Does two pizza joints = a trend? Hope not. But regardless, worth a link for the headline alone.
Pizzapocalypse
Trading Parking Spots for Potted Plants
If the plaza goes through, it will not only take part of the street, but also nix seven parking spaces in an area where every space is prime real estate.
Uh, this stretch of Broadway is not exactly overrun with traffic. The bigger impact will be that cars turning right on Bedford will have to go about 20′ out of their way. I think we’ll survive.
Salvation Army Demo
Wow – that started quickly.
For those wondering, all signs point to this being another Salvation Army building. Renderings that I saw back in June or so were clearly for the Salvation Army, and knowledgeable people I spoke to at that time had no information to the contrary. You’d think they’d cash in, and maybe they plan to, but I’ve seen nothing to indicate that that is in the offing.
Juliet Balconies: The Worst Architectural Design In History
Or, as I like to call them, bike racks.
English is Absent and Math Doesn’t Count at Brooklyn’s Biggest Yeshivas
What the situation amounts to, Alpert and others say, is a school system bigger than Boston’s operating virtually without oversight, making it easily the largest unregulated school system in America.
Bigger than Boston’s? Turns out Boston’s school system is relatively small, but still.
North Brooklyn Start-Ups Find Office Space Is Scarce
Though there are plenty of start-ups that favor Williamsburg and Greenpoint, developers, local officials and real estate brokers say there is a dearth of office space. Most landlords, lured by the promise of building lucrative apartments in the increasingly popular residential area, are reluctant to devote space to commercial tenants who can pay little and might wither as quickly as they bloom.
“Industry” in Brooklyn is booming, it is just not the smokestack-type industry that we all associate with Brooklyn. Whether start-ups, artisanal manufacturing, food processing, or film production, there is a huge demand for “manufacturing” space in North Brooklyn. And a huge need – the more jobs that can be made local, the less demand there is on our transportation infrastructure.
Although many buildings have retail space on the first floor, upper-floor offices are hard to come by, according to several people who have recently looked… Part of the problem is zoning: though parts of Williamsburg and Greenpoint are zoned for mixed commercial and residential use, the zoning tilts residential.
Ironically, this was among the objections raised in the community response to the 2005 rezoning – in converting hundreds of blocks of outdated industrial zoning to largely residential use, the city was turning a mixed-use community into a bedroom community.
Renderings: New Development at Manhattan and Box
Greenpointers has renderings for the new mixed affordable/market-rate development going in at the site of the former BRT trolley barn at 1133 Manhattan Avenue. I noted before the similarity of this project to 11 Broadway – turns out there is another connection in the architect (the design team behind 11 Broadway is now at Perkins Eastman).
Oslo Burned Out on Bedford!
Yikes – Oslo on Bedford Avenue is no more, gutted by a fire this morning. No one was hurt, and hopefully no one other than the coffee shop is out of a home (this is the base of a six-story apartment building). Very sad news on my old block.
Motorino Coming Soon
The pizza oven was just delivered to the new Broadway location (shame they had to get rid of the graffiti, though).
Williamsburg Home Prices up 174% Since 2004
Double digit increases in much of brownstone Brooklyn, but Williamsburg is the only neighborhood to break three digits (Greenpoint had the fourth-highest increase, checking in at 47%).