The empty storefront is the new bank branch.
With Citigroup’s acquisition of Wachovia and JPMorgan Chase’s Washington Mutual takeover, more storefront bank branches citywide will come into play, according to retail brokers. (Washington Mutual alone has 148 branches in the five boroughs.) Much like the bank consolidations of 1991 and 1996, when Chemical Banking Read More
With JP Morgan Chase’s announcement that it will shutter dozens of Washington Mutual bank branches around the city, we mourn the passing of a perennial trend piece: the story about all those bank branches around the city. (The Observer wasn’t immune.)
The bank-branch-explosion trend piece was as reliable as a Yankees post-season the Read More
The most ferocious investment firm of the last six months, Broadway Partners, is in contract to purchase 280 Park Avenue from Istithmar for a little more than $1.2 billion, a source said.
The building was purchased in a very quiet off-market transaction, and represents another gaudy move for the extremely young yet impossibly strong Broadway Read More
“Good rally, guys!” announced UFCW Local 1500 honcho Bruce Both after Brooklyn Councilwoman Tish James led a placard-wielding mob in chants of “No Wal-Mart!” and “Not in my neighborhood!”
After all the banter denouncing “poverty-wage jobs” died down around 1:48 p.m., some fired-up protesters blew off steam by dancing to Outkast’s 2003 smash-hit “Hey Ya!” Read More
Sexually transmitted diseases and a reduced bank account aren’t the only drawbacks when visiting a prostitute, as one apparently disappointed and critically wounded customer discovered on May 24.
The victim, a 37-year-old Philadelphia resident, was patronizing a house (or rather apartment) of ill repute at 1270 First Avenue around 3 p.m. when something went terribly Read More
Phony Patient Gives Docs
Big Pain in the Neck
If you want to burglarize a doctor’s office and wouldn’t mind picking up a bit of sympathy along the way-if not a blood test and full checkup-what better prop to use than the old neck brace?
The ruse worked like a charm for one Read More
Affordable Housing or Lack Thereof
