The renovation work underway at Kellogg’s Diner, at the corner of Union and Metropolitan Avenues, looks serious. The only cause for concern, of course, is that the building is surrounded by a big new Chetrit development whose tag line is “Gateway to Williamsburg,” which will be a big mixed-use commercial and residential development. In that context, Kellogg’s is what is known as a “hold out building.” In any case, the door says “Hope to See You Soon.” We assume that “hope” is just the way they happened to write it and doesn’t really have any meaning.

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

• Parents Want Schools Tested for PCBs [NYDN]
• Brooklyn Needs a Venue for Discussion of Development [AYR]
• Billions of Bucks for Bruce Roundup [No Land Grab]
• Bodega Owner Faces Felony Charges After Attacking Teen [NYDN]
• Hammer Attack Leaves Teen Critical [NYP]
• Ask About Brooklyn Architecture [CityRoom]
• Checking Out Coney Island Avenue [Brit in Brooklyn]
• New Images of 40s Coney [Kinetic Carnival]
• Working on Traffic Calming, Other Measures in PLG [Hawthorne Street]
• Stoned on Fifth [Brooklynometry]
• Transmitter Park Meeting Notes [New York Shitty]
• Mysterious Wreck of a Building on Bedford [Clinton Hill Blog]
• Gowanus Photo Gallery [Brownstoner]
• The Luso-American Cultural Center in Carroll Gardens [Lost City]

Among the things that spring means are more chances to get out on the Gowanus Canal. So it is with the 9th Annual Gowanus Canal Earth Day Flotilla. This will be happening on Sunday, April 20 from 11AM-3PM and will include “a ceremonial eco-cruise” on the Big G. It is sponsored by the Urban Divers and includes the chance to go up the canal on a 32-foot Indian Shipping Canoe that holds 21 people. Per an email:

Join us for a fun-filled of environmental education through recreation. Paddle along this annual flotilla on the historic and notorious little estuarine waterway that flows in the heart of Brooklyn. Armed with landing nets, garbage bags, our fleet of skiffs, including our unique 32ft canoe (accommodates 21 paddlers at at a time). The Urban Divers Environmental Educators guide eco-volunteers on an eco-cruise and help pick-up floatable debris along the water and on shore…Everyone is also welcomed to bring their own kayaks or canoes or GET ON BOARD OUR FLEET OF VESSELS, including our unique GIANT 32ft INDIAN SHIPPING CANOE- vessel accommodates 21 paddlers at time. To register to volunteer call The Urban Divers Estuary Conservancy at 718-802-9874, or 347-224-5828.

The starting point is Second Street at the Canal. A post with photos from last year’s event is here and a video is here.

These heads appeared this week in a couple of places in Williamsburg. These are on Driggs Avenue between N. 9 & N. 10 Streets.

“The art world has masticated in contemplation over sculptor Tom Otterness just as the dog he assassinated in the name of artistic expression over 20 years ago might have chomped on a tasty bone. The chance to jump on the Otterness Hate Wagon has come (literally) to DUMBO where the artist’s piece Large Covered Wagon is now on display. (If you get off at the 14th Street stop of the A,C,E you’ve already had a chance to fall in love/hate with his whimsical statues.)”–Brooklyn Heights Blog

Court Street, Cobble Hill

“For all her grit, filth, grease, stench, pollution, and absurd amounts of over-development (do we really need more condos, peeps? I mean, really!), Sheepshead Bay is not a half bad place to hang one’s hat at the end of the day.” Nice dusk pics, too.–Erica’s Blog

From a building site on Hope Street in Williamsburg, near Havemeyer.

In case you care about the G Train and didn’t make it to last week’s City Council Meeting, here’s another chance to speak your mind. New York City Transit President Howard Roberts will be appearing at a forum tomorrow, April 16, from 5PM-7PM. It’s the NYC Transit Riders Council, 2008 President’s Forum on Subways. It takes place at 2 Broadway (between Beaver and Stone Streets) in the 20th Floor Auditorium. (Photo ID is required to get into the building.) Per an email: “Attendees must register in person by name and topic in order to speak. Speakers will be called by topic. Once all speakers on a topic have been heard, no further comments on that topic will be accepted. There is no advance registration.” More info, as always, on the Save the G Blog.

So, which is better: the rendering of the Gowanus Condo on First Street in Park Slope or the very different reality of the now (mostly uncovered) building?–Curbed

Havemeyer Street, Williamsburg

The weather outside the Brooklyn Weather Observatory early on this Tuesday morning has all the makings of a glorious day. The forecast calls for “a full day of sunshine” with a high of 60, so that one can make the walk to the mailbox with the tax return in beautiful spring weather or go outside and cheer up after hitting the send button on the e-filing. Tonight will be clear with a low of 41. A number of glorious days are coming up this week.–Accuweather

[Photo courtesy of Gary Mirabelle/Mirabelle Studios]

This is a photo taken behind the Fairway in Red Hook by sculptor, artist and photographer Gary Mirabelle, who is a regular photo contributor to GL. A show of Mr. Mirabelle’s photo called “The Figure” will be on display at the Patio Lounge at 179 Fifth Avenue in Park Slope through May. The opening is April 16, from 6PM-9PM.

The development at 360 Smith Street has gotten a website, but not to sell condos. It’s intended to keep people informed about what’s going on with the project. As such, it may be a watershed event in the use of the internet by developers to communicate with a neighborhood about their project. The 360 Smith building has been deeply controversial and led to the formation of CORD, a neighborhood group that later began to push for an overall downzoning of Carroll Gardens. Developer Billy Stein has made two community presentations about the building and, most recently, was holding “private meetings” with some residents. Word of the Oliver House Condos website, which includes two renderings of the revised plans for the former Heavy Metal Building, came from City Council Member Bill de Blasio’s District Director Tom Gray, who sent out an email via the Carroll Gardens Neighborhood Association yesterday evening. Mr. Gray wrote:

Billy Stein the developer of the 360 Smith Street has recently launched a website specifically to the project. On the site you will find real time project updates, renderings and may ask the developer questions regarding the project. There is a live person at the contact number provided around the clock for questions and concerns after hours.

The new 360 site says that work will be taking place at the property tomorrow, with workers starting to install a construction fence that will presumably mean the end of the Democracy Wall at the embattled subway plaza at the Carroll Gardens station on which residents have been posting messages and posters since last summer. It is unknown if they intend to use the fence for similar purposes. The website says that the construction fence will not include the any of the plaza itself. As for the plaza, a reliable neighborhood source confirmed that the “rumor” we posted on Friday about a possible lawsuit concerning whether the developer or the city owns the property is more than “a rumor” and that those who strongly believe the plaza is public property are talking “seriously about the possibility of a lawsuit.”

The fight about the Jim Mamary Oyster Bar on Hoyt Street has engendered strong opinions along the way, some of which have played out in the form of vigorous back-and-forth between supporters and opponents in our own comments. Last week’s approval of a liquor license for the establishment led to a loud reaction from neighborhood blogger Pardon Me for Asking, who accused Community Board 6 of “sticking it to” residents and setting “a very, very dangerous precedent” that “signaled to all restaurateurs that this district is a free for all and that residential streets are as good as any to open bars.” An email from what appeared to be a member of the Hoyt Street Alliance said, “They should be called Business Board 6. They are absolutely useless to the community.” The led to an angry email from CB6 member Mark Shames who voted against the license, but who felt “compelled to defend the board against an attack that does not fairly reflect the facts or the complexity of the case.” Here’s an excerpt:

I am a member of community board 6. I voted against the liquor license at the board meeting. Except on the most non-controvercial issues I tend to find myself with little company and I have no particular love for the board leadership. However, I feel compelled to defend the board against an attack that does not fairly reflect the facts or the complexity of the issue. First, the board has only considered two liquor licenses in its history and it rejected the other one….

The latest email, from Glenn Kelly (who is the original blogger’s husband), does not address the dispute, but says “I am surprised and disappointed in the decision made by our community board in voting in favor of the liquor license application on Hoyt street.” The Hoyt Street group intends to appeal the license to the State Liquor Authority. The odds of success at that level are unknown. The broader issue is that residents feel the city will avoid issuing new liquor license on Smith Street and steer them to places like Hoyt Street, which neighbors are afraid will turn into “another Smith Street.”

Brooklyn Flea, the big Fort Greene Sunday production from our friends at Brownstoner, had a great second weekend despite weather that was, once again, somewhat less than ideal. When we stopped in around 4PM there were still people flowing into the Bishop Loughlin HS schoolyard, although clearly crowds had thinned somewhat from peak times. We found a wonderful assortment of vendors offering both new handcrafted items and older “flea market-type” goods. In other words: a little something to keep everyone shopping for everything from handmade jewelry and art to vintage clothing and retro furniture happy. The Flea got a big boost this weekend with major coverage from the New York Times. We were struck by the large number of people that it is drawing to its corner of Fort Greene and by its size and variety. We don’t think we’re taking a big risk by predicting that it will be a big feature of Brooklyn Sunday life through the Spring, Summer and Fall. Totally cool.

The South Brooklyn Neighborhood Alliance–whose formation we noted in an exclusive report here on March 5 and whose name and status we updated last Thursday–has officially announced itself. It involves groups from Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill and Red Hook’s Columbia Waterfront District. A press release from SoBNA went out last night and it has a temporary website here. The release says it has been:

created to introduce community-based planning. The primary goal of the SoBNA is to build sound neighborhoods through community-based planning that engages the residents, small businesses, elected officials, city government and developers. We are committed to supporting the unique character of each of our neighborhoods, enhancing the quality of life for our residents through cooperative planning for much needed mixed-use development. It is our goal to advocate for our communities through civic involvement, education and community building.

Groups that a members of SoBNA are: Baltic & Warren Neighbors, Carroll Gardens Neighborhood Association, Inc., Cobble Hill Association, Columbia Waterfront Neighborhood Association, Committee for the Historic Integrity of Cobble Hill, CORD, South Brooklyn Local Development Corporation, Union Sackett Block Association and Warren Street Block Association. Two Gowanus groups–Friends and Residents of Greater Gowanus and Friends of Bond–are absent from list. A local activist we spoke with on Saturday told us the new Alliance intends to be politically active and wants to make it presence felt in the 2009 local elections. The group may be particularly active in rezoning issues. It will be interesting to watch, as some of the groups have been involved in community activism about some of the most controversial developments and issues in neighborhoods such as Carroll Gardens and Gowanus and do not always see eye-to-eye on them.

We hadn’t checked on the site of the Karl Fischer “Monster Tower” at Grand Street and Driggs Avenue, which had been the scene of an earlier demolish & dig frenzy as the controversial neighborhood downzoning was being considered. Apparently, the city slapped the site–which has had an astounding 44 complaints phoned in against it–with a Stop Work Order the day before a vote on the rezoning because “job not vested…foundation 0% completed” under the rezoning, which was approved by the City Council. Someone wrote on the document, whose image is below, “job to be lifted by zoning only.” It would appear that Mr. Fischer will be shrinking his 15-story building by nine stories to comply with the rezoning (which is the subject of a bitter local debate and a lawsuit by property owners).

“A potential Prospect Heights Historic District remains on track, though the process could take two years, representatives from the city Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) told an attentive, supportive, and sometimes wary audience last Wednesday night. The meeting, called by the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Council (PHNDC), drew more than 130 people, many of them homeowners, to P.S. 9 on Underhill Avenue.”–AYR

The former Anthony Anastasio International Longshoreman’s Association building at 340 Court Street is quickly disappearing. It has quickly overcome its Sarajevo Phase and is about to enter its Non-Existence Period. We would think it will no longer be visible by the end of this week. The Clarett Group, anticipates starting to dig a foundation for its new building on the site by late next month.

We stopped by the demolition site at N. 9 and Roebling (239-261 N. 9 Street) yesterday to see if there was still a hole in the fence allowing free access to the nastiness within and found two things: (A). It had been plugged and (B). the site had been hit with a Stop Work Order for “hazardous conditions” on Friday. However, (C.) 261 N. 9 Street, which is part of the same development, was featuring an open fence and construction equipment. (The latter is a former Construction Site Du Jour, but last time we featured it, there was no heavy equipment on site.) The end result of all this (whether people are injured or not) will be a five-story Karl Fischer building with 91 apartments.

The city has put up a big fence around sagging parts of the boardwalk rather than repairing it and Coney Island businesses are very angry about it. Boardwalk entrepreneur Dianna Carlin, who owns the Lola Staar Boutique, and whose store is somewhat blocked by the fence, sent out a press release headlined “Free the Boardwalk!” that demands the city make repairs. Business owners are saying they’ll take down the fence and fix the boardwalk themselves.

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

• 106-Year-Old Woman Celebrates Birthday at Crown Heights Church [NYDN]
• Brooklyn’s Art Scene Outside Galleries [Metro]
• Increased Air Traffic Noise? [OTBKB]
• Pier 1 Buildings Disappear [McBrooklyn]
• New Flatbush Food Coop Looks Great [Sustainable Flatbush]
• The Five Faces of Mary [Bed-Stuy Banana]
• Planet Mom T-Shirts [OTBKB]
• Bet You Couldn’t Park This Way in Park Slope [GerritsenBeach.Net]
• Demolition Approaches for South Slope House [IMBY]
• Francis Morrone Walking Tour [Ditmas Park Blog]
• Greenpoint Mufflers & Pipes ’03 [Fading Ad Blog]

This is from Berry Street in Williamsburg between N. 6 and N. 7 Streets. We appreciate the juxtaposition of happy face and the unfinished Finger Building.

Here are some cool pics shots from the J Platform at Myrtle Avenue in Cypress Hills in 2003. Check out the rooftop views, old signs, tagging, etc.–Fading Ad Blog