DailyHeights

unknown writes on the Prospect Heights Message Board: “This property has been through the ringer…”

unknown continues to say (NOTE: we don’t have any way to verify this information, so read with a grain of salt):

“The original owner died in 1992, leaving the property to his grandson and his son as the executor. Through unknown reasons, the will was not probated until 2004 by the son and his father. The son sold the property to someone who promised to renovate the building, this person incurred violations from the DOB while cleaning out the building. This person then sold the building in late 2005 early 2006 to someone else.”

“The property is 696 Washington Ave and you can find the new owners name on the property tax website. This property is an eyesore to our community and I would love if someone can do something with it.“

Geido Sushi!

Originally uploaded by Cat Whisperer.

What must-try PH restaurants would you recommend to a Park Sloper? steve asks in the Prospect Heights Message Boards: “I think I’m gonna cross the great divide tonight and head into the heights. Where would you recommend we go to dinner? I would prefer to stay closer to GAP, other than that I’m flexible.”

Here’s the short list so far:
1. Geido (sushi on Flatbush)
2. New Prospect Cafe (good lunch spot)
3. Garden Cafe (“this place definitively has the best food in Prospect Heights,” says Carnivore)
4. Grand Castillo de Jagua (El Carneviento. Need we say more?)
5. Aliseo (cozy but somewhat pricey Italian dinner spot)
6. Amorina (low-key pizza by the owner of Aliseo)
7. Sorrel (worth a try)
8. Beast (try the burger and/or skirt steak)

Where to? Check for updates on the Prospect Heights Message Board

bobobob posted a photo of the scene from my cellphone camera on the Prospect Heights Message Board: According to one of the crew, it was for a Rolling Stone magazine publication, but not necessarily the magazine — it sounded like some sort of calendar. Apparently Cassie, the hip hop singer, was there for part of the shoot at some point.

Flatbush Speaks, Again

Originally uploaded by Dope on the Slope.

Blogger/journalist Paul Berger, who previously wrote about the Flatbush Pavilion anagrams for the New York Times, has another piece in that paper yesterday, this time on the creeping chain store takeover of Flatbush Ave. near Grand Army Plaza.

Brooklyn is one of the few places left in America where “Mom and Pop vs the Big Boys” is still a remarkable story, so go read this article now, which chronicles the Crunch Fitness squeezeout of Christie’s Jamaican Patties, the American Apparel takeover of the old Flatbush Pavilion space (and formerly anagrammed marquee), and… and… well, can’t all good trends be broken down into 3 bullet points?

Perhaps a third example is the Blockbuster across the street, which doesn’t exactly fit Paul’s story, as it’s not a “new” entry among the retail storefronts of Flatbush Ave., but it fits the character of “Future Flatbush” quite well. Blockbuster is certainly the villain in countless vintage “Mom and Pop vs the Big Boys” stories, since that chain wiped out perhaps thousands of independent video stores seemingly overnight (note that the photo accompanying Paul’s article does subtly bring Blockbuster into the story).

Small business owners on Flatbush, beware: the pace of change is likely to grow exponentially in the next few years, especially now that virtually no one outside of Prospect Heights seems to oppose Bruce Ratner’s Atlantic Yards project (at least, that’s the sense you get from reading this editorial from Bruce Ratner’s “partners” at the New York Times).

New (York Times) Discussions on the Prospect Heights Message Boards:

NYT Confirms Support for Atlantic Yards

Christie’s Vs. Crunch

Q-Train Mystery

Originally uploaded by AMRosario.

Thanks, trent, for the update! As noted on Regional Geographic, the Q Train of the Future is upon us: “It was bright and had a red LED on front of it. At first I thought it was a misplaced 6 train, but then it came closer.”

“… I looked inside and things were still shrink-wrapped; there were Print Shop Pro signs that said ‘Test Train – not in service.’ Inside was like you would expect. Not the L style with the barely-informative 3-color LED panels but the normal 4,5,6 kind with the regularly informative one-color strips and lighted maps.”

“There were other fantastic things on the train. The first couple of cars had flatscreen CRTs that had screen savers, scrolling [Windows] 95-style, that said ‘SUPER.’ And boy were they, because they had an octopus worth of cables going in and out of their boxes…”

Read more at Regional Geographic

UPDATE: Comments on the new Q Train on the Prospect Heights Message Board

image14

Originally uploaded by dailyheights.com.

spinningpinwheel reports on the Prospect Heights Message Board: “I walked by the old tattoo place on Underhill between St. Johns & Sterling – the one several DH people looked at renting only to balk at the ridiculous rental price. Anyway, the gate was open and a couple of guys were working inside. Looked like a fresh coat of pastel paint had just gone up. Is that the future location of the fabled Underhill Spa?”

Indeed, Carnivore said he saw an older Asian woman taking down the “For Rent” sign: “She said that it was going to be a spa … once they finish that giant condo on St Johns and Plaza, I think that whole stretch of Unerhill is going to change dramatically, in terms of the commercial properties at least. There’s going to be a huge influx of relatively affluent people who are going to want to buy stuff, and I’m not sure Hood Hing (the bulletproof Chinese takeaway) is going to cut it alone. I bet the stretch between Sterling and Eastern Parkway on Underhill is going to be unrecognizable within 5 years.”

Say goodbye to the old block on the Prospect Heights Message Board

farm 2

Originally uploaded by jscandinaro.

Carnivore writes in the Prospect Heights Message Board:

“So Idlewild, alafairnadia and I stopped in here after dinner tonight. Great spot. The atmosphere was nice, the beer selection excellent, and there were a variety of sitting areas for different moods (the overall vibe was extremely mellow).”

“They have a bar food menu that looks really promising (we were assured that the restaurant kitchen will have a much more extensive menu once it opens). Plus the staff actually shooshed someone who was yelling annoyingly!”

“The music was a little random, but I’m sure that will vary. Overall, I think this is a spot I’ll be returning to often. It would also make a great spot for happy hour (hint! hint!).”

More opinions on Flatbush Farm on the Prospect Heights Message Board

vanilla
Bruce Ratner’s Love Child
Joined: 05 Sep 2005
Posts: 623
Location: washington avenue

Posted: Fri Jul 21, 2006 3:36 pm

i thought that the blackout in 2003 was romantic… lights out at 9pm, everyone drunk, doing it, and yelling “who’s your daddy?”…
i mean, that’s what was happening in greenpoint. disregarding disaster, good times.

Brooklyn brownstone

Originally uploaded by Shield.

Thinking about buying in Brooklyn and signing away your life to a mortgage holder? That’s just one level of humiliating serfdom that’s in store for you. As dds580 writes in the Prospect Heights message board: “Sadly, all the utility companies treat us like lepers rather than customers…”

“When I got my house, I did not get a water bill for almost a year, nor even on the prior owner’s name. A year later, I got a bill for a couple of thousand plus penalties. I tried to negotiate a deal with them since a never got a bill, but they would not hear of it.”

“The bills were supposedly accurate because they were an ‘actual’ readings of the meter – I couldn’t find one in the house, and when I would bring this to their attention, they would sarcastically ask me if I knew what a meter look like. I could not get them to come to inspect their meter.”

“… It turns out there was no meter in this house. I was still being held responsible for the missing meter. I had to get a plumber, and paid to have a meter installed. Once I had a meter, I fought them to have a refund on the outrageously high bills … After a year two years, I finally got them to credit some money … but I could not get credit for all the time they overbilled me, because of a ‘statute of limitations’ on the time I could get some credit for…”

“If you need something from the electric company, they want to charge you for everything, even to do a reading on Saturdays. They act like dictators. As such, they demand they are always right, and we have no right to complain or anything else.”

“I have a friend from Dominican Republic, and his family bought a generator to send to their relatives because they experience blackouts on a regular basis. I wish we could do the same thing so we would not have to do business with the utility companies here.”

Be happy you’re still renting in the Prospect Heights Message Boards

450px-Leech_blutegel

Originally uploaded by dailyheights.com.

DH regular armchair_warrior has been swarmed by Realtors(TM) who want to list his building: “today i got my third realtor asking me if they could list my building with them. they all said they been waiting around for me. i vist that building like few times a week at diffrent times.”

And putting it on craigslist only added to the feeding frenzy, leading AW to ask, “Are realtors vultures?”

Eh… not exactly. As doctorj points out: “Realtors are definitely not vultures. Vultures feed mostly on the dead. So unless you expect your project to tank… I would say realtors are more like leeches. Or maybe more like Plasmodium falciparum, which has different life-cycle strategies for infesting different hosts.”

Go to the Prospect Heights Message Board to find out: Are Realtors Vultures Or Leeches?

… and gosh, why don’t they advertise on this site?? (Note: This is sarcasm. The joke is that realtors would not want to advertise on a site where they are being called leeches. But you know what? The only thing worse than being called a leech is not being called a leech.)