS]
Willets Point: The “Iron Triangle” of car-related businesses near Shea Stadium is up for redevelopment — but with no sewers in the area, what toxic goop lies beneath? [Curbed]
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The Partial Return of City Hall ParkBorough Park: Due largely to its prolific Orthodox Jewish community, this hood holds the city’s record for most babies, pumping out an average of thirteen daily! [Fort Greene Courier via Brooklyn Record]
Brooklyn Heights: Some beautiful old sgraffito façade work at 177-179 Columbia Heights will likely go unrestored due to prohibitive costs. Quel dommage. [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
City Hall: After years of public pleading, City Hall Park will partially reopen in July. [Tribeca Trib via Curbed]
East Village: Guess what’s arrived at that longtime mystery lot bounded by Second, Third, 13th, and 14th? Drumroll, please: It’s …a bank ad! Wow. [Curbed]
Harlem: Would Langston Hughes have hung out at Starbucks? A new book finds that the uptown scene may be most compromised by the city’s increasing “suburbanization.” [City Limits via Uptown Flavor]
Prospect Heights: A petition is circulating to spare the lovely 1911 Ward’s Bakery building from Atlantic Yards–related demolition. [Gowanus Lounge]
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You, With the Pet Raccoon! Time for Your Rabies Shot
Chelsea: When you buy into “the most coveted new address” in “New York City’s most desired neighborhood,” hot babes in fishnets await you on your couch. [Curbed]
East Harlem: Were you one of the two white thirtysomethings wearing scrubs who brought that injured raccoon to the 110th Street animal shelter Tuesday? Well, you better call the Health Department, because that little mofo was rabid! [Flatbush Gardener]
East Village: Complaints from upstairs neighbors have led to a ban on live music at Avenue B punk dive Manitoba’s, owned by Handsome Dick Manitoba of the Dictators [Brooklyn Vegan]
Prospect Heights: Those long-sought financials for the Atlantic Yards project are finally out. Now just try to understand them. [Brownstoner]
Sunnyside Gardens: Residents want to turn the pretty area into a landmarked historic district, but their state senator opposes the idea. [Queens Crap via Queens Gazette]*
Sunset Park: A high-rise threatens to obscure the view of Lady Liberty from one of the highest points in Brooklyn … and residents are fuming about it. [NY1 via Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn]
*Correction: An earlier version of this story suggested that Sunnyside Garden residents opposed the area’s historic designation while their state senator supported it. Also, the original item was found in the Queens Gazette, not the Queens Courier.
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There’s Nothing Temporary About Twenty YearsBrooklyn Heights: At St. Francis College last night, they were hootin’ down plans to finance Brooklyn Bridge Park with luxury condos, restaurants, and office space on the 70-acre site. [MetroNY]
Harlem: You and poochie can make new friends this Saturday when you help move a big pile of wood chips at the soon-to-be-rehabbed St. Nicholas Park dog run. [Friends of St. Nicholas Park Blog via Harlem Fur]
Lower Manhattan: Plans for Santiago Calatrava’s much-hyped tower of “stackable” condo cubes for 80 South Street are reportedly “still alive.” [City Realty via Curbed]
Midtown East: For whatever reason, the Rite Aid in Grand Central is selling cereal for $1.79 a box. Even the kind that usually costs $6. Run, before the Cap’n Crunch is gone!. [This is What We Do Now]
Prospect Heights: Those “temporary” parking lots planned for Atlantic Yards already aren’t very popular. Could they actually last up to twenty years? [Brooklyn Speaks]
Soho: In a refreshing change of paint, uh, pace, the latest street-art defacing comes not from the hardworking Splasher, but from … Katsu! [Gothamist via Razor Apple]
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Forest City Ratner Wants to Hear Your ComplaintsClinton Hill: Whoever thought that a bar-hopping query would be so charged with race and class drama? [Brooklynian]
Clinton: Thanks to Renzo Piano’s eco-swank Times tower, the legendarily scuzzy Port Authority district is now safe for top-line businesses. [Gothamist]
Gowanus: Park Slopesters want the Whole Foods megastore coming to 3rd Street and Third Avenue to swap its planned rooftop parking deck for solar panels. [Gowanus Lounge]
Harlem: A new luxury condo from architects Feder & Stia will soon cantilever boldly over the 116th Street mosque where Malcolm X once held court. [City Realty via Curbed]
Nolita: Sure, the billboard on Houston and Lafayette is for a clothing line, but what if “Come as you are” was the new neighborhood tagline? [Copyranter]
Prospect Heights: Come vent! Forest City Ratner, developer of Atlantic Yards, has opened a “community liaison” office. [Brooklyn Speaks via No Land Grab]
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Chickens Further Brooklyn Gentrification
Battery Park: This funky glass carousel thingy could serve as a spot that links park visitors to the Coney Island aquarium via a ferry. [Kinetic Carnival]
Clinton Hill: Why go to a food co-op or the farmers’ market when you can raise chickens right behind your own brownstone? [Brownstoner]
East Village: A first peek inside (and through the windows of) the Bowery Hotel, where rooms start (for now) at $245. [Hotel Chatter via Curbed]
Gowanus: Oh, boy! It’s the four-part lecture on the history of the canal we’ve all been waiting for. [Brooklyn Record]
Morningside Heights: Columbia students use clever street art to strike back at their school’s real-estate takeover of the area. [Gothamist]
Prospect Heights: Have you met Sydney, Hudson, Jenny BiBabe, and Dakota on MySpace? They’re the new condos that want to be friends with you. [Gowanus Lounge]
neighborhood watch
Public Art Stops Traffic in Red Hook (For Half a Day)Fort Greene: Happy birthday, Tillie’s! The pioneering boho café on DeKalb is marking its tenth anniversary with a month of events showcasing Brooklyn-based music, arts, and writing. [Clinton Hill Blog]
Harlem: Rumors are flying that the (refreshingly contextual) Gateway II condo project at 114th and Frederick Douglass may unravel, leaving early buyers in the lurch. [Wired New York via Curbed]
Jamaica: The city’s proposal to build up the Hillside Avenue commercial strip is causing a stir among local pols and residents. [Times Ledger via Queens Crap]
Long Island City: If you come, they will build it: a better bike route over the 59th Street Bridge. The MTA wants your input on improved cycling in (and out) of Queens. [Astorians]
Prospect Heights: When the Atlantic Yards–themed “Footprints” exhibition opens February 13 at the Brooklyn Public Library, one work — depicting Ratner’s project as a giant looming toilet bowl — will not be on display. Censorship? [Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn via Brooklyn Record]
Red Hook: At the dangerous intersection of Van Brunt and Dikeman en route to the Fairway, a mysterious “traffic-stopper” sculpture was removed last weekend almost as soon as it appeared. [Brooklyn Paper]
neighborhood watch
Last Call at NorthsixClinton Hill: Lots of abandoned homes up for sale—for first-time homebuyers, that is, not folks looking to trade their tiny co-op for a spacious fixer-upper. [Clinton Hill Blog]
Coney Island: Developing Coney Island isn’t “financially feasible” without high-rise housing on Stillwell Avenue, says Thor Equities. [Kinetic Carnival]
Harlem: That empty lot at 1405 Fifth Avenue will soon be low- and middle-income housing. [What About the Plastic Animals?]
Prospect Heights: Turns out there are still five privately owned acres smack in the path of Atlantic Yards. [Develop Don’t Destroy Brooklyn]
Prospect Lefferts Gardens: Would expanding the historic district help prevent new development eyesores? [Across the Park]
West Village: Which fashion label will grace the N.J. Turnpike–size billboard being affixed to the Gansevoort Hotel? [Curbed]
Williamsburg: Catch the last show at Northsix before the space closes to magically transform into the Music Hall of Williamsburg. [FREEwilliamsburg]
