Kensington Update
Friday, July 23rd, 2010
Here’s Liena’s latest summary of the problems with big, planned city land give-away in Kensington:
Rezoning: Some of the area will be upzoned, allowing folks like Bergament department store to all of a sudden be able to build 6 stories on top of their store. To give away that much money (for the apartments that can now be developed can be sold or rented at profit) without getting anything back for the neighborhood does not sound right.
The neighborhood needs public green space. It needs a community center that would offer kids as well as grownups recreational opportunities after school, summer or winter (dare we dream of a swimming pool?). It needs a location for a new public school. Before $$ is given away to developers just for asking, by way of upzoning their lots, the community needs to know what it will get in return.
For the lots that are not expected to be developed in the next 10 years – how about they are turned into a temporary neighborhood space that can be used for kids to play or a community garden – we have enough abandoned lots storing derelict vehicles already.
Everybody wants more affordable housing. Culver El Affordable Housing project should be affordable in perpetuity. If you can sell a 5 bedroom apartment to whomever you wish in 15 years, it will not be affordable in 15 years.
Culver El public land should not be given away for parking. So much is given to the surrounding property owners through rezoning, that they most likely can afford to buy any land they need for parking.
And the alternative:
By designing awesome affordable housing, there is potential for completely transforming this derelict stretch of our neighborhood by creating an attractive environment that fosters a sense of community and allows for neighborly interactions. From the current plans, it looks like we will be getting more of the same and increasingly ugly – walk a block up 37th to between 12th Avenue and Fort Hamilton Parkway, or down to 15th Avenue and you’ll see the already developed parts of Culver El.
6 Responses to “Kensington Update”
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nathan thompson says:
Liena thank you for summarizing this stuff. You are dead right on this area in particular not protecting itself from developers. The new buildings must come with their own parking. And the the local schools are overwhelmed specifically due to the explosion of development in the last few years. A whole new floor needs to be added to the top of PS 154. The spats between new neighbors who bought because of a school they now cannot get into have gotten nasty. And politicians when confronted seem to be afraid the developers will just stop. Maybe like the drivers on the Fort Hamilton Parkway circle, it won’t kill them to just slow down and see how they can fit into the rest of the community.
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Felix says:
Hum. Developing that area is a good thing because it looks pretty sketchy. If the developer is working for the hasidics forget about making them pay for an all-inclusive community center or garden or pool. Have you heard of the west bank? If we want this area to stay part of the diverse kensington community, the developer needs to be unbias. The sad reality is that people who can afford community centers and parks are the rich and they require luxury housing. We might require some more gentrification to have those perks, until them we are lucky to have an awesome park three blocks away.
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Barbara says:
Felix, your comments about “hasidics” and “the west bank” are out of line. If by “the developer needs to be unbias” (unbiased?) you are suggesting that Jewish developers will build only for Jews, that’s also plain silly. Finally, the rich do not use community centers.
I have a suspicion that one subtext is that Jews are taking over Kensington and Windsor Terrace. Also silly. We always had Jews among our neighbors. When I was a student at P.S. 154, a very long time ago, the classrooms were almost empty on High Holy Days (before they became school holidays). I used to wonder, “Where is everybody?” Maybe the vacant chairs had to do with the fact that so many Catholic families sent their children to Holy Name.
I agree with you on one point: We do have an awesome park three blocks away. I do wish, though, that some of the current users of the park would cart away their garbage instead of leaving it scattered under the trees where they were sitting. When my grandmother, who had emigrated to this country as a young girl, took my cousins and me to Prospect Park for picnics in the 1950s, whatever we brought into the park that ended up as refuse, we took home to throw away. I wonder what’s so hard about that. -
William says:
There is no such thing as enough greenspace. This is NYC. It can always use more parks. That area is woefully under parked.
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littledebbiet says:
Thanks so much for bringing all this too light and doing the hard work to find out what the developers are up too. You have great ideas that will truly benefit everybody in the neighborhood!
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Stamie says:
Many great points have been raised. I drove around the area on Sunday (by Bergament) and was saddened by the neighborhood which looks like it’s been abandoned by all for many years. There is such a need for housing and green space and I don’t mean low-income housing. I see plenty of ads in the Daily News for low income developments. What I don’t see is middle income housing. It’s a shame many civil servants (like me) who work hard and earn $60-90,000 can’t afford to buy a home. In any other city our incomes would seem terrific but in NYC we must rent. What’s needed is Mitchell-Lama style coops where middle income folks can become homeowners and take pride in their neighborhoods by rebuilding and caring for them. There’s no such thing as too much green space, either.
