Developer Blight

Gowanus Lounge (again) has a very good post about the plight of the neighborhood in the face of abandoned or under-financed development sites. As Robert says, this developer blight has the potential to make “the neighborhood unsafe, unfriendly and [ugly]”.

Developer blight is not just abandoned construction sites – it also covers new developments that ignore the basics of maintenance. A few days after one of the recent snowstorms, I noticed that a lot of the unshoveled sidewalks were in front of new – and occupied – developments (of course some of those have proven to be chronic problems). This is on top of all the vacant sites that don’t bother to shovel their walks either (I’m looking at you, Domino).

And its only going to get worse – particularly if all these new condos are underfunding their maintenance reserves.