Category: Linked

…in 2010 – wah, wah, wah.

While you are waiting to get on the L train, ponder some of these numbers from today’s Times:

The busiest station on the Brooklyn part of the line is Bedford Avenue, in Williamsburg, which had 4.99 million riders pass through the turnstiles last year…

Of course by the time they get to Bedford, the trains are already full. The 5 million people using the Bedford station do not include any new riders generated by the waterfront rezoning. The nearest subway station to those 10,000 (or more) new households? Bedford Avenue.

That was a 139 percent increase from 1995, when 2.09 million riders entered the station…

5,000,000 riders works out to about 14,000 people per day using the Bedford station (assuming ridership is spread equally over 365 days, which it is not). With another 10,000 to 20,000 new adult residents in Williamsburg and Greenpoint over the next decade (probably a lot more), ridership could actually double again.

Over all, subway ridership increased 46 percent in the same period…
…the L line ranked 20th out of 22 when evaluated for the likelihood that a rider would find a seat at rush hour…

At least there are still seats on the J train. (Though even that is getting more crowded lately.)

And this little gem:

…the new signal system was designed in the mid-1990s and that at the time the hefty residential growth in areas like Williamsburg had not been anticipated… In 2002 and 2003, the authority acquired 212 new computerized cars for the line. But last year, officials acknowledged the fleet was not large enough to handle the increased ridership and they began planning to add conventional cars until more computerized cars could be acquired. The conventional cars will be added later this year.

Over the years, community activists have been complaining that the waterfront rezoning did not do enough to accommodate future transportation needs, and that the increase in service from computerized trains originally touted by the MTA was nowhere near enough to handle even the existing ridership. I guess Teresa was right all along.

Have I mentioned how great the water taxi is?

Eleven miles of the waterfront bikeway have been planned. Your three miles have not. Come out and make it happen!

Gowanus Lounge:

We’ve never had it happen to us, but we can only imagine that it sets the blood pressure to spiking.

Fact is, lot line windows are an unprotected luxury. We live in a city of party walls, and, as the saying goes, unless you live directly on Central Park, no view is safe.

Still, I’m with Mr. Lounge; it would suck.

Actually, I think that this has some potential. Though how you cram 20 units into this site will be interesting to see.

After years of (rightfully) fighting against the context-busting Finger Building, it will be interesting to see what the (chopped off) finished product looks like. Soon, perhaps – the building is getting its skin on. And that skin is a terra-cotta rain screen, from the looks of it, though its not clear what happens between the panels.

And here’s the big question – will the building look like a chopped down tower, or did the architect revise the design to account for the lower height? (Or, will the owner just leave a bunch of I-beams poking through the roof, taunting the neighborhood with the possibilities of future growth…)

They’re both pretty awful, and they are both proof that
scale and materials ≠ context.

A good start.

One of the beautiful things about this designation – if it happens – is that provides a balance to the neighboring Greenpoint Historic District. The Eberhard Factory factory, along with the dozens of other factories, shipyards, refineries, etc. throughout Greenpoint provided the capital that paid the salaries of the managers who lived in what is now the Greenpoint Historic District.

Workers’ housing is woefully underrepresented when it comes to Landmarks designations – but in Greenpoint we have the Astral Apartments, an apartment building constructed by Charles Pratt as worker housing, and an individual Landmark.

GowanusLounge has some interesting maps up, showing the vulnerable areas of Williamsburg and Greenpoint. Not surprisingly, an understanding of historical geography helps to make sense of it all. Obviously, the coastal blocks are all inundated in a Cat1 storm or higher. But upland, the effects are different block by block. The area immediately around the Bushwick Inlet, as far inland as Berry, would also be flooded in a Cat1 storm. Further inland, a Cat2 storm out past McCarren Park to Withers Street, and south along Union to Grand. Its not coincidental that that pattern corresponds exactly to the footprint of the old Bushwick Inlet that we noted earlier.

Elsewhere, much of Greenpoint would be underwater in a Cat2 storm, but most of Williamsburg to either side of Grand Street would not be effected until Cat4 or Cat5, if at all. This makes sense if you know that Williamsburg once had a bluff running along the line of what is today Bedford Avenue, and that Greenpoint was mostly uninhabitable (and inaccessible) swampland until developer Neziah Bliss came along.

The City Planning Commission voted yesterday to allow the City to sell a number of firehouses – including our own Engine 212 – with no strings attached. The Community Board, Councilmember Yassky and local activists have pushed hard to keep these buildings be preserved and remain a part of the community – either as firehouses, community centers, affordable housing, etc. What we object to the most is the idea that these firehouses would be sold to the highest bidder, which invariably will mean luxurycondos, and no benefit to the community.

In the case of 212, the building has a highly significant social history as the focal point of community activism in the 1970s. And, its a handsome building.

The light at the end of the tunnel here is that both HPD and EDC have put “holds” on the disposition of the firehouses. A task force of community, council and administration reps has been established to help figure out the best use for these buildings. But through its action yesterday, CPC has cleared the way for a no-strings attached disposition if the task force process should fall through.

Arts in Bushwick is accepting registrations for artists wanting to participate in the Bushwick Open Studio and Arts Festival, the weekend of June 1 to 3. Bushwick is Beautiful has more.