Aaron Short interviews the makers of the Domino Effect, a (still) topical documentary about the New Domino approval process. I’ve seen the picture in preview, and it is very well done and quite powerful.
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Heart the G
Public Advocate Bill de Blasio is joining the effort to continue the G train extension. Unless the MTA decides otherwise, the extra stops on the Crosstown Local into south Brooklyn are scheduled to go away very soon.
Now that the construction is nearing completion, the M.T.A. is considering discontinuing the G-train extension that enabled riders in Greenpoint to go all the way to Kensington without switching trains.
[Via Brownstoner]
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Stapleton is the New Williamsburg
Correction: March 18, 2012
In an earlier version of this article, a timeline misidentified a Williamsburg diner in a photo from 2000. The restaurant was Relish, not Miss Williamsburg Diner.
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Lured by Profits
Charles Bagli has an in-depth piece in today’s Times on the fall of Community Preservation Corp. There is not much in here that I hadn’t been hearing in bits and pieces over the past few months, but still, seeing it all together is jus incredible. Real estate deals like Domino (though Domino is far from the only one) have almost shut down one of the most important conduits for funding affordable housing in the NY region. As I’ve said in the past (and despite their claims to the contrary), CPC is a funder of affordable housing, not a builder of housing – clearly they lost focus on their core mission.
For anyone who thinks CPCR (the for-profit arm at the root of the problem) is going to do the Domino project, let along do it as the community was promised, this has to be pretty sobering.
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Whole Foods Confirmed
Aaron Short – who is clearly on a roll – confirms the Whole Foods on North 4th Street rumor. Commence the all-out Williamsburg-is-over discussion.
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50 Best Blocks in Brooklyn
The L Magazine has published its annual list of the best blocks in Brooklyn – an eclectic and fun 29-page clickfest through the entire borough. Some annotated local highlights:
11. Best Example of Gentrified Ugliness: North 3rd between Berry and Bedford. Quadriad’s development on the south side street (fully rented out on the retail side, but still no one living there – even though parts have been completed for over a year). “Looks like a public high school airlifted from the Des Moines suburbs, c. 1996.”
12. Best Example of Gentrified Perfection: Wythe Street [sic] between Metropolitan and North 3rd. A block away from #11, and a good choice. But I would have gone with North 3rd between Wythe and Berry – a great mix of new buildings, converted lofts and strong local retail throughout (which the L tags as one of the 5 best blocks in Brooklyn to live on, so I guess we kind of agree on this one – but what’s up with the photo of Wythe?).
13. Best Block for Illustrating the Multiple Stages of Gentrification: South 2nd street between Wythe Avenue and Kent Avenue. A lot going on here, from Stage 1 through endgame (though the preschool dates to the pre-gentrification days of the neighborhood, and the “Soho-esque trattoria doubles as a job-training facility for local residents).
17. Best Block for Accidental Voyeurism: Grand Street between Driggs and Roebling. True. Excellent picture choice too (William H. Gayor’s ca. 1888 Tuttle Department Store, a cast-iron beauty that has absolutely nothing to do with the accidental voyeurism in question).
25. Greenest Block: Grand Street between Bedford and Driggs. Never thought of it that way, but I guess it works.
And my favorite of the 50:
1. Best Dead-End Block: Central Avenue between Cooper and Trinity Cemetery. Perfect.
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Passing the Sugar
Aaron Short does some good reporting to advance the Domino story. Among the enticing new nuggets is word that the owners had a deal to sell the project for $200 million back in December. According to Short, that deal fell through after some of the 15 investors on the buyer’s side “got skittish about the project’s finances and zoning variances”.
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Another Whole Foods in Williamsburg Rumor
The empty hulk of a building at North 4th and Bedford is the site of the latest Whole-Foods-in-Williamsburg rumor.
The Post reports that the property has changed hands, with the Backer Group having sold to new owners. The new owner confirms that “several national tenants are interested” in the property (isn’t that always the case?), and the Post says that “sleuths have ferreted out” that Whole Foods is the intended tenant.
This latest rumor has a bit more heft than the recent vague rumors of a Whole Foods on Kent Avenue. The fact that the property has new owners also lends some credence to the idea (the Backer Group had previously floated CVS, Marshalls, Starbucks, Capital One and other national chains for their various properties on this block of Bedford Avenue).
Still, some things don’t quite add up. The Post has the new owner saying that the development will be 150,000 square feet, a third of which will be luxury rentals. According to city records, the whole site (lots 6 and 24) is 47,400sf – at an FAR of 2.0, that only yields a tad less than 95,000sf (maybe I’m missing something with the MX M1/R6B rules). But others are telling the Post that Whole Foods will occupy about 40,000sf, and New York Sports Club another 15,000sf on the second floor. That works out to about two-thirds of the development, in line with the owner’s estimates.
Other numbers that have to be worked out are the size of the market itself. 40,000sf is, believe it or not, on the small side for a Whole Foods – both their Union Square store and their proposed Gowanus Store are 50,000sf or more. And while there will certainly be plenty of foot traffic at North 4th and Bedford, between customers and deliveries, a market of this size will make the vehicular traffic in this corner of the neighborhood even worse.
And I wonder what Williamsburg Food Town (a Backer Group tenant) thinks of all this? (Or Retro Fitness, for that matter, which is just opening up a 20,000sf fitness center around the corner on North 3rd and Berry.)
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Domino for Sale
In news that should surprise no one (but is surprising nonetheless), the Observer reports that the Domino site is on the block. Apparently, the Katan Group and their development partner CPC Resources have been shopping all or part of it to potential buyers.
A spokesman for CPCR told the Observer:
We are pursuing various options that will achieve our goals: to realize value for ourselves and our partners, and to insure that development is consistent with all project entitlements
Chief among the entitlements CPCR received (and of primary value to them, their partner and any potential buyers) was approval from the City to redevelop the site for as many as 2,400 housing units. In exchange, CPCR promised to build 660 units of affordable housing, a lot of open space and a public school, all (nicely) designed by architects Rafael Viñoly and Beyer Blinder Belle. Most of this of these benefits were not guaranteed – something that was a very big issue for people opposed to the project back in 2010.
Hopefully we were wrong.