One of our favorite summer series, Rootop Films, is back for another season. Per an email:

We’re back, kicking it off with a screening this weekend! On Saturday, May 31st, at 9:00pm we will be holding a FREE screening of the film “At the Death House Door” in Fort Greene Park, Brooklyn. The film: Pastor Carroll Pickett oversaw 95 executions at a Texas prison, but the experiences changed his views forever. The makers of “Hoop Dreams” examine this contentious issue through the story of this unique anti-death penalty activist. The filmmakers (Steve James & Peter Gilbert) will also be in attendance for a Q&A after the screening…This is our “Rooftop Films 2008 Summer Series” warm-up show. Our official opening night is Friday July 6 on the roof of the New Design High School in the Lower East Side.

Brooklyn screenings take place at the Old American Can Factory in Gowanus and at Automotive High School in Williamsburg. For the schedule so far, click here.

The City Planning Department unveiled its draft proposal for the big Gowanus rezoning at a Community Board 6 meeting in Carroll Gardens last night. The area that is proposed for rezoning is a 25 block area between Fourth Avenue and Bond Streets bounded on the south by Third Street and on the north by Butler Street. This area would be rezoned from manufacturing use to mixed use. The city is proposing to leave about 35 other blocks that it looked at with current manufacturing zoning. (At the meeting, City Council Member Bill de Blasio called for a “ban” on the construction of new hotels in the manufacturing zones; there are currently seven open or planned.) Brooklyn Planning Director Purnima Kapur explained that these other blocks are heavily used for manufacturing and that the city sees no purpose in changing the designation. In avoiding changes on these blocks, and concentrating the rezoning on the 25-block area, the city would be avoiding opposition by community groups that wanted to preserved manufacturing.

That leaves an area called the Waterfront District as the key battleground. Centered around the canal between Bond Street and Third Avenues, buildings in this area could rise to 12 stories. Developers would get significant density bonuses for adding affordable housing. Most people that spoke at the meeting were critical of different aspects of the plan, particularly of the height of buildings near the canal. Local resident Marlene Donnelly, who is part of the Friends and Residents of Greater Gowanus group said that the plan involved “a little bit of deception” and that “a lot doesn’t incorporate what the community wants.” A number of residents said that the plan ignored environmental concerns, particularly the impact of new construction on the sewer system and also voiced worries that the rezoning will encourage construction on toxic parcels that will not be adequately cleaned up. The city hopes to have the rezoning certified for the land use review process by early next year.

Highlights of the zoning changes ahead.

[Photo courtesy of Seth Holladay/flickr]

This is not a Brooklyn story, but given that we constantly cover construction safety issues and the Department of Buildings, it is so horrendous that we’d be remiss to not mention that a crane collapsed this morning at E. 91st St and First Avenue. It damaged nearby buildings and early reports are of two fatalities. There have been issues and complaints related to the crane. Full coverage at Curbed.

Brooklinks is a daily selection of Brooklyn-related information and images:

· Dealerships Forced to Remove Cars from Bay Ridge Sidewalks [NYDN]
· PlaNYC 2030 Needs a Parking Policy [AYR]
· Scarano Thinks Big on Bergen [Brownstoner]
· Looking Back [A Year in the Park]
· Flatbush Unity Garden Kicks Off [Sustainable Flatbush]
· Loving the No Children Policy at Zenkichi in the Burg [Bad Advice]
· Mini Gardens Out There [Bed-Stuy Banana]
· Big Supermarket Opening on Coney Island Ave. [Flatbush Pigeon]
· Bad Santa (and Out of Season) [New York Shitty]

The story about the guy that fell through the toilet floor at Ruby’s Bar in Coney Island over the weekend has been explained and updated. The person who posts photos as Rubyhost on flickr, explains that the person did not emerge “literally covered in shit” as was thought and says that landlord Joe Sitt is helping to pay for repairs and that Ruby’s hopes to be often for the weekend after the bathroom floor is replaced. Here’s the poop on the poop dirt:

Rubys over the weekend had an unfortunate accident as everyone has reported. The facts are as he did fall thru a partially collapsed floor in the mens room – the piping was not broken – he missed them – barely. He had literally hit the dirt floor underneath along with all the cobwebs etc. When he emerged – he was moving slowly himself up the ladder (thank goodness he had jeans on) only from his knees down was pretty filthy- mainly with dirt.

Joe Sitt offered to help.

The city is looking for someone “to operate excursions, educational boat services, and/or other waterborne vessels intended for public use” from the Brooklyn Army Terminal in Sunset Park. The RFP has gone out from the New York Economic Development Corp.–The Real Estate

[Photo courtesy of Dalton Rooney/flickr]

This gorgeous shot comes from Dalton Rooney via our GL Flickr Photo Pool. It is from Nevins Street and features the perfect combination of light, shadow and composition.

There’s another great electronics recycling opportunity coming up in Carroll Gardens this weekend. Here’s the info about it:

Recycle your old electronics! Bring your clunky TV, old fax machine or printer to our electronics recycling drive this weekend at Smith Street between Carroll and President Streets in Carroll Gardens in Brooklyn. Bill and the Lower East Side Ecology Center are teaming up for the electronic recycling event this Saturday, May 31 and Sunday, June 1 from 10am-4pm. If you can’t make it over the weekend, you can also come on Monday, June 2 from 4pm-7pm. WHERE: Smith Street between Carroll and President Streets, Carroll Gardens. WHEN: Saturday, May 31 and Sunday, June 1 from 10- 4 pm, Monday, June 2 from 4-7 pm. For more information, contact the Lower East Side Ecology Center at 212-477-4022.

Recycling old electronics items is a good thing to do for the environment, so take advantage of the opportunity.

[Photo courtesy of lostinbrooklyn]

This is another shot from beautiful Green-Wood Cemetery, which is the final resting place of many, many people and would be one of the nicest parks in the city if it wasn’t, you know, a cemetery. As such, it’s still a very cool place. This came to us via our Gowanus Lounge Photo Pool.

Outside the Brooklyn Weather Observatory it is looking good right now. Today’s forecast calls for a day that will be “seasonably warm with sunshine mixing with some clouds.” The high will be 77 and it will feel like 82. Tonight will be mostly cloudy with a low of 60.–Accuweather

This box just popped up on some ugly new construction on Union Avenue in Williamsburg, which itself, is quite boxy. The art is the most colorful thing about the puke-brick colored building.

There was more than playing going in a little park/playground on Warren Street between Hoyt and Smith in Boerum Hill late yesterday afternoon. There have been many emails on both the Boerum Hill list and the BoCoCa Parents group about gunfire in or near the park (including one explanation to a late-arriving parent of the heavy police presence being due to a “building violation”:

At just after 4 pm today near the park on Warren Street between Hoyt & Smith there were what sounded like at least 5 gunshots, pretty loud. The park was full of dozens of parents and kids and everybody just grabbed their kids and ran. The cops turned up a few minutes later.

There is also this account:

We arrived at the playground at around 4:30 this afternoon. Police tape still cordoned off Baltic St. near Hoyt & there were about 6 or so officers hanging around. I could see that from the swings area and it stayed that way until about 5 or so. I am surprised (but, maybe I shouldn’t be) that no officers came into the playground to warn those of us who arrived after the event that we should be careful.

The police said there was a ‘building violation’

Here’s one of our weekly features from the Center for the Urban Environment (CUE). This week’s interview is with Get Fresh owner Caroll Lee. Get Fresh, which is located at 370 Fifth Avenue in Park Slope, is part of the local living economy stressing organic, local foods.

Q: How did Get Fresh Get Started?

A: Get Fresh started when I realized that there were very few options for a quick, healthy meal that weren’t restaurant takeout or cooking from scratch. New Yorkers are so busy, but that doesn’t mean they should forego healthy home-cooked meals! At the same time, I was learning more and more about how the majority of our food comes from industrialized factory farms, and knew we needed an alternative. At Get Fresh, we source high-quality local and organic ingredients, then do all the prep work for your meal. At home, you follow very simple cooking or heating instructions and dinner is served!

Q: Why is it so important for people to eat local and organic?

A: Eating local and organic has a huge impact on the environment. Did you know that if every U.S. citizen ate just one meal a week made from locally and organically produced ingredients, we would save 1.1 million barrels of oil a week? Not to mention that local food is fresher, has a positive impact on the local economy, and just plain tastes better! At Get Fresh, we source all of our meat and produce from local and organic sources, and in doing so, are supporting local sustainable farmers.

Read more of the fascinating interview with Caroll Lee by clicking here.

We do enjoy a construction fence that has been busted down (and many in Williamsburg can be opened by a 12-year-old) to allow access to a deadly building demolition site. So it is with 261 N. 9 Street this week, which is one of the sites in Williamsburg being developed by an owner of the Greenpoint Hotel. The building is within our Williamsburg Triangle of Death, a corner of the Burg where one can find more wide-open sites than ones that are closed, a number of them presenting clear threats to public safety, and no evidence of effective Department of Buildings enforcement.

See the semi-demolished building in which children can play.

“Once the train finally pulled out of the station, the kid stood with his nose an inch from the door, faced away from the car full of people who’d just watched 3 kids try to beat him up…The boys kept hitting the other kid, so the man started yelling more and approaching them, other men now at this side, also yelling. Some of them started to pull the boys apart. The opposite train came, and it was scary to think that one of the fighters or mediators might wind up in front of it.”–Brooklynometry

Fifth Avenue in Park Slope now has a Park Slope 5th Avenue Business Improvement District (BID). The district will cover the area from Dean to 18th Streets. It was approved yesterday by the City Council. A statement from City Council Member Bill de Blasio said: “I commend the 5th Avenue Merchants Association for helping make this a reality. BIDs are a great way to improve and maintain commercial strips. 5th Ave is already a trendy destination because of its wide array of restaurants and shops, and the BID will only increase the popularity of the area.” The BID’s services will include maintenance/sanitation, a security program, marketing and promotion of local businesses, economic development, administration and holiday lighting.

Will the Gowanus hotel boom, which has been thoroughly chronicled and mapped out by Brownstoner, come to a premature end? It will if City Council Member Bill de Blasio has his way. Mr. de Blasio and commmunity members will be holding a press conference before the City Planning presentation on Gownanus rezoning this evening that will call for the city “to ban the development of hotels in the rezoning of the Gowanus.” (See Brownstoner’s excellent coverage today of Mr. de Blasio’s request.) Per an email and press release:

Councilmember de Blasio is calling on City Planning to ban hotels for several reasons: in predominately manufacturing areas, hotels will likely push out existing manufacturing uses, in areas that are predominately residential, hotel uses are disruptive because hotels are 24/7, often with taxis or cars idling outside, and while we are in the midst of a hotel boom, at some point that will taper off and some of these hotels will not make it or even worse, will turn into “hot sheet” motels in order to stay afloat.

Will it be the death of the Gowanus Hotel District? More to come.

The long awaited proposal for rezoning Gowanus should be revealed tonight in a community meeting in Carroll Gardens. It’s an “update and presentation” by the Department of City Planning on the next phase of the Gowanus Land Use Framework for the Community Board 6 Land Use Committee. The meeting will take place at PS 32, which is located at 317 Hoyt Street, at 6PM. The actual rezoning proposal is expected to cover about 25 blocks of the original 60 that were studied, leaving about 2/3 of the study area zoned for manufacturing rather than mixed use development. Heights up to 10-14 stories tall along the Gowanus Canal have been considered. The likely part of the neighborhood that will be rezoned are the ones marked A, B, C and D in the map here, with “Subarea B” being one of the biggest battlegrounds. There is more info on the preliminary framework here at the City Planning website. Hopefully, there will be an updated map to share tomorrow.

While Community Board 6 has already voted in favor of a liquor license for the Oyster Bar that restauranteur Jim Mamary is opening on Hoyt Street, residents attended a meeting at PS 32 in Carroll Gardens last night to talk about the plan. The session was sponsored by City Council Member Bill de Blasio and the Hoyt Street Alliance, which strongly opposed the liquor license in a residential area. Our Carroll Gardens Correspondent attended the session and filed a detailed report, saying that David Logan, a Hoyt Street resident and member of the Alliance, “stole the show with his poignant words about the impending change of neighborhood character with the opening of a bar.” Mr. Logan noted that it would be “a permanent change” with a liquor license granted to Mr. Mamary for a venture in two former doctor’s offices on a tiny stretch of Hoyt Street between Sackett and Union Street. He suggested that the bar would ultimately “‘exploit the charms” of the neighborhood for “personal gain.” Mr. Mamary, he said, should not “hold a monopoly” on what is right for the neighborhood. His establishment, he argued, would do better in a commercial rather than a residential district.

The session was moderated by Tom Gray from Mr. de Blasio’s office and by Paul Nelson from Assemblywoman Joan Millman’s Office. All told, there were a dozen speakers, and all but one spoke against the new establishment. Speakers cited quality of life, noise, violence, traffic and trash concerns. Some complained that bags of trash would block children’s path to school. Others noted that they already have to use air conditioners on nice summer nights to block noise from Mr. Mamary’s existing wine bar. A CB6 member attended but left halfway through the meeting.

Mr. Mamary declined to speak, citing ‘personal attacks and pettiness’

Brooklinks is a daily selection of Brooklyn-related information and images:

· Big Chains Get Big Tax Incentives, But Don’t Create Jobs [NYT]
· Coney Island Rescue Hero Wanted to Stay Anonymous [NYDN]
· Atlantic Yards Timetable as the Subject of a Court Fight [AYR]
· Meet the Neighbors, Part VI [Bed-Stuy Blog]
· Bed-Stuy Pigeons [Bed-Stuy Banana]
· Salvation in a Station Wagon [New York Shitty]
· Big Renovation at Atlantic Ave. Key Foods [BK 11201]
· A Blues Explosion in Fort Greene [Brooklyn Based]
· Local Bodega Robbery [Kensington Brooklyn]
· New Baby Store on Court Street [ABL]
· Nabe Bike Shop Goes Up in Flames [Sheepshead Bites]

The Fifth Annual Atlantic Avenue Artwalk is coming up on Saturday & Sunday, June 7 and 8, from 1PM-6PM both days. Per an email:

ARTWALK08 is a tour of open studios, exhibits, public art projects, and special events on Atlantic Avenue featuring over 250 artists. A wide range of artists across media will open their private studios to the public for a special, rare glimpse into the artist’s workspace and creative process.Special events in local businesses, galleries, and many more locations throughout these historic neighborhoods also includes music, film, vibrant public art projects, and activities for families and children of all ages.

The Artwalk is held on Atlantic Ave. and surrounding streets. Go here for more info and a downloadable PDF Map.

There is some very tough chalk writing in the Hot Spot Tot playground in Flatbush. For instance, it says “You can play. No taking crap. No peeing. You can smack people with the swing…You can show your ass and your pennise and (? something)”–Flatbush Pigeon

We posted about the Celebrate Brooklyn Widget last year and it’s almost that time again. Per the widget website:

The Celebrate Brooklyn Widget will keep you informed by displaying the details of the next upcoming event as well as a list of all remaining events for the current season. Mac OS X 10.4.3 or above and an internet connection are required. Both the widget and the events are free and this widget will make sure you never miss the shows you’ve been waiting for!

Yes, it’s almost summer.

National Grid is drilling holes at Thomas Greene Park in Gowanus. The first round of holes is six feet deep. The next round will go to 60 feet. The utility is trying to figure out the extent of the toxic coal tar under the park, playground and swimming pool. It is said to be deep enough to not be a threat to people.–Brownstoner

This is East River State Park in Williamsburg, an expanse that it not landscaped, but is heavily used by North Brooklyn residents and offers opportunities to sit by the East River and stare at Manhattan.