We’re not sure what advantage one gains by boarding up windows in a building at the major intersection in Coney Island, other than to create an air of abandonment and urban rot. Yet, plywood has gone up in the windows of the historic Henderson’s Building at Stillwell and Surf Avenues, across the street from the subway station, where hundreds of thousands of visitors to Coney Island arrive. The building, of course, is owned by Thor Equities and developer Joe Sitt. Thor plans to demolish it, but many are urging its preservations. The building has been significantly altered over the years, but it has a colorful Coney Island history. The bigger discussion is the fodder for other posts. Our point here is simply to show the degraded state of the building and to point out that it didn’t look quite so bad before Thor put plywood in the windows. Any redevelopment of the property is still a long way away. There’s a bit of a discussion on the topic at the Coney Island Message Board.

If you’ve been to Coney Island, or if you’ve read GL since January, you probably know about the huge fences thrown up by Thor Equities around its property in Coney Island. The one around the land where the go-kart tracks, batting cage and bumper boat ride were demolished, which is the equivalent of an entire city block–is a particularly ugly one. Although it’s been painted blue and there appears to be an effort to paint over graffiti when it appears, we’ve wondered why no effort has been made to upgrade it. We were particularly curious after we saw some of the colorful banners that Thor has put up inside the fence. We got an email yesterday saying that “the City would not allow Thor to hang the colorful banners they had made to cover the construction fencing and add a little color to Coney.”

Now, we realize that Thor’s “colorful banners” are, in effect, advertising for its redevelopment scheme and that this could be the core of the objection to it or that there is something in the building code that prevents it. Yet, it would also seem that the city should have worked to liven the space for the summer. There were early discussions of allowing street vendors on Stillwell Avenue. At one point, we saw vendors draping the fence with merchandise they were selling. (We assume the police put an end to the practice, as we only saw it once or twice.) All we’re saying is that the summer season is already more than half-over and the simplest steps haven’t been taken to liven the corridors that have been made dead as public street scapes by Thor’s demolition work.

Brooklinks is a daily selection of Brooklyn related information and images.

• Vito Lopez Invokes Jane Jacobs to Call for Smaller New Domino [AYR]
• Class Conflict at Domino Hearing [Brownstoner]
• Tenants Protests at Starrett City Office [NYDN]
• New Beginning Coming for McCarren Pool [NYPress]
• What Are the Borders of Kensington? [Kensington Brooklyn]
• The Circles of Apartment Share Hell [newyorkshitty]
• Roof Party for Greenpoint Lofts [Queens Ledger]
• Greenpoint’s got a “weird neighborhood-y vibe” [11222]
• Bensonshurst Park Restoration Plan [NYT]
• $40M Overhaul for Downtrodden Park Near Coney [NYP]
• Developers Smell Gold Along the Gowanus [Metro]
• Was a Bicyclist Run Down on Seventh Avenue? [OTBKB]
• Detail on the Mermelstein South Williamsburg Rent Strike Battle [NYPress]
• Things You See When Walking [A Brooklyn Bachelor]

From time to time we’ve touched on the topic of oysters in the Gowanus. We think they, and the Gowanus Oyster Stewards, are fascinating. Our oyster friends get some space in the New York Press this week, so we though we’d share a bit:

“Oysters are native to the Gowanus,” explains Katie Mosher-Smith, a young Vermont native and mother of two who now lives in the neighborhood. She’s also the program director for the Gowanus Oyster Stewards. “They’re native to all of the East Coast. In fact, the Gowanus had tons of oysters—food for the rich and food for the poor. They were big back then—the size of dinner plates, it’s said.” According to Mosher-Smith, when the Gowanus was a navigable channel, the oysters would clean the water and formed an ecosystem, like building reefs, that provided natural filtration. “But all the harvesting and the dredging kind of wiped out the oysters,” she explains. She says it will take a “hybridization of remediation” to clean up Gowanus and other bodies of water like it, but history has taught us that oysters are cheap and effective labor.

Mosher-Smith coordinates a cadre of neighborhood residents who come down to this stretch of the Gowanus Canal most Saturday afternoons to haul out their oyster nets and count, measure and clean the oyster population. Sitting around with this earnest group of urban environmentalists, scrubbing shellfish and learning about the seals that used to navigate this stretch of water and the squatters and gentrifiers that do now, the experience is a combo of a day at the dog park, an afternoon planting trees and a symposium on the evolution of Brooklyn.

You can check out the Gowanus Oyster Garden Stewards blog here. It has links to more Gowanus info.

Related Posts:
Gowanus Oyster Gardening
Check Out the Gowanus Oysters

[Photo courtesy of paulpablopawel/flickr]

Starting today, and every Thursday in August, kids under the age of 12 can ride the cool Prospect Park Carousel for free. The Carousel dates to 1912 and was restored in 1990 by the Prospect Park Alliance. It has 51 hand carved horses, as well as a giraffe, lion, deer and two dragon-pulled chariots; the Wurlitzer organ has 141 pipes and 16 bells. If you want to swing by, the carousel is open Thursdays through Sundays, from 12-6PM (5PM after Labor Day). If you go on a day other than Thursday or if you are older than 12, the rides are $1.50 and a book of 6 tickets is $8. Children under three must be accompanied by a parent or guardian, giving adults a perfect excuse to ride, while pretending they are only doing their duty.

The Carousel is located in the Park’s Children’s Corner, just inside the Willink entrance to the Park, at Ocean and Flatbush Avenues and Empire Boulevard. The nearest subways are the Q, S, or B Train to Prospect Park station. The free rides are sponsored by Astoria Federal Savings. For more information about goings-on in Prospect Park in general, click here.

What you’re looking at is Astronaut photograph ISS015-E-548 from the Image Science & Analysis Laboratory at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. We found it courtesy of Flatbush Gardener, whose great blog covers more than backyard flora and fauna. You can find the original photo page here. It may have been up for a long time, but it’s new to us and we like it.

GL headed down to Coney Island yesterday evening to check out the presence of the Cole Brothers Circus, which is playing through August 5. The yellow and red striped tent–which, quite frankly, looks as though it needs a serious power wash–can be seen from blocks away as the F Train and others travel to the Stillwell Avenue Station.

It was hard to say exactly what kind of business the circus was doing, but it looked like a decent sized crowd was coming out of one show, and there seemed to be more people than usual around for a Tuesday night. The circus is occupying land cleared by Thor Equities that had been home to two Go-Kart Tracks, a batting cage and a bumper boat ride. The land has been empty since winter, surrounded by a blue fence. Interestingly, Thor has decorated the inside of the fence with “Future of Coney Island” banners, but the exterior is still simply painted blue. Free outdoor Monday night movies will follow on the property after the Circus leaves town after the weekend.

Don’t look now, but our old friend The Modern on N. 7th Street in Williamsburg, to which we’ve devoted much space (for instance, here, here and here), has been hit with another Stop Work Order. You’ll note the image above about workers apparently drilling into, or coming close to drilling into, the L Train subway tunnel, which runs along the property. Last week, the development damaged a sewer line, requiring emergency repairs. And, it’s been noted that it is undermining the sidewalk in front of the project. The New York Post even picks up on the story today, playing up the Robert Scarano connection and noting that “NYC Transit officials said the incident did not cause service problems, but residents said transit inspectors had been monitoring the site for weeks since the first complaints about drilling were made last month.”

Related Posts:
More Modern Trouble in Williamsburg
How to Have a Crappy, Modern Weekend on N. 7th Street
The Modern Continues to Improve Life on N. 7th
The Modern Rocks Williamsburg at 1:30 AM

Here’s a mystery about two Prospect Park ducklings. We found it yesterday on OTBKB, which had posted a link to a long item about two ducklings that went missing in Prospect Park mid-July. We fear that, by now, their fate is a moot point, yet a bunch of photos of the cute duo were posted as was some of their tale. We urge you to read the story, but more than anything, this is a wonderful excuse to run heartbreakingly cute pictures. If you know what happened to the ducklings, who the blogger nicknamed Moe & Larry, email the writer at giveducksachance (at) gmail.com. She really wants to know and, at this point, so do we. There’s a little gallery of duckling photos with the post.

[Photo courtesy of Luma]

The Parkside Auto Repair property at the corner of Fourth Avenue and Third Street has been sold. Well, at least, there’s a big sticker on the “for sale” sign saying that it’s in contract. We don’t know if it fetched the asking price of $3.75 million, but that will become known soon enough. The lot has a 20,000 buildable square feet and is zoned commercial. It’s across the street from J.J. Byrne Park and the Novo Park Slope and just down the block from the Hotel Le Bleu. The owner once told us he thought about building a Red Lobster on the property.

Related Post:
Gowanus Rising: $3.75M at 3rd St. & Fourth Ave.

The announcement that car-free hours in Central Park are being expanded has led some Brooklyn groups to say that Prospect Park is being left out. Park Slope Neighbors sent out a press release yesterday saying that “City Hall overlooked several clear and easy options to make Prospect Park safer, healthier and more enjoyable for Brooklynites.” Among the options:

* Closure of the northbound East Drive during the evening rush hours, when traffic is minimal.
* Closing Prospect Park’s 3rd Street entrance to cars to eliminate dangerous conflicts between motor vehicles and the many children and parents who use two popular, nearby playgrounds.
* Expanding the already crowded pedestrian and cyclist lanes on the park drive eliminating one of the motor vehicle lanes.

In the release Park Slope Neighbors co-founder Aaron Naparstek said, “It’s great that the Bloomberg Administration is following through on its Long-Term Planning and Sustainability process by reducing motor vehicle traffic in Central Park, but it’s a shame that the Mayor seems to have forgotten about Prospect Park.”

“The increase in car-free hours in Central Park is great news. The only way it could be better is if Prospect Park had been included too,” said Robert Witherwax, coordinator of the Grand Army Plaza Coalition (GAPCo). “GAPCo supports creating a more livable, balanced, pedestrian friendly Grand Army Plaza, and reducing traffic on the Park Drives would help us to achieve that.”

A study cited by the group found that more than 75 percent of those surveyed reported a “close” call with a vehicle while walking or biking in the park and that 60 percent said that accessing Prospect Park during hours where cars are allowed into the park was “dangerous.”

1) Brooklyn Pita on Seventh Avenue, which has been in the works for many months, is finally open on Seventh Avenue between Seventh Street and Eighth Street. Falafel and gyros for everybody.

2)We don’t know about the wisdom of calling a tanning salon “Alaskan.” (Truth be told, we don’t know about tanning salons in general.) However, Park Slopers will now have the option of Alaskan Sun Tanning, which is next to Brooklyn Pita, at 303 Seventh Avenue. Alaskan Sun Tanning, in fact, is a small chain, with other locations in Bay Ridge and Bensonhurst. (At least, those are the two that show up on the map on the website, although a map of the entire country pops up.) They appear to have a large second floor space on Seventh.

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

• State Sending Out Eminent Domain-Related Letters in Atlantic Yards Footprint [Sun]
• It Came from the Blogosphere [No Land Grab]
• Trying to Flip Greene Avenue Atrocity [Brownstoner]
• Scantily Clad Floating Pool Swimmers Scandalize Brooklyn Heights [BDE]
• To All the Landlords I’ve Loathed [newyorkshitty]
• Boymelgreen’s Faux Townhouse Sells [Set Speed]
• Will Fort Greene Suffer Same Fate as Brownsville [Duffield St. Underground]
• 60 Henry Street Scaffolding Coming Down [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
• Domino Museum Advocates Revealed [Lost City]
• Circus Comes to Coney Island [NY1]
• On Brooklyn, Dodges and Dodgers [Brooklynometry]
• Detail on The Yard in the Old Issue Project Room Gowanus space [Brooklyn Based]
• A Solution to Stroller Rage [Streets Blog]
• Congestion Pricing and PLG [Across the Park]

If you haven’t heard, and if what’s under your feet is your kind of thing, then you should know that tours of the old subway tunnel under Atlantic Avenue are being held again. What’s it like down there? Check out Nathan Kensinger Photography for a look. He’s posted several pics from a recent trip down there. He writes:This tunnel was built in 1844 and sealed in the 1860’s. It was considered lost until Brooklyn’s Bob Diamond discovered an entrance in 1980. The tunnel runs underneath Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn. Entry is gained through a manhole cover in the middle of a busy intersection. The tunnel was closed to the public for the last five years, but it will now be open at specific times.Check out more information about the tunnel and tours here.

Officials from the New York Economic Development Corp. have made a number of trips to amusement parks around the world to look at possible models for Coney Island, reports Jotham Sederstrom in today’s Daily News. Among the destinations: Blackpool, England, Copenhagen (photo of Tivoli Gardens above), Amsterdam and Orland. Mr. Sederstrom writes:

Since 2005, city Economic Development Corp. officials have visited five locations – in Blackpool, England; Copenhagen and another Danish city; Amsterdam and Orlando – in search of the best rides, the boldest designs and the most effective ways to draw crowds.

“People no longer just want amusements,” said Coney Island Development Corp. President Lynn Kelly…

Paid for by the EDC, the journeys included two stops in Denmark – in Dyrehavsbakken, the world’s oldest amusement park, and in Tivoli Gardens, where Kelly and other officials rode the historic 93-year-old Rutsjebanen roller coaster. In Florida, officials hit the rides at Universal Studios theme park and Disney World. In England, they went to Blackpool, a beach resort that shares similarities with Coney Island.

Officials say they aren’t negotiating with anyone, just seeking ideas. How this fits in with Thor Equities plans for its Coney Island property is unclear.

We featured this building as a “Construction Site Du Jour” back in the spring because it was so special. Well, now that it’s been fully unveiled to the public, it’s just as nice. It’s not as, uh, ornate in design as some of our previous “What Were They Thinking?” friends. Nonetheless, its utilitarian character and profusion of Fedder’s air conditioning unit give it that certain something that make you scratch your head and say, “What were they thinking?” Thanks, as always, to our Greenpoint correspondent for taking note of this beauty and sharing.

The murder rate in North Brooklyn is apparently increasing. The New York Sun reports that, as of last week, “the homicide rate had risen 13% in the 10 precincts that make up North Brooklyn; the city as a whole is in a downward trend.” There have been 78 murders in the northern half of Brooklyn this year compared with 69 during the same period last year. We’re not sure that indicates a serious trend, but the number of shootings is also up about 13 percent. Meanwhile, murder arrests are down 10 percent. Citywide, the homicide rate has fallen 15 percent so far this year compared to the same period last year.

Were there warnings before the roof collapse at that building at 90 First Place in Carroll Gardens on Sunday night? Brownstoner has details on the collapse and the Department of Buildings response, including a Stop Work Order. A look at the DOB website, finds 6 complaints lodged against the building since May, including ones for large pieces of falling debris, an illegal fence, debris being tossed from windows and construction exceeding the approved permit (exterior work being done when the permit only covered interior work). Three of the complaints, however, relate to the roof collapse itself.

In any case, we got the following email via the Carroll Gardens Neighborhood Association, saying neighbors have been concerned about the building:

The roof of a building under construction at 90 First Place collapsed last night. The fire, police and building departments were on site assessing the situation. There is currently a stop work order posted on site. The elected officials were notified. This is the building that has a construction shed that goes completely to the sidewalk, and that sometimes has a truck collecting debris in the courtyard. (Parking in the courtyards is illegal under the City Transportation Code).

I was told by tenants of the adjacent buildings that the roof had been sagging for some time, and that 311 had been notified by several of the nearby tenants and property owners. Some of the nearby neighbors surmise that the rain on Saturday probably may have facilitated the collapse. This building had been completely gutted and the walls had just been stabilized with supporting beams, but a neighbor who has a view of the building said that many of the beams seemed to have been knocked down by the weight of the roof debris. Neighbors told me that they have reported other construction site problems to the building’s department and 311.

There’s no record of “sagging roof” complaints on the DOB website, which is interesting.

[Photo courtesy of Property Shark]

We’re not even sure how we found the listing for this building at Union and Bond in Gowanus/Carroll Gardens, but it can be yours for a mere $12 million. It’s listed on City Cribs, and this is what they have to say:

This corner warehouse on Bond Street is very large development site in a very hot area – Gowanus. The warehouse is located on the Gowanus Canal, hugging a bridge connecting the two neighborhoods. Lots of very famous artists have bought large studios there. The zoning has been changed on a number of properties to allow for more building. Currently there are several condo conversion projects underway.

The building itself is 40′ by 247′ and the lot is 28,500 square feet. The current zoning for the property is commercial, but the listing doesn’t mention the ongoing process of an overall rezoning for Gowanus.

We’re not entirely sure what is planned for 291 Kent Avenue, which is a long, narrow lot across the street from the Domino Sugar Plant (AKA, as of recently, the New Domino with 2,000 apartments). What we can say is that the building on the site has been demolished and that the Department of Buildings website shows approval for a new building with 23 units. (It also shows the new building being one-story tall, so we’re figuring there’s an error somewhere.) The developer of the property is 291 Kent Properties LLC. Anyone with further info, do let us know. What we do know is that any building going up in that spot and anyone moving into a property there better be a fan of long-term construction as the mega-development across the street should be going strong until 2017ish.

Without question, the proposed “New Domino” development that was formally rolled out to the press at an on-site event last week and which is has its first hearings today in from of the City Planning Commission, would be a huge project. It would include at least 2,200 residential units and several buildings of 30 and 40 stories. It would create serious transportation challenges and significant new density in the neighborhood, among other things. Overall, the $1.3 billion development would take at least eight years to build and be one of the most significant projects on the entire North Brooklyn waterfront. For anything that comes close (at least, in terms of announced projects) one needs to look at the Queens West project in Long Island City.

We say this in order to say that Norman Oder dug deep into the Domino project on Atlantic Yards Report yesterday, drawing parallels between the New Domino and Atlantic Yards. Mr. Oder, was particularly taken by the developer’s spin on the project (which emphasized affordable housing, open space and historic preservation) and flipped it on its head:

The press release (not online) issued last week sure sounded good:
Plans for the New Domino Set Goal of 30% of Units for Affordable Housing in Mixed-Income Community on the Brooklyn Waterfront
Former Industrial Site Will Mirror the City’s Economic and Cultural Diversity and Preserve Historic Architecture in Williamsburg

An equally skewed, though likely not inaccurate, press release might have stated:
Plans for the New Domino Include 1540 Million-Dollar Condos on Brooklyn’s Waterfront
Four Tall Towers, Minimal Historic Preservation Needed To Achieve Profits for Much-Criticized Silent Partner; Significant Government Subsidies and Rezoning Sought

Mr. Oder’s examination of the proposal is very, very long, but anyone interested in gaining a real sense of the development and its impact ought to read it. For instance, he points out that the developers will be seeking to upzone land across Kent Avenue from the main plant site, in addition to upzoning the waterfront site itself. He also notes that the developers spent $400,000 on lobbying the Department of City Planning in 2005 and 2006. The Department is holding “Scoping” hearings today from 2PM-5PM and from 6PM-8:45PM

The email we got along with the link to the YouTube vid above, which is really more of a Powerpoint presentation than a video, said “why can’t we have affordable housing and something that gives back to the community, city, etc? it could even be private financing if need be.” Yesterday, Lost City described the group advocating for this as “a group of prominent Billyburg arts leaders are trying to stir up support for a plan which would transform the Domino Plant into a world-class art center, a la The Tate Modern in London.” He has an extended explanation of why the plan would make sense. And, the idea even makes the jump to a story in today’s Sun. Anyone interested in New Domino alternatives should also check out the Waterfront Preservation Alliance‘s extensive postings on further historic preservation on the property. Right now, the Adant House, which is probably the most attractive historic structure on the property is not up for landmarking and would be demolished. Its loss would be an architectural tragedy for future generations of Brooklyn residents. One doesn’t have to have an architecture degree to see how the Adant Building could be renovated and repurposed–say as space for the arts.

What you are looking at is the rapid progress being made on 525 Union Avenue, the luxury condo going up behind Our Lady of Mount Carmel, the Giglio church on Havemeyer Street in Williamsburg. One of the reasons that the building has gone up so quickly is that there had been a great deal of Sunday work on the site, which as we noted (and videotaped), was making a nasty racket for parishioners during mass. We’re glad to report though that ever since our posts and the WNBC news crew that showed up one Sunday, all has been quiet. And progress on the building still seems fast.

Related Posts:
A Peaceful Sunday Morning in Williamsburg
Williamsburg’s Giglio Church Under Siege by Construction

Brooklinks is a daily selection of Brooklyn-related information and images. Today, we pay our respects to Tom Snyder, who passed away yesterday.

• Yvette Clarke Taking 6-Week Medical Leave of Absence [City Room]
• Brooklyn Housing Court Trial Over South Williamsburg Rent Strike Wraps Up [BDE]
• Weekly Coney HOOPLA! [Kinetic Carnival]
• The Wonder Wheel is a Wonder [Lost City]
• Clinton & Montague Get Craned [BK 11201]
• Group Wants Old Domino Plant Turned into Tate-Like Museum [Sun]
• Catcall Construction Site Du Jour: 240 Richardson Street [newyorkshitty]
• Is the Best Public Bathroom in NYC on the Brighton Beach Boardwalk? [NYDN]
• Updating the Scarano on Fourth Street [Brownstoner]
• Kensington’s Wikipedia Page Sucks [Kensington Brooklyn]
• Bedford Avenue, Part I [Forgotten NY]
• Community Health Information Fair on Saturday [Bed-Stuy Blog]
• Smith Street Tree Solution [McBrooklyn]
• A Day on the Gowanus [Aesthetic/Esthetic]
• Brooklyn in Berlin! [Clinton Hill Blog]
• Man Busted in Bizarre Attempted Brooklyn Abductions [NYP]

If it’s not one thing, it’s another. In recent weeks, we’ve had a spate of stories about car window smashings and tire slashings on Boerum Hill, not to mention hookers under windows and (0ur favorite) the Boerum Hill Crapper. This morning, we find some emails about everyone’s favorite urban sonic scourge–the screaming car alarm. We have this:

OK – this morning between 7 and 8 a car alarm of a blue-green Isuzu Trooper on the corner of Dean and Hoyt was going off for, like, a friggin hour. This is ridiculous. I am not a late sleeper – but who wants to hear this crap in the morning even if one is awake??? What can we do to get cars that go off like this towed?

And, we have this advice:

What to do? Go outside and write down the licence plate and make of the car. Then call 911, like I did, and give them the info. Put a note on the car telling the owner their alarm is malfunctioning. Tell the owner in a note of the time the alarm was going off and the problem that this noise has caused. (Theoretically, the police will come and deal with the problem and/or give them a ticket. However, as you know, this is not a high priority for the police.)

The car’s owner at Hoyt-Dean moved the car at some point this morning (and it will probably annoy another group of neighbors tomorrow.)

The law is that all cars that have car alarms are supposed to have their contact info on file at their local police department and that local precinct’s info and phone number should be posted on their dashboard.

Now, how many people have car alarm contact info on file at the local precinct and the precinct’s number on their dash? Huh? Huh? In the meantime, all we can say is NaNa NaNa NaNa. Ehhhhrrr. Ehhhhrrrr. Ehhhhrrr. Woooooooo-Woooooo-Wooooooo-Wooooooo. NaNa NaNa NaNa. Etc. Etc. Etc.