“We noted a few weeks ago that renovation of the Lundy’s space is underway; now we’re happy to bring you confirmation of the new tenant. And the business that will be operating in the iconic building is… [cue drumroll]… Cherry Hill Gourmet Market, a local food market with a storefront currently on 2278 86th St, on Bay 31st street in Bensonhurst/Bath Beach. It is expected that Cherry Hill-Lundy’s will open its doors in the next 2 to 3 months.”–Sheepshead Bites

[Photo courtesy of Trina356/flickr, click to see full size]

The photographer who dropped this pic into our GL Photo Pool on flickr calls it Cool Pool in a Carroll Garden. Click here to see the uncropped photo in all its glory.

Outside the Brooklyn Weather Observatory, we’ve got sunny skies and cool temps this morning. Today’s forecast is for skies that are partly sunny with “a shower or thunderstorm around this afternoon.” The high will be 75. Spotty showers and thunderstorms tonight too, with a low of 61.–Accuweather

This is Beard & Dwight Street, where we’ve been photographing the street from the same vantage point, using the Stop sign as a kind of marker. The photo on the left was shot in April, 2006. The photo on the right is now. The crane in the right hand photo, by the way, was relocated from its original position on the property to preside directly over Beard Street. All of the original cranes from the Todd Shipyard were left on the property.

[Photo courtesy of Brit in Brooklyn]

Red Hook has been a busy place today, with Beard Street busy with traffic and the Ikea parking lot jammed. Plus, there have been lines. Old school Eastern Europe lines reminding one of the days before the Fall of the Berlin Wall and Communism. GL Contributor and Brit in Brooklyn blogger Adrian Kinloch was on scene and shot a lot of great photos of the opening day Ikea Frenzy, a couple of which we’re featuring here.

Here, from the list compiled by the Daily News, are some upcoming Brooklyn Community Board meetings. Some of them take place today.

Community Board 4 (Bushwick) will hold its regular board meeting at 6:30 p.m. todoay at Hope Gardens Multi-Sevice Center, 195 Linden St. The agenda will include a public hearing by the School Construction Authority on a new permanent facility to be built on Palmetto St., between Irving Ave. and Knickerbocker Ave. The proposal is for a new 400-seat facility for All City Leadership Secondary School.

Community Board 5 (East New York, Cypress Hills, Highland Park, New Lots, City Line and Starrett City) will hold its next board meeting at 6:30 p.m. June 25 at 127 Pennsylvania Ave.

Community Board 7 (Sunset Park, Windsor Terrace) will convene its next board meeting today at 6:30 p.m. at the board office, 4201 Fourth Ave.

Community Board 9 (South Crown Heights, Prospect Lefferts Gardens, Wingate, parts of North Flatbush) is holding its regular board meeting at 7 p.m. June 24 at Middle School 61 Auditorium, 400 Empire Blvd.

Community Board 12 (Borough Park, Kensington, Ocean Parkway, Midwood) will meet at 7 p.m. June 24 at Amico Senior Center, 5901 13th Ave.

Community Board 13 (Coney Island, Brighton Beach, Gravesend, Seagate) is meeting at 7 p.m. June 25 at Coney Island Hospital, Ocean Parkway and Avenue Z.

Yesterday, we noted a new group called Stop BHOD, as did Brownstoner. The organization is aimed at lobbying for an end to the city’s plan to reopen the Brooklyn House of Detention and doubling its size. (It doesn’t appear to have a position on the addition of retail to the jail.) The group has been busy. We found posters up all over Court Street, including in the windows of a number of businesses. Stop BHOD is planning a press event in the near future. It is a separate organization from the Stakeholders Group, which is also fighting the jail plan.

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The new building going up at 5 Roebling, which is the site of the former Giant Fart Cloud building, is now in the pile driving phase. Yesterday, blogger Bad Advice first said it wasn’t so bad, but she is having second thoughts:

Remember how yesterday I said that the piledriver wasn’t so bad? Yeah, well, I was wrong. Imagine having an angry giant monster, jumping up and down, right next to your house. Everything is bouncing, books are falling off shelves. As I work at home, I’m sure today is going to be a really productive day. And you know, if any of you new Williamsburg condo owners are reading—which I doubt—you guys must be out of your minds. The “luxury” condos next door are being built on a hazmat site. The ones across the street are built on a bubbling field of oil and those down the street are being constructed on top of a brown field that’s laid dormant for the last decade because it was so toxic!

She concludes by asking: “Why on earth would you move here when there are really nice neighborhoods with things like trees?…Wait until you start having kids with six arms and giant goiters.

Neighbors Allied for Good Growth (NAG) in Williamsburg is holding what they’re calling “Tenant Rights Happy Hours” on Tuesdays. They take place at the NAG office, which is located at 101 Kent Avenue (at N. 8 Street) on Mondays from 4PM-8PM and Tuesdays from 2PM-8PM. Per an email:

NAG is happy to announce that our new tenant organizer, Ryan Kuonen, will be having drop-in tenant’s rights happy hours where anyone in CB1 (North Brooklyn) can get advice and help on landlord issues, how to find affordable housing, discrimination–you name it, she can help you or get you the help you need.
• Learn About Your Legal Rights as a Tenant
• Find Out How to Protect Yourself if Your Building is Sold to New Owners
• See if You Qualify for Rent Subsidies
• Discover New Affordable Housing Opportunities in the Neighborhood
• Sign-up for Further Counseling & Housing Workshops
• Get Legal Representation if Needed

Can’t make our walk-in hours…Contact Ryan Kuonen, NAG Tenant Organizer, to set up an appointment. Office Ph: (718) 384-2248 ryan@nag-brooklyn.org www.NAG-brooklyn.org

They take appointments on non-“happy hour” days.

[Photo courtesy of Racked]

The deed is done. The sawdust has already been cleaned from the ceremonial log sawing and the first customers have already been inside the Red Hook Ikea for two hours. The new era on Beard Street has begun. Racked has full coverage of the morning and dozens of photos, much of which can be found by clicking here.

[Photo courtesy of Mirabelle Studios]

This is the set up for the heavily-promoted Metropolitan Opera concert featuring husband-and-wife team Angela Gheorghiu and Roberto Alagna in Prospect Park on Friday. A very large crowd is expected. A Year in the Park, as we would expect, has a big photo feature on the workers setting up for the performance.

The Greenpoint Gazette has finally gotten a website. The paper has been around since 1973 doing local coverage. “This is a definite great addition to the web for Greenpointers!”–Greenpointers

By now, there are probably about seven people in the entire city that don’t know that Ikea is opening in Red Hook, and five of them are under three years of age. Ikea’s advertising and PR campaign has been so complete–and every media outlet and blog has been so happy to help cover the pending opening–that few retail openings in recent memory have been as widely covered and hyped. Here’s the Ikea mobile, which we found parked on Court Street yesterday evening with flashers blinking and then saw being driven around.

Red Hook’s Beard Street may be one of the most changed streets in all of Brooklyn over the last few years, although Kent Avenue in Williamsburg could start to give it a run for its money. The transformation of Beard Street from a long stretch featuring a closed shipyard and sugar refinery to a big Ikea has been dramatic. The photo above is from April 2006.

The full series of photos from April 06-June 08, ahead

It is zero hour. At this very moment, the first customers are streaming through the doors of the new Red Hook in Ikea, the first of hundreds of thousands of people that will come to this formerly remote and industrial corner of Brooklyn over the new few months to shop for Billy bookcases and Ektorp sofas. Once upon a time, we went to Red Hook to soak up its quiet and take photos of its industrial ruins. It could be eerily quiet on Beard Street sometimes. No longer. The Red Hook landscape has changed forever. With the influx of shoppers and what is certain to be a lot more big box retailing and real estate development over the next five years, the neighborhood itself will never be the same. Some people cheer this development. Others are angry or melancholy. Regardless, this kind of development is the direction that Brooklyn’s leaders have chosen. Now, everyone will have to deal with both the benefits and the consequences.

We have nothing against Ikea (although we wish they would have been more responsive to community concerns during the development process) and we certainly understand why the corporation wanted to develop the waterfront property, but we believe that putting a major retailer in this location represents a planning failure of some significance and that it is a bad decision for the neighborhood itself. It is the sort of thing that, like some of the lousy decisions made by Robert Moses generations ago, will be viewed negatively by a future generation. Why do we say this when 500 jobs are being created and thousands of people are seized by Ikea shopping frenzy and couldn’t be happier? Because we don’t think the highest use of valuable Brooklyn waterfront property is big box retailing surrounded by acres of parking and we don’t believe it makes any sense to place things that will generate tens of thousands of car trips a week in place that is not accessible. A different development scenario for this land–even if it had taken longer–would have been better in the long-term, and if done properly, could also have generated community jobs.

Those that don’t care about Red Hook as a community–who will view it as a place to drive through to get some furniture or buy something at the big boxes of the future–will have no problem with the impact of these flawed planning decisions on it. How does a city calculate lost opportunities and the cost of directions not taken? It is difficult. Yet, one could easily have foreseen a different future of mixed use development, parks and preservation of the neighborhood’s industrial heritage and maritime industry. It is not an issue of development, but it is fundamentally an issue of the kind of development we encourage.

On a personal level, we’ve shed some tears as we’ve wandered on Beard Street and seen buildings that were part of a landscape we loved coming down. It’s been like losing friends. Still, we’ve made our peace with the Ikea even as we mourn a Red Hook now relegated to the pages of Brooklyn history books and photo exhibits. Everyone now needs to make the best of the new Ikea, whether it’s making sure they give back to Brooklyn as a community or keeping their feet to the fire in terms of truly employing Red Hook residents in jobs with decent benefits or simply buying some furniture.

Yet, today, it’s still hard not to be a little wistful about the loss of the Red Hook that was and the one that will never be. We’re a little perturbed about the short-sighted public policy choices that Brooklyn and New York City leaders have made that have brought us to this point. Just as some of the things that former shapers of the New York landscaper did are viewed very dimly today, so will the decisions made by our current leaders. Check back in about 10 years. We think there will be some bad reviews of their choices and actions.

[Photo courtesy of Racked]

Our friends at Racked are live on the scene down on Beard Street and filing reports from the Ikea opening. The latest dispatch says about 500 people are in line an that the scene is “a cross between a political rally, a big-top circus and some sort of fanatical cult gathering.”

Brooklinks is a daily selection of Brookyn-related information and images. (The photo above is Red Hook in April, 2006):

· Brooklyn DA Dropping Charges in Sean Bell Protests [NYT]
· Bensonhurst Food Pantry Facing Crisis [NYDN]
· TB Scare at Bed-Stuy School [NYP]
· At the Department of Buildings Job Fair [CityRoom]
· Some groups Lobbying Against Tax-Free Bonds for Sports Facilities [AYR]
· Who’s Sabotaging Bridge Bikers? [Runnin’ Scared]
· New Municipal Art Society President Chosen to Replace Barwick [Crain’s]
· Bed-Stuy Banana Blog Going on Hiatus! [Bed-Stuy Banana]
· Used Book Shop Coming to Atlantic Ave. [BK 11201]
· Coney Island Weekly Hoopla Links [Kinetic Carnival]
· Love is All Does the Market Hotel [Bushwick BK]
· Diamondstone Announces City Council Bid [BHB]

The reports being filed from the Ikea tent line by Adam Robb are alternately funny and weird, with the blow-by-blow of what it’s been like to camp out at the Red Hook Ikea (and await a free Ektorp sofa) being particularly compelling. Check out all the glorious coverage by clicking here.–Racked

[Photo courtesy of Tracy Collins/flickr]

The Dean Street Block Association is having a block party on Dean Street, between 6th and Carlton Avenues, on Saturday (6/21) from Noon to 6PM. Per an email:

Join your Dean Street neighbors as we party in the street between 6th & Carlton Avenues. Break out the BBQ grill, cooler and lawn chairs! Invite your friends and family to chill in the street as the block will be closed to traffic all day! Enjoy food and music, games and activities for kids, including a Moonwalk, face painting, and a clown! Tour our firehouse and an ambulance! These were big hits with the kids last year. Donate to our fund-raising flea market (where you might also find a great deal), or whip up a batch of your famous cookies for our bake sale! Proceeds from last year’s block party were used to help beautify our block with window boxes and flowers. Of course, cash donations are always appreciated.

Those who wish to volunteer or donate something can contact rbk888 [at] aol [dot] com or tc [at] 3c [dot] com.

The rezoning that put the wheels in motion for the development of Brooklyn’s Park Avenue four years ago covered most of 4th Avenue between President and 15th streets, allowing for the construction of 12-story residential buildings on the thoroughfare. What was left out of that rezoning is now set to join the higher-rise party. One of the areas covered by the Department of City Planning’s draft rezoning proposal for Gowanus is the west side of 4th Avenue between 1st and Douglass streets.” Those blocks could get 12-story residential buildings, but unlike the rest of Fourth Avenue, there would have to be “active ground floor uses.”–Brownstoner

This vid, which has interviews with some Court Street old timers, has been making the rounds and we posted it yesterday on Curbed. It is 9 minutes long, but totally worth the investment of time.

No, this sign isn’t from Park Slope, site of this summer’s Alternate Side Parking Follies (where some people say the temporary suspension of alternate side parking has made parking harder and some say it’s made no difference whatsoever). It’s from Williamsburg, where a bunch of signs on the South Side have been altered, perhaps to confuse those who don’t know which days are which.

Outside the Brooklyn Weather Observatory this morning, it’s quite nice. Today’s forecast calls for it to be cool with clouds and sun. There is a good chance of afternoon showers and thunderstorms coming through. The high will be 73. There will also be some showers and thunderstorms around tonight with a low of 60.–Accuweather

Every now and then we put a couple of Craigslist Missed Brooklyn Missed Connections in reserve for a weekday because they move us. So it is with the very short tale of tears and dropped ice cream on Bedford Avenue:

clumsy girl at penny licks – m4w – 25

outside penny licks on thursday, about 8:30 pm. you were sitting with a guy in sunglasses and laughing. i saw you accidentally drop the cone all over your pants, then you got all flustered and he just got up and left and you cried. you looked hot.

For every cloud, a silver lining.