Author: linked

Brownstoner has pictures of actual progress on the playground construction at East River State Park (which I mentioned a while back).

David Yassky’s exit interview on the Greenpoint/Williamsburg waterfront rezoning.

One lesson of that is: whatever neighborhood improvements are supposed to go with a big development plan should be done up front–should be done before it’s passed. The commitment should be made enforceable in some way. And if not, then don’t bank on it.

Words to live by.

Voice food critic Bob Sietsema has his list of the 10 best restaurants in Williamsburg, which include:

10. Baci & Abbracci
9. Qoo Robata Bar
8. Fette Sau
7. Egg
6. DuMont Burger
5. Marlow & Sons
4. Motorino
3. Frost
2. Oasis
1. Peter Luger

He also has a long list of runners up: newcomer Döner; La Superior; El Almacen; Saltie (another newcomer); Fanny; Dressler; Cono & Sons; DuMont; Diner; Gottlieb Restaurant; Bamonte’s; Radegast Beer Hall; Raymond’s Place; Taco Santana; Juliette.

A good list overall, but plenty to quibble with. Missing entirely are Aurora (which is far and away the best new Italian restaurant in the neighborhood), Zenkichi and Bozu (all of which were flagged by readers). On the other hand, the inclusion of Oasis and Frost is right on (though I might have switched Bamonte’s and Frost, just for the atmosphere of the former).

The Hunt winds up at 125 North 10th Street.

Never let it be said that the Brooklyn Paper lets facts get in the way of a good headline.

As you may have heard, three people were arrested at an apartment on North 7th Street for possession of 28 kilos of cocaine (presumably not for personal consumption). For the media, this of course becomes an opportunity to use the word “hipster” in a sentence, even if the suspects are all in their forties and early fifties and include the super of the building where the drugs were found – not exactly the hipster demographic. (And yes, this is the “former site of the Laila Lounge”, but isn’t it also the current site of DBA’s Williamsburg outpost??)

The Brooklyn Paper does get a quote from one of the suspect’s lawyers, who claims that her client, Christine Ladeveze, 48, “had absolutely nothing to do with those charges” and was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. What the lawyer probably meant was that Ladeveze was dating the wrong guy – building super Johanny Olmedo, 51 – at the wrong time (the wrong time in this case being “for months”).

More from the Daily News here, sans irony.

….Rep. Louie Gohmert of Texas suggested yesterday that Democrats may actually want another terrorist attack because rebuilding [NYC] would create jobs.
‘You’ve got subways, tunnels, bridges all subject to terrorism. And unless they’re trying to create a new jobs bill by allowing terrorism back in New York then this is insane. And even that would be insane.’

As Benen says, “the guy has ‘future member of the House Republican leadership’ written all over him”.

John Gruber (of Daring Fireball fame) has started a new log to track who is (and isn’t) afraid of terrorists.

(You can add David Paterson to the wrong-side-of-history list.)

And still 100% ugly. Just goes to show that location is still a fundamental.

Because new condos are so scarce in Williamsburg?

In some cases, scarcity, or even the perception of scarcity, can spark bidding wars. At the Rialto, a new 31-unit condo in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, sales started 14 months ago. The building had its first bidding war in August, when there were only seven units left; two more bidding wars followed in October.

Good. When he’s convicted, maybe we can make a nice little prison for him overlooking ground zero.