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Kim Velsey

By Kim Velsey 5/24 6:10pm

Road Rage

Anger

Will Citi Bikes Be Even More Reviled Than Their Racks? Is That Even Possible?

These last few weeks, to hear some people tell it, you’d think that New York’s streets have been endangered by one of the greatest threats to public safety that the city has ever seen (not to mention the worst aesthetic blight since the Ugg craze). Comparisons have been drawn between the Department of Transportation and the Taliban. There have been impassioned pleas, there have been fits of yelling and, of course, there have been lawsuits. But now, perhaps, we’ll finally get some respite from all the bike rack hatred as New Yorkers shift their hatred to the bikes themselves.

Citi Bikes will be arriving in the next few days—some 800 of the 6,000 bikes are already docked at stations—and New Yorkers will be able to take them out for a spin starting Memorial Day. It’s just too bad that the incessant whining over the bikes is likely to sound very much like the incessant whining over the racks, led first and foremost by the chorus of sanctimonious ninnies going on about public safety. Read More

By Kim Velsey 5/24 10:15am

Manhattan Transfers

The three townhouses are not the best raw material for a 60-footer.

Could a Mega Mansion Be In the Works On East 64th Street?

On March 19, the charming 11-room townhouse at 159 East 64th Street came on the market for $14 million, joining its once-removed neighbor at 163 East 64th, which was asking $24.9 million at the time. Then, almost simultaneously, the mansion in the middle—161 East 64th Street—was revealed as the Kips Bay Decorator Show House. Traditionally, the Kips Bay Show House has hit the market after its time in the spotlight—we imagine it would be hard to persuade an owner to turn his or her house over to teams of decorators and hordes of visitors otherwise—and sure enough, last week the show house was listed for $16 million with Sotheby’s broker Roger Erickson.

With all three for sale in a row, we couldn’t help but ponder the possibilities. Given the gaga real estate market, mightn’t some deep-pocketed buyer take a fancy to the 60-foot-wide mega combo mansion? Read More

By Kim Velsey 5/24 9:57am

Elsewhere

On the Market: Menstrual Poetry Slam To Be Held On UES; Considering the Great Promise of Pre-fab; Peter Jackson Selling Tribeca Hobbit Hole

Now frozen yogurt for dogs is coming to Central Park. [DNAinfo]
How many houses does Bloomberg own again? [NYMag]
Did Googamooga destroy Prospect Park’s nethermead? [Bk Paper]
A hotel will rise on Fort Greene’s Park Avenue. [Brownstoner]
Bill Murray’s old Greenwich Village apartment is for rent. [Post]
David Schwimmer’s new front door is exciting why? [EVGrieve]
Bonjour Capital takes over stalled Bed-Stuy rental building. [TRD]
Max Fish slated to leave LES by July; cafe will re-open in Brooklyn. [Lo-Down]
Dwell editor believes that pre-fab can bring good architecture to the masses. [NYT]
Greenpointers say city lied about affordable housing, parks. [Bk Paper]
Weird things: menstrual poetry slam to be held on the Upper East Side. [DNAinfo]
Restoring Sag Harbor’s watchcase factory. [NYT]
Peter Jackson lists his uncombined Tribeca penthouse for $21.5 million. [Curbed]
The architecture of seduction: Fire Island’s importance to gay culture. [NYT]

By Kim Velsey 5/23 9:14am

Elsewhere

On the Market: Will SUNY Tax Breaks Spur Development? Unlucky Developer Will Try Again In the Flatiron; Ben Shaoul Sells Upscale FiDi Rental

The best New York area beaches you can get to without a car. [Gothamist]
Decade-old carriage house in Clinton Hill hits the market for $5 M. [WSJ]
And Brooklyn Magazine is very underwhelmed. [Bk Magazine]
State proposes tax-free zones around SUNYs to spur development upstate. [Crain's]
Madison Square Garden denied indefinite permit, offered a 15-year one. [WSJ]
Now street vendors hate bike share too. [Atlantic Cities]
Good Enough to Eat finds new home at Columbus and 85th. [DNAinfo]
Modular disaster relief housing prototype will rise in Downtown Brooklyn. [Post]
Developer Ian Bruce Eichner is really hoping that third time’s a charm. [WSJ]
LIC climbing gym is slated to open this summer, despite bribery scandal. [DNAinfo]
Bad news for bookworms: All Brooklyn libraries will be closed this weekend. [Patch]
Affordable housing planned for Fulton Street lots in Clinton Hill. [Brownstoner]
Ben Shaoul sells FiDi building to Queens developer for $25 M. [TRD]
Black marble and gold leaf: fraudster’s United Nations Plaza pad returns. [Curbed]
Cuomo is the one we should hold to account for LICH’s future? [Bk Paper]
Underground high-speed cycling event will move to the Navy Yard this year. [WSJ]
Williamsburg Cinemas commissions mural by Frederico Massa. [Brownstoner]

By Kim Velsey 5/23 12:06am

Grave Developments

Mary Help of Christians Church on Avenue A was built over an old cemetery.

Building On a Boneyard? Preservationists Beg Steiner Not To Put Luxury Condos On Former Cemetery Site

The dead may not literally walk among us, but they can certainly cause headaches for developers. In 2006, work on Trump Soho was temporarily halted when human remains were discovered at the construction site, where a Baptist Church once stood. Last year, plans for a development in Queens were nixed after the property—home to a colonial-era cemetery—was landmarked. And back in 1991, the federal government was forced to significantly alter plans for its $276 million federal office tower in Lower Manhattan after uncovering the 17th and 18th-century remains of hundreds of African Americans.

Now, several preservation and community groups are pleading with developer Douglast Steiner to his abandon plans to demolish the Mary Help of Christians Church complex at 181 Avenue A (between East 11th and East 12th streets), because the buildings were built over a former Catholic Cemetery. Read More

By Kim Velsey 5/22 4:07pm

Affordable Housing or Lack Thereof

A rendering of the Dattner Architects-designed building slated to rise at the site.

City Selects Developer For Affordable Housing Slated To Rise On Architectural Graveyard In Williamsburg

Fifty-five units of affordable housing may not do much to stem the tide of gentrification washing over Williamburg, but they will allow a not-insignificant number of low-income families to stay in the increasingly expensive neighborhood.

Today, the Department of Housing Preservation and Development announced that it has selected MDG Design and Construction and the North Brooklyn Development Corporation to build a mixed-use affordable housing development at 337 Berry Street, the site of a former Landmarks Preservation Commission warehouse. The development team was selected nearly a year after an RFP went out for the project, which will include 55 low-income units, ground-floor commercial space for a grocery store, community space for tenant services and an open space for use by future tenants. Read More

By Kim Velsey 5/22 9:58am

Elsewhere

On the Market: Poverty Surges In New York’s Suburbs; Housing Court Rules To Evict Aldon James; Massive Outlet Mall Is Getting a Makeover

Outlet mecca Woodbury Commons will be getting a makeover. [NYT]
The hipster jitney is back… and with even more routes! [CapitalNY]
Housing court rules to evict Aldon James from National Arts Club. [TRD]
Kips Bay show house listed for $16 million. [Curbed]
Residents sue to stop Damrosch Park from incessantly being rented out for events. [WSJ]
Check out 1950s creative types cutting loose in these old photos. [Gothamist]
Plan to landmark South Village Historic District will have a public hearing. [Epoch Times]
Paris advances ambitious plan to re-imagine and develop the suburbs. [NYT]
And the percentage of residents living in poverty grows in NYC suburbs. [NYT]
Toys R Us’s Times Square space in limbo as retailer ponders lease renewal. [Crain's]
Community considers controversial plan to demolish Five Pointz, build condos. [Daily News]
Bloomberg: Flushing Corona Meadows Park may not be the only place for MLS stadium. [CapitalNY]

By Kim Velsey 5/21 9:27pm

Adventurous drinking

18 Photos

Dispatches from New York's Craft Cocktail Scene

A Long Strange Sip: (Mis)Adventures In New York’s Crazed Cocktail Scene

In New York, there are few occasions for hope as reliable as a cocktail, and few better than a party. The beginning of any party, even a bad one, is imbued with a kind of bright expectancy. And the beginning of a massive, opulent gala held in the marbled magnificence of the Fifth Avenue library, especially one with more than 25,000 very good cocktails, is an opportunity for the most outrageous kind of hope. The kind of hope that can make even a gala-jaded Upper East Side society matron, upon entering a room with nine cocktail stations and straw-hatted jazz band, dreamily raise her hand to the pearls at her throat and murmur, “This is great. My god, this is this great. This is grand.”

The opening night celebration of the Manhattan Cocktail Classic—which drew 2,900 aficionados, arrayed in tuxedos, sequined gowns, lacy sheaths, smoking jackets, velvet blazers and all manner of hats and feathered plumes—was a lavish, debauched spectacle befitting the outsized, increasingly dominant role that craft cocktails have come to play in the city’s drinking culture. Tickets, despite costing $195 to $395, sold out rapidly.

The press invitation had cautioned us to eat dinner beforehand—though there would be food—and to pace ourselves, both of which turned out to be not so much advisable as mandatory for staying upright throughout the four-hour bacchanalia. There was music and dancing, along with stilt walkers and living statues, plus sweet and savory edibles, but all these offerings paled in comparison to the drinking: 73 different cocktail stations, many of them serving multiple varieties of specialty cocktails, splayed over four massive floors of the library. Read More

By Kim Velsey 5/21 5:47pm

The Transom

Artist_Credit Amanda Cohen_63

New Kid on the Block: Investigating West 44th’s Artist in Residence

The artist appeared on our block two weeks ago. A lean man with inky fingers covered in silver rings, he wore a cap, a small button fastened to the bottom of his shirt—“I love porn”—and a menthol-flavored Marlboro tucked behind one ear. He would arrive around 9 a.m., arrange his scroll of paper, his pot of ink and his various clips on the sidewalk between The Observer offices and the adjacent Japanese barbecue joint, remaining there, painting intently, until 6 or 7 p.m. As he painted, he scrunched himself into contorted positions and seemed not to take breaks or register the passersby, who invariably stared.

We were curious about the new arrival on our block. Though of course West 44th between Eighth and Ninth Avenues hardly belongs to us alone. We share it with a lumber yard, a theatrical supply company, the Intercontinental Hotel, several parking lots and a convenience store whose clientele appear to buy nothing but lottery tickets. And, as we recently learned, we also share it with the dingy walk-up where Cuban novelist and poet Reinaldo Arenas spent the last years of his life and committed suicide in 1990 at age 47, impoverished and suffering from AIDS. Read More

By Kim Velsey 5/21 10:02am

Elsewhere

On the Market: Michael Shvo Is Back! The Rockaways Are Scheduled to Re-open This Weekend; An Indefinite Lease For Madison Square Garden?

New York City’s cool offices open their doors for tours. [Curbed]
British group acquires long-term lease on Broadways’ biggest theater. [NYT]
Michael Shvo is attempting a comeback, this time as a condo developer. [WSJ]
City plans to offer possibility of lease in perpetuity to Madison Square Garden. [CapitalNY]
Bike share hating co-op is vindicated when EMS is (kind of) blocked by racks. [Post]
Bronx tour company stops selling itself as a chance to see the real ghetto. [NYT]
City wants to turn Fourth Avenue in Park Slope into a pedestrian plaza. [Bk Paper]
Approval process for Staten Island ferris wheel has been set in motion. [Crain's]
Williamsburg Urban Outfitters plans to add booze and food to shopping experience. [Post]
You haven’t seen ivy until you’ve seen this mansion. [WSJ]
Most of Williamsburg’s promised affordable housing has yet to materialize. [DNAinfo]
Much work remains to be done, but Rockaway beaches will open this weekend. [Daily News]