Astor Place to Get Slightly Less Life-ThreateningScruffles are playing in the streets in Jackson Heights. Gays are scared for their Vespas in Chelsea. Some other group of people is turning in its Uzis in Clinton Hill. And everybody is reading our daily boroughs report.
neighborhood watch
Michel Gondry Moves to Historic East Williamsburg BlockYou can find libido-enhancing maca in Jackson Heights, aspects of Frenchness in Boerum Hill and, speaking of French things, possibly filmmaker Michel Gondry in East Williamsburg. That and more in our head-choppingly wacky Bastille Day boroughs report.
neighborhood watch
Heather Mills Is Moving to the West VillagePaul McCartney’s ex drops some of his dime on a New York pad, well-meaning yuppie scum set up shop in the East Village, Enrique Norten gets a second chance in downtown Brooklyn, and more, in this week’s kickoff to our daily boroughs wrap-up!
neighborhood watch
On the Bowery, New Hotel Tower Physically Squeezes Landmarked HomePlus, boos drowning out a Harlem rezone vote and Grand Theft Auto’s uncanny recreation of a certain famous, fun-oriented island (“Johnson’s Famous Hot Dogs”?). All that with mustard and sauerkraut in today’s boroughs report.
neighborhood watch
Take a Walk Down Tin Pan Alley, Er, 28th StreetEast Village: Right across from its iconic 1859 building, Cooper Union wants to build a corrugated, spiky new thing by Japanese architect Fumihiko Maki. Um…yeah, we’ll skip the stupid, vaguely racist sushi joke. [NYO]
Flatiron: The next time you walk down nondescript 28th between Broadway and Sixth, sing out “Won’t You Come Home, Bill Bailey?” or “In the Good Old Summertime” to commemorate that the block was once the famed Tin Pan Alley. There’s no plaque or anything that denotes as much. And that’s a sad song. [Lost NYC]
Gowanus: Take a look at the residential-retail complex the Toll Brothers would like to build along the canal. Nothing like mixed-use magic alongside the miasma! [Gowanus Lounge]
neighborhood watch
The Army Occupies East 103rd Street; Residents DispleasedEast Harlem: There’s outrage over a new Army recruiting center on East 103rd Street, on the heels of Army promo teams here this summer that included gals in camo midriffs and short shorts. [NY Latino Journal]
Jackson Heights: Starbucks is here! Gentrification officially begins! [Curbed]
Northwest Bronx: So many parks are being repaired here that there’s no place for the massive youth baseball league to play this spring! [Norwood News]
neighborhood watch
Bedford-Stuyvesant Not So Sold on the ‘Hope’ and ‘Change’ Parts of This ElectionBedford-Stuyvesant: Some folks are skeptical that anything will change here, no matter who’s elected in November. And they’re employing their mailboxes to say so. [Newyorkshitty]
Greenwich Village: After renovations of Washington Square Park found human remains there, folks will protest there tonight, saying the city should merely “repair” the park and not upset buried bones with a full-scale redo. [Metro]
Jackson Heights: This is the home of the largest of 47 rent-stabilized apartment buildings throughout Queens just purchased for $300 million by Vantage Properties. Housing advocates fear the new owner will systematically push out low-rent-paying tenants in the nearly 2,000 units. [The Real Deal]
neighborhood watch
Flatbush Enters the Food Co-op FrayChelsea: The proliferation of noncontextual glass condos is driving area high schoolers to stab one another in front of the construction sites. [Vanishing New York]
Flatbush: Watch your back, Park Slope Food Co-op. The one here is moving into an old Associated market, and they’ve poached a Trader Joe’s staffer to be their produce czar. [Ditmas Park Blog]
Jackson Heights: Wow, the scrappy hood beat out Manhattan’s newly hot financial district in Curbed’s Best Nabe of ‘07 competition. Now, can it trounce — gulp — Tribeca? [Curbed]
neighborhood watch
You Aren’t the Only Person Who Comes Home to Find Random People Smoking in Your StairwellClinton Hill: Beware of undesirables who sneak into your apartment building to smoke butts, do drugs, copulate, urinate, and drink coffee. Because it’s happening. [Clinton Hill Blog]
East Village: The latest bank branch hopes that if it puts up a big photo of the hood in Ye Olden Days, no one will notice that it’s filled mostly with bank branches now. [Vanishing New York]
Flushing: Local Quaker farmers demand freedom of worship! Well, they did in 1657. But the tatty document in which they listed their demands, called “The religious Magna Carta of the New World,” is on display up in here. [NYT]
neighborhood watch
Bed-Stuy Fires Back at the ‘Shwick!Bedford-Stuyvesant: Uh-oh. Bed-Stuy just upped the stakes in the blog battle between it and Bushwick. They even dis ‘shwick homegirl Rosie Perez. This is war, muthaf*ckas. [Bed-Stuy Blog]
Coney Island: So many people showed up last night at the first public meeting on the city’s plans for Coney that it had to be canceled for lack of space. Wow. This should be an epic novel. [Gowanus Lounge]
Jackson Heights: The hood’s got a new bulletin board! Where else will you learn where to get the area’s best pizza, Mexican cocoa power, and $5-or-under eyebrow threading? [Jackson Heights Life]
neighborhood watch
Jackson Heights: The Musical! Wait, That Sounds Familiar…Cobble Hill: Some performance-art weirdos queued up, droidlike, outside of the future Trader Joe’s here. Was this some sort of Marxist semiotic commentary on the store’s long lines to come? [A Brooklyn Life]
Elmhurst: The locals are getting into t’ai chi, which is cool, but they look like they’re doing the Thriller zombie dance in this pic. [Junction Blvd]
Hell’s Kitchen: The flea markets haven’t been doing as well since they moved here from their longtime home in Chelsea, where condo-velopment pushed them out. [Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York via Chelsea Now]
Jackson Heights: Stay tuned for Jackson Heights: The Musical! Hey, wait a minute, that Washington Heights show hasn’t even opened on Broadway yet! [Queens Crap via NYDN]
Morningside Heights: Creatures including a camel, two llamas, some goats, a Chinese goose, a fourteen-pound rabbit, a porcupine, and a hermit crab paraded down the aisle at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine yesterday for a blessing. These pics are so cute! [Gothamist]
Upper East Side: This sticky Indian summer is hardest of all on uptown gals planning the final stages of their wedding, don’t you agree? [Sex and the UES]
Williamsburg: Yuppies moving here and to Greenpoint don’t want to send their kids to the local public schools, leaving some of them half-empty. [Brownstoner]
neighborhood watch
Beware of Moped GangsDumbo: One Brooklyn Bridge Park slightly taller, slightly less yellow. Also, slightly expensive. [DumboNYC]
East River: We wouldn’t normally swim in the East River. But we might do it with art? [Gothamist]
Jackson Heights: New ad campaign: equal opportunity appaller. [Curbed]
Park Slope: Moped gangs in the Slope! If only we were joking. [Daily Slope]
Red Hook: The planned giant IKEA will stomp out a Civil War–era shipyard. Also, taste. [NYDN]
Roosevelt Island: OpenHouseNewYork will allow people into the scary old Smallpox Hospital you can see from the FDR (remember the end of Spider-Man?). And onto the Highline! [NewYorkology]
the morning line
Here We Go Again: Mike to Get His Traffic Money, If Albany Agrees
• The Feds are expected to announce today that, yes indeed, they’ll shell out the big bucks necessary for Bloomberg to execute his congestion-pricing dream plan — if Albany passes it first, that is. [NYT]
neighborhood watch
Cue the Violins in Park Slope and KensingtonConey Island: The clowns have been sent. Cole Brothers Circus is on the old go-kart tracks through August 5. [Gowanus Lounge]
East Village: Duane Reade finally has Harry Potter. There’s no need to go without. [East Village Idiot]
Jackson Heights: Mayor Bloomberg runs afoul of locals complaining about traffic, noise, and sanitation gripes. [FoxNews via QueensCrap]
Kensington: Talk about a virtual inferiority complex: Locals here lament that their Wikipedia page is not as nice as Park Slope’s. Cue violins, please. [KensingtonBlog]
Park Slope: Whine of the Day from the Slope set? “Why did they reduce driving hours in Central Park and not our park? Whaaa!” [Gowanus Lounge]
Union Square: Beware the hordes of student filmmakers in the park today. [The Weblicist of Manhattan]
Williamsburg: White middle-class preservationists faced off against nonwhite low-income affordable-housing proponents at a hearing over the future use of the Domino sugar factory. [Brownstoner]
neighborhood watch
Nothing Says ‘Small-Town Feel’ Like Community ToiletsThe Bronx: Car-free Sundays return to the Grand Concourse. [Streetsblog]
Clinton Hill: Hollenback Garden invites all the neighbors to soil the soil, but wait until the composting toilet is built on Saturday. [Clinton Hill Blog]
East Village: One Ten 3rd is still not ready for human occupancy, but for now it’s populated by a bunch of Sub-Zero refrigerators. [Curbed]
Jackson Heights: The normally private gardens here are open to the rest of us schlubs for the weekend. [OuterB]
Kensington: Virgin doesn’t even bother giving this underrated neighborhood its own ad. They just get a generic “Brooklyn” one. [Kensington Blog]
Park Slope: Anyone want to buy Seventh Avenue Books? It’s “priced to sell.” [Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn]
neighborhood watch
East Village Not Cool Enough to Justify Tiny Closet
Chelsea: Tourists find Hotel Chelsea to be old and shabby. Well, yeah. [Notes from the Trenches via Living With Legends]
Cobble Hill: Who says you can’t go (to his) home again? Walk to Cobble Hill Park and peer into the dank basement flat that once housed young scribe Thomas Wolfe. [Lost City]
Dumbo: Angry phone calls succeed in putting the temporary kibosh on improper asbestos removal at 205 Water Street. [DumboNYC]
East Village: Chic “lofted living” (right) can be yours for just $1,700 a month! Walk-in closet (for dwarves) included. [Craigslist via Curbed]
Gowanus: City enviro-honchos have released a cleanup plan for the parcel of toxic soup known as Public Place — and locals will sound off on the parcel’s future at a meeting on February 22. [Gowanus Lounge]
Jackson Heights: Next Tuesday, get a free stack o’ flapjacks at the Northern Boulevard IHOP when you make a donation to a children’s charity. [Joey in Astoria]
