Free WiFi Coming to McCarren

06/09/2011 | 1 Comment

FreeWiFi

Morgane Opens on Bedford

Yet another restaurant on my old block. This one a faux-histo bistro, not unlike the faux-histo taqueria (Bonita, RIP) that once lived next door. I happened to walk by this evening, and the place looks very nice.

Videology to Open a Screening Room

A screening room with a full bar.

Williamsburg Walks Activities

06/06/2011 | Comment

Williamsburg Walks is coming up this Saturday (and next). WW has just posted the lineup for this year’s programming. The biggest news is that the event now extends all the way to McCarren Park.

Exploring the Abandoned Pfizer Plant

Scouting NY scouts the former Pfizer plant, which straddles East Williamsburg and Bed-Stuy. The pharmaceutical giant was founded in Williamsburg in 1849, and operated there until about a year or two ago when (despite taking $46 million City tax incentives to bring jobs to NYC) the company closed up and left. But not before demolishing the oldest building on the site, their ancestral home.

Brownstoner 3.0

Brownstoner unveiled its snazzy new WordPress design this morning – lots of slick new toys to play with, and a whole new (very WordPress-feeling) design to get used to.

But it is also another sad (for me, at least) milestone in the slow wasting of the Movable Type blog platform. For small blogs like brooklyn11211, MT ceased to be a viable platform option some time ago (I stubbornly held on until last Fall, but most small sites made the jump to WP.org or WP.com ages ago). When “power bloggers” like Brownstoner start making the switch, you know that MT is finished (of course they haven’t quite figured it out yet – Brownstoner is still prominently displayed on MoveableType.com’s “Power Blogger” page).

Edge Selling More Units

The Edge has “sold” more units in the first 5 months of 2011 than any single development sold in all of 2010.

Yes, the Edge has more units to sell than any single development on the market in 2010, but the fact that they are “selling” (signing contracts, really, but that is the PR standard, so let’s go with it) units at a pace of 30+ per month is yet another sign of a relatively strong market in North Brooklyn. Or maybe it just reinforces the old real estate adage – “location, location, location” – something the Edge also has more of than just about any other development on the market.

Domain Name For Sale

06/02/2011 | 1 Comment

In case you haven’t heard, the postal service is splitting off half of the 11211 zip code into a new zip code (11249 – doesn’t exactly roll trippingly off the tongue). This is happening because there are so many new dwelling units west of the BQE that the post office can’t keep to its delivery schedules.

In a sign that the Postal Service is still operating in the (early) 20th century, there isn’t any information about this zip code change on their website – just a letter that appeared in everyone’s mailboxes yesterday. And apparently this doesn’t mean that “West Williamsburg” will get a new post office, just a new zip code. So we can expect the same substandard service with a far less snappy zip code.

So, I guess after 12 years, maybe it’s time to retire brooklyn11211.com (or broker a trade with this guy). No reasonable offer refused.

Size

Barney Frank and Anthony Weiner? That’s an act I’d pay to see.

The Congressman[Weiner] is doing interviews with CNN, MSNBC, and FOX News to discuss the matter.

“I’m doing them in order of….something,” he told reporters.

“Size,” Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) said, interrupting him from nearby.

“That’s what I didn’t need right now,” Weiner replied.