elitt writes to Daily Heights: “I’m curious to know if anyone has information on the antique street clock that was knocked down and subsequently taken away from the corner of Sterling and Flatbush. It was/is of historical significance…”
Obscure phonecam photo sent to us by Charles Star of Stay Free Blog:
Discuss: Prospect Heights Message Boards
Over on Brownstoner:
Some folks in Prospect Heights aren’t happy about the barricade…
“>http://dailyheights.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2198
Posted by: Hal at January 24, 2006 11:15 AM
Hal – those people complain about everything/anything.
Posted by: Anonymous at January 24, 2006 11:52 AM
LINK: Meier Gets Out His Shovel [Brownstoner]
This editorial is a bit of an extreme view. Had it appeared in the New York Post, it would be easy enough to dismiss outright… but this comes from the the Daily News, which in the past has been fairly sympathetic to the anti-Ratner crowd:
Bounce this suit
“Opponents of the planned $3.5 billion Atlantic Yards project in Brooklyn have stooped to a new and ludicrous low by filing a futile and all-too-predictable lawsuit in state Supreme Court to try to stop developer Bruce Ratner from demolishing six vacant, partially collapsed buildings that he already owns…“
“Opponents appear determined to sue early and often to tie him up in litigation and are even trying raise a nonissue: the fact that an ESDC environmental lawyer involved in the project once worked for Ratner…” Read more…
DISCUSS: Prospect Heights Message Boards
From the Daily News: “The fire that gutted the Crown Heights brownstone next to mine Saturday morning could easily have killed me and my family… more than just the smoke stinks. Yesterday, a Fire Department spokesman told me the burning of 600 St. Marks Ave. has been classified as arson.”
“… the house changed hands three times in less than two years, each time for considerably more than the place was plausibly worth. In February 2004, a longtime owner named Gloria Moore sold the house for $640,000 to a woman named Francillia Ryan, who in turn sold the house to Janet Howard in December 2004 for $790,000… A few weeks ago, on Dec. 19, the house changed hands yet again, bought by someone named Crispin Booker for $850,000.”
“No one on the block thought the building was worth anywhere near that much… Neighbors tell me that an ominous warning was allegedly made to the building’s residents the night before the fire to quit the place or else.” Read more in the Daily News
From the Prospect Heights Message Boards:
“Am I the only one that noticed that Tony Soprano was pulling this scam, like, 3 seasons ago?”
BrooklynSwordStyle says: “Man, this whole nabe has gentrified all to hell. I remember when it was a just cooled mass of magma and noxious gasses. Those days rocked. Only the hard-core lived here, and the vibe was great.”
“Old school? Fuck that, man. We were single celled! I had this kick-ass bit of rock, but then these yuppie lung-fish started waddling in on their fancy-pants fin-legs and drove up the cost of everything. I tried dividing myself a few times to share the rent, but then one of me mutated and became a total dick to be around. It’s all those damned lung-fishes’ fault. If they hadn’t moved in, then those hairy-assed mammals wouldn’t have shown up. Now this place is so lame.”
Ground Breaking
Originally uploaded by Atomische.
*OK, OK, we know a million dollars ain’t what it used to be… So let’s propose a new definition of Millionaire: anyone who won’t think twice about plunking down a record-breaking (for Brooklyn, at least) $1000+ per square foot for a condo.
…That’s the sale price predicted a few months ago for units in Richard Meier’s “super deluxe” 15-story glass tower on Grand Army Plaza in Prospect Heights, now under construction (photo, right). While these may be quite a bit more expensive than luxury apartments near the edge of NYC they seem like a screaming bargain next to the current price of luxury apartments in Manhattan, which according to the Daily News are now almost $1500 per square foot.
But there’s a bigger story here about a smaller public space… at least for those of us Prospect Heights residents who are already making way for millionaires every day as we try to squeeze past the blue plywood wall that’s blocking the public sidewalk.
The construction company drilled the foundations for this wall more than a foot into the cement sidewalk!
Is that legal? No idea – we are simply too dense to translate those obtuse building permits.
Is it annoying? Just ask any pedestrian who’s forced off the sidewalk and onto the muddy, garbage-strewn strip of “grass” by oncoming strollers, dog-walkers, or the weekend hordes of PHers making their way to Prospect Park and the GAP Greenmarket. Hell, try to get past a single XXL pedestrian, for that matter – the sidewalk simply no longer adequately allows two-way traffic.
Is this what life will be like for the next two years? When the subject came up on the Prospect Heights Parents group on Yahoo!, there was some talk that local politicians (Tish? Marty? Hello?) could pressure the developer to move back the wall.
Somebody got in touch with somebody who actually knows something at the DOT, and according to them, the permit says they have to maintain a pedestrian walkway 5 feet wide. Uh… what pedestrian walkway? We don’t see any. Anybody handing out citations yet?
No. In fact, somebody called 311, and they said, “Get over it, crybabies!” Well, not exactly… but apparently they claimed it had been inspected and that the passage is adequate. Uh… no.
What next? You can make noise, too: If this annoys you, then call DOT and reference complaint # C1-1-203530336. Now who’s got their phone number? Let us know in the Prospect Heights Message Boards.
—
Construction photo: Thanks to Atomische for capturing this and uploading it to the Prospect Heights Photo Pool.
Daily Heights regular quig, who is no stranger to confrontation (see his previous doggie doo exploits here: “Say That One More Time, and I’ll Punch You in the Face”), is back with a vengeance, catching a real estate agent in the middle of tacking flyers to trees in support of an open house at 436 Sterling Pl.:
“Seriously, it really gets my goat when people tack up advertising on trees. For crying out loud, there is a reason that people don’t do this. I came across an agent doing this in the midst of the final marketing push before the open house…”
Apparently the agent confronted Quig after he tore down two of the flyers tacked up to trees on Underhill:
“Long story short, I told him that taping flyers to lamppost doesn’t set precedence like thumbtacking to a tree. We had words. And since I’ve lived in Brooklyn for a mere 15 years, not 42 like the agent, I had no right to tell him what to do.”
“In a nutshell, he asked me for my address so he can tell the sellers the reason the open house didn’t resemble a mosh pit was because of my efforts. I provided it to him and we bid each other good day.”
Oh yeah… we got the agent’s card, too: Prospect Heights Message Boards
If you found this dog, give it up. It’s not yours.
“Skippy is not ordinary dog, he is a zoo in itself…”
Alex writes in the : “I saw two white women on my block (Nostrand/Lincoln) this morning as I left my apartment. One pushing a stroller, the other walking a dog. Amazing!”
Back in the Day adds: “We’ve got two couples that own, plus three or four renters at Park Pl. between Nostrand and New York Ave. …”
“… One of my friends has hypothesized that you’ll know the neighborhood is changing not when you see white people, but when you see Asian couples.”
“I’ve seen two Asian women on Nostrand, one with her child, but no couples yet.”
Show your colors, yo.
Prospect Heights Message Boards
