Month: December 2009

War of the Roses

Apparently things got pretty heated at the Borough President’s hearing for Rose Plaza.

Marty, to his credit, pushed the applicant to go beyond the bare minimum of 20% affordable housing. Their response was:

‘There is no other waterfront project developed on private land that is required to provide more than 20 percent affordable housing,’ said [Rose attorney Howard] Weiss.

Fair point (though I think Schaeffer Landing would meet Weiss’s test). But on the other hand, the community has consistently advocated for more than 20%. Twice as much as 20%, in fact.

McCarren Pool Groundbreaking

12/08/2009 | Comment

mccarren_shovel.JPG
l to r: Assembly Member Joe Lentol; Marty Markowitz; Mike Bloomberg; Brooklyn Parks Commissioner Jules Spiegel; NYC Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe; David Yassky; and OSA’s Stephanie Thayer.
Photo: BP Markowitz’s office

Progress at McCarren yesterday – Mayor Bloomberg and others “broke ground” on the renovation of the McCarren Park Pool (work has been underway for a while, but it’s nice to recognize that).



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Rezoning of Broadway Triangle Advances

By a 12-6 vote, the Council’s Land Use Committee approves the Broadway Triangle. The Council’s vote modifies the plan (by adding about 10,000 square feet of new open space), so the whole thing goes back to City Planning for a new sign off, and then returns to the full Council for a final vote. The additional open space was one of the modifications requested by CB1. The other important modification – funding for industrial relocation – was not acted on.

Rose Developer is “Bankrupt”

12/07/2009 | Comment

I use quotes in the headline here because contrary to the Brooklyn Paper’s headline, it’s not Isack Rosenberg himself who is bankrupt, but rather one of his other development projects.

Rosenberg is trying to raise money by seekign a city rezoning of his lumber yard site from manufacturing to residential — a move that would vastly increase the property’s value.

True enough. But the rezoning isn’t going help Rosenberg meet his December 21 bank deadline to settle a $45 million debt on the Warehouse 11 project (aka the Roebling Oil Field).

A few points with regard to how this impacts the Rose Plaza development:

1) For the most part, it doesn’t. Rose Plaza is a separate project, which may or not get built by this developer. Whatever rezoning passes will run with the property (and increase the value of the property). Whatever special permits are approved will also run with the property, but a new owner could decide not to use them and do an “as-of-right” project.

2) One important way that it does effect the project is that a new owner (or even the current owner) could decide to opt for a different architect or landscape architect, ditching the nice designs that are being presented now in favor of something of lesser quality (this, perhaps?). Such bait-and-switches are not unheard of – Douglaston Development did it at the Edge, dropping Enrique Norten in favor of Stephen Jacobs. That is why the CB1 resolution rejecting the proposal made such a big deal about giving the board a role in future design changes.



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11211 Tech Note

12/07/2009 | Comment

I’ve recently upgraded the blogging software that keeps this running, and it has not been without hitches. One of those, I have been informed, is that the site looks worse than ever on Internet Explorer. Since I a) don’t use Windows very often and b) use IE even less often, I hadn’t noticed. But I checked and it’s true.

Everything seems to be OK with Firefox, Safari or Chrome on Windows XP, and it’s possible that IE8 behaves properly, but IE7 (and I assume earlier versions) are definitely not OK. If the content you are viewing is half a page down and you are not seeing a little icon for the NAG party on the right of the screen, something is wrong with your browser. Switch to Firefox (or any other modern standards-compliant browser – it works fine in ) and things should be better.

But I will try to fix it.



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20 Bayard Files for Bankruptcy

In a move that stunned real estate executives and residents of the building, the sponsors of 20 Bayard Street in Williamsburg filed the condominium into Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection late [Friday] afternoon… According to documents filed in U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Brooklyn, the condo by North Development Group owed more than $10 million to more than 50 creditors.

The building is roughly half sold, with the remaining units rented out by the developer.

And I still think the reason the building hasn’t sold is because no one can figure out how to get into it.