Marc Farre and others have posted a very nice and quite lengthy obituary for Bob Guskind on Gowanus Lounge. A proper obituary, as he deserves.

I am still at a loss for words to think that Bob is no longer with us. He was a tremendous writer, both in terms of quantity and quality. His writing and journalistic abilities were outshone only by his passion for his subject – which for the past few years was almost exclusively Brooklyn. From Coney Island to Greenpoint, Bob was a tireless defender of what he saw as good about the borough, and an even more tireless assailant of all that he thought was evil in our midst. I didn’t always agree with him (though I agreed more often than not), but I always admired his work, his skills and his passion.

I will miss his voice, and I will miss him.

Photo: Miss Heather

I just read about the death of Bob Guskind. Like most people, I am at a loss for words. Bob was a passionate, tireless, dedicated reporter on Brooklyn and everything that has been happening to it.

I will miss him.

More (and more eloquent) tributes can be found at the following (the list is evolving):

Dedicated To A Good Friend [NYShitty]
Gowanus Lounge, You Had Brooklyn’s Back [A very thoughtfully written remembrance by Louise at OTBKB – highly recommended]
Robert Guskind, Founder of Gowanus Lounge, Dies [Brownstoner]
Robert Guskind 1958 – 2009: Founder of Gowanus Lounge Dies [OTBKB]
Robert Guskind: A Walk Around The Blog with Gowanus Lounge [also OTBKB]
Bob Guskind: I Am Not A Fan of the Looming Manhattanization of Brooklyn [yes, OTBKB again]
Bob Guskind, Gowanus Lounge Blogger, Dies [Gothamist]
Robert Guskind [Curbed]
Robert Guskind, R.I.P. [Curbed’s official remembrance]
Death of a Blogger – Robert Guskind, R.I.P. [Brooklyn Paper – as noted in the comments here, the original version of this article was a journalistic disgrace. BP has now cleaned up the article so that it is sourced and so that it is news.]
Bob Guskind, RIP [The Albany Project]
R.I.P. Bob Guskind [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
In Memoriam: Bob Guskind [No Land Grab]
RIP: Bob Guskind [Dope on the Slope]
Silent Post For Big RG [FiPS, with whom Bob had his share of run ins]
Robert Guskind, Founder of Gowanus Lounge, 1958-2009 [Flatbush Gardener]
RIP Bob Guskind [NAG]
Sad on a Thursday [Bad Advice]
Famed B’klyn Blogger Robert Guskind, 50, Dies [Brooklyn Eagle – a nicely reported piece]
Bob Guskind – An Appreciation [Brooklyn Paper – Gersh’s appreciation of Bob, nicely done]

Note: Gowanus Lounge is offline entirely, but for the moment at least you can see Bob’s last postings via Google cache (unformatted, since the CSS is offline), and you can still see the old Blogger version of Gowanus Lounge. If you don’t know Bob’s work, you can get a good sense of why he’ll be missed here.

In addition to being a prolific (and very good) writer, Bob was also a prolific (and very good) photographer, which you can see at his Flickr stream.

That red tape seems to have been worked out. Friends of East River State Park announced this morning that they have finally succeeded in getting the waterfront park reopened a month early. The State will continue to save its $444.44 a day, while locals will get to enjoy a bit of early spring.

Here’s an excerpt from the press release:

EAST RIVER STATE PARK WILL RE-OPEN SUNDAY, MARCH 1ST!

With spring right around the corner and weather getting warmer, we’re happy to report that the East River State Park on Kent Avenue between North 7th and 9th Streets in Williamsburg, Brooklyn will be open in time to enjoy nice days ahead.

The Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation (aka State Parks) plan was to close the East River State Park until the beginning of the next fiscal year (April 1st). The Friends of the East River State Park with help from Assemblyman Joe Lentol has been working to get the park open. After a letter from the Friends Group to the State Parks Commissioner—signed by thirty-two elected officials and statewide and local open space advocates—meetings and numerous phone calls, State Parks finally relented.

Friends is looking for volunteers to help keep the park clean during March. If you are interested, contact them at friendsoftheeastriverstatepark at gmail.com

On the way to the L train this morning, I noticed that just about every construction site (along Metropolitan and Wythe/Kent) was busy. Perhaps its a case of in for a dime, in for a dollar, which is where Viridian seems to be. The project is nearly finished, no one is buying, so the developer is declaring bankruptcy and hoping that rentals carry it through to some profit (or that someone ponies up $65 million to buy the whole thing – right).

As in any down (or collapsing) market, there will be a flight to quality. Usually that means established neighborhoods, with strong services, good transportation, good schools, etc. North Brooklyn doesn’t have much of that (yet), but it does have areas of relative quality and buildings of relative quality (architectural, financial and built quality). In the former, I would put the northside generally and in the latter I would put buildings like Northside Piers (on the other hand, there are always exceptions). In a market that stresses fundamentals (location, location, location), Greenpoint is just not the place for half-million-dollar apartments*.

Two big questions – how much will the huge glut of product coming to market at exactly the wrong time affect the market, and what is the financial condition of buildings that do come on line? Anecdotally, the quality of construction on most new condos leaves something to be desired.

* Its times like these that I fondly recall a conversation with a Greenpoint realtor back in 2000 or 2001. She was offering an apartment in the Garden Spot, and I was curious as to exactly where it was. Her response (in lightly accented Polish): “Everywhere in Greenpoint is desirable”.

Espo/Steven J. Powers
via City Room

The Times has a City Room post today titled A Sociologist’s Look at Graffiti, a serious discussion with a Baruch College sociologist who studies graffiti and graffiti artists. The post is illustrated with this Espo mural, which used to face the Williamsburg Bridge from atop the Oliva refrigerator building on Bedford and South 5th. It was always one of favorite works – somewhere I probably have some color postcards showing it.

At last night CB1 meeting, Chairman Vinnie Abate announced that he was appointing Teresa Toro as chair of the Transportation Committee. She replaces Teresa Toro, who was let go late last year in a controversy rooted in the Kent Avenue bike lanes. Teresa’s appointment is great news, although she will have large shoes to fill if she is to match the work that Ms. Toro did in making the Transportation Committee one of the most effective and well-run committees on CB1. I wish her luck.

The City announced the opening of 22 new schools today.

Not on the list is a new elementary school in PS 84 (or anywhere else in the area). As far as we can tell, there also are no plans to improve the near-failing performance of the existing school (although it did better this year). Which means that the city is pretty much committed to another year of substandard education at 84. The school is already less than half full, and after years of bitter fights over how to improve it, a lot of parents who can send their children elsewhere are going elsewhere.

I have been told that the reason given for not putting a new school in 84 is lack of parental involvement – in effect that because so many parents choose to go out of zone, DOE is throwing up its hands. Of course when parents did to get involved, DOE wasn’t there, and there was zero effort on DOE’s part to reach out beyond the walls of 84 this time around. With that attitude, DOE is setting up a Catch-22 that screws the students who go there, screws the parents who do try to make their kid’s school better, and ensures that parents won’t have any incentive to get involved.

But I’m sure they have a plan.

Brownstoner and the Brooklyn Paper report on CB1’s ULURP Committee vote last week to endorse an additional 10 stories for 145 West Street. The project, on West between India and Huron, would be Greenpoint’s first waterfront development (if it ever gets built). The developer proposes to reduce the height of the midblock portion of the project from 15 to 5 stories, and move that 10 stories to the tower portion of the project, thus increasing that portion of the project to 400′ (39 stories).

Brownstoner says CB1 “likes” the plan – in fact, the response was much more ambivalent. All the talk about sewer easements and benefits to the community is largely BS. Nonetheless, the Committee did find that the proposal was marginally better than the as of right 30-story tower and two 15-story midblock towers. The benefits are largely to the affordable housing portion (five stories along West Street), which would not have two 15 story midblock towers looming directly over it. The bulk transfer would also push the out of context height away from the residential scale of the neighborhood east of West Street.

Since there is no increase in floor area, and the overall height does not exceed the maximum allowed for the waterfront, the transfer boils down to a question of where you want your sun-blocking monstrosity – all in one place, or spread out and closer to the lower-scale residential neighborhood. One might say that this proposal sucks less. It certainly makes the tower look better (although its still not going win anyone a Pritzker prize).

The Committee vote is just a recommendation to the full board, which could vote against the whole thing. The full board will meet at 6:30 tonight (2 December), at 211 Ainslie Street (corner of Manhattan). Sign up by 6:15 if you want to speak in the public session.

The (current) final plan for the Kent Avenue Greenway (Brooklyn Greenway Initiative).

At Wednesday’s CB1 meeting, the issues of parking, bike lanes and the Greenway came to a head. Following on the elimination of parking on Kent Avenue from Division to the Greenpoint border, residents and business owners are up in arms. Meanwhile, bike advocates are protecting their turf with vigor.
The problem is, both sides – to one degree or another – are right.
The Greenway is a good thing. It is good transportation policy, and its good open space policy. The bike lanes along Bedford/Berry (northbound) and Whythe (southbound) are also good things. Bicycle ridership is up astronomically over the past few years, and we should do everything to ensure that ridership continues to grow and continues to be safer.

Between South 2nd and South 3rd.

But the Greenway (and its precursor, the bifurcated bike lanes that were just installed on Kent Avenue) poses a very real and very immediate threat to the many businesses that continue to operate on the east side of the avenue. With the implementation of “No Stopping” rules on both sides of the street, businesses can no longer take deliveries curb side. Customers can no longer park in front, even just to load a purchase into their car. This is a huge problem, one that is symptomatic of the lack of planning that continues to plague Williamsburg and Greenpoint. Ironically, the bike lanes come just as new businesses are opening along Kent (with more to come as the retail components of new residential developments comes on line).
I will admit that I am somewhat less sympathetic to the parking issue. Cars – even those that are not moving – should not take precedence over open space, pedestrian walk ways and bike lanes. North of Broadway, the City has promised to make additional parking available on the side streets, though its not clear that has happened yet. South of Broadway is a different story. Because there are fewer side streets and more parking restrictions along Wythe Avenue, residents of Schaefer Landing are forced to park far away from home (unless they want to pony up $300 a month to park in the development’s garage). Worse yet, they can’t even stop in front of their building to drop off passengers.

(A lot of this latter problem could be solved if Schaefer Landing allowed all of their tenants to use the parking circle for drop offs. But in a pathetic separate-but-equal move, tenants of the affordable housing units are apparently not allowed to use the off-street drop-off area. I didn’t believe this when I heard it at the Board meeting, but I have since spoken directly with one of the tenant leaders who tells me it is true. He also tells me that his efforts to have the policy changed have been rebuffed by Schaefer Landing management. Classy.)
All of the problems with the Greenway are problems of implementation, and they are indicative of a complete lack of comprehensive transportation planning on the part of the City. Which really should not be a surprise to anyone. CB1 Transportation Chair Teresa Toro has been calling for a comprehensive transportation study for years. CB1 requested this during the 2005 rezoning, and was told it was not necessary. Every time the issue is raised, DOT says that existing transportation policy and infrastructure is adequate to meet our needs.
Chicken, meet roost.
The problem with Kent Avenue is not the Greenway. The problem is that DOT is asking Kent Avenue to do too much. They want Kent to be a two-way truck route, with existing manufacturing users on the east side of the street and new residential/commercial uses on the west side of the street. Add to that the temporary bike lanes (or the future Greenway), and there is just not enough room.
The answer is not to eliminate the bike lanes/Greenway. The answer is to reconfigure Kent Avenue so that the Greenway works for everyone. The first step should be to eliminate two-way traffic – make Kent one way northbound. This will increase traffic southbound on Wythe, but if Wythe is not a truck route, this added traffic should not be burdensome. (The major north/south truck routes should be along the through routes in the neighborhood – McGuinness Boulevard, Meeker Avenue, etc. With the transition to residential in the 2005 zoning, Kent Avenue is no longer needed as a major thoroughfare – it should handle local traffic only.) The only public transportation affected is the Q59 bus, which runs southbound on Kent from Grand to Broadway. That can easily be shifted over to Wythe as well (which is where the route ran when Kent was being repaved a year to two back).
When you eliminate two-way traffic and the truck route, all of a sudden there is room for the stuff the community needs. A 15′ wide Greenway would occupy the west side of Kent, a 15′ traffic lane the center, and 15′ for parking and loading in the east lane. Businesses (which are all on the east side of the street) would be able to load, and customers could park. A drop-off area could be created across the street from Schaefer Landing (and the Mayor himself should call the owner of Schaefer Landing and tell them to drop their discriminatory drop-off policies).
These are also changes that could be implemented quickly. (DOT has already responded to one drop-off problem – that of the girls school South 9th and Kent by installing a bus loading zone (before that, school buses couldn’t stop in front of the school).) But there are also a host of bigger issues that need to be addressed along Kent Avenue. For instance, DOT refuses to consider stop lights on the Northside. From Metropolitan to Quay, there are no lights, turning Kent into a highway. Meanwhile, you have one new park (and another to come) and one new residential development (and four more to come). More and more pedestrians must now negotiate two directions of bike lanes and two directions of high-speed vehicle traffic to get from one side to another, with no crosswalk for blocks.

South 9th Street.

(On a related note, when the Greenway was first presented last Spring, both directions of bike traffic were located on the west side of the avenue. Because of the residential development, and the difficulty of having cars exiting those developments negotiate two-way bike traffic and other cars, DOT determined that it was safer to bifurcate the Greenway, which is what they have done with the new bike lane striping. I believe this is temporary, and that the Greenway itself will be only on the west side of the avenue (if not, it won’t be a very Greenway), but the problem could have been avoided entirely with a traffic light or two.)
Another long-range issue for Kent Avenue is the complete lack of public transportation south of Broadway. In addition to Schaefer Landing and 475 Kent, new residential development is under construction at the former Domsey site and more is planned just north (Kedem Winery) and just south (Certified Lumber) of Schaefer. That’s a lot of residences with no immediate access to buses or subways (or buses to take them to subways). (This is less of an issue on the Northside, where the Bedford L train is a short walk away, but it will be an issue if Domino gets built.)
These issues are all about one one-mile stretch of road. District-wide, we have similar problems and no comprehensive approach to fixing them. The neighborhood is changing pretty rapidly, but our transportation policies on a heavily-industrialzed past that the city zoned away three years ago. The crazy thing about all of this is that DOT clearly has their priorities in the right place when it comes to the big picture issues. Bike lanes and Greenways are good for the neighborhood and for the city as a whole. But because they can’t get the implementation right, they have managed to shift public sentiment against bike lanes and Greenways.
As a result of the CB1 meeting the other night, the Board will be writing to DOT asking them to do a comprehensive plan for the whole neighborhood, make the Greenway work, make businesses along Kent Avenue viable again, and address the parking and drop off issues. In other words, to do what should have been done in the first place. Given the passions on both sides, there is sure to be follow up until the issue is resolved.