'On Prospect Park': Nicely Designed Beneficiary of Tax Abatement Program

We walked by Richard Meier's "On Prospect Park" building the other day (mentioned on the Gowanus Lounge blog as "an example of a building that fits the scale of its surrounding and is nicely designed"). It's certainly coming along. It's also a beneficiary of the 421-a tax abatement program.

According to the Gowanus Lounge, the tax-abatement program "has run amok, and is routinely used to subsidize luxury housing." Like this one.

But wouldn't you?

More here.

Photo by MK Metz

Icky Really, Really, Really Doesn't Like the Brooklyn Paper

We respect the Brooklyn Paper's stance vis-à-vis Atlantic Yards but -- a rather hilarious diatribe against the paper, by Icky in Windsor Terrace here.

City and State 'Pissing on Each Other,' and Other Brooklyn Briefs

- Developer Bill Stein says he won’t build atop the public courtyard at the Carroll Street entrance to the F train, which is a good thing, since he doesn’t own most of the land, says former assemblyman Frank Verderame. Verderame says the courtyard on Second Place and Smith Street is divided into several parcels, and the city and Metropolitan Transportation Authority have jurisdiction over most of the plaza. Brooklyn Paper

- Are the city and state "pissing on each other?" That's one reason being given for delays in the building of Brooklyn Bridge Park. Brooklyn Eagle

- The 9-year-old Brooklyn girl who told cops she fought off an attacker by biting his hand admitted to investigators that she made up the "harrowing tale." NY Daily News

- The attorney Rishi Bhandari and his wife Heather put 10 percent down on a $795,000 apartment at 110 Livingston in March. And by this Wednesday they'd filed suit against Mr. Walentas’ Two Trees Development. A few days before the couple was set to close on their apartment, they found that the place was 109 square feet smaller than Two Trees had promised. Observer

- Christmas shopping starts this week. Spurred on by hundreds of millions of dollars of advertising, more than one hundred and fifty million Americans will celebrate the birth of Jesus Christ by engaging in a mindless, debt-building, four-week frenzy of consumerism. Huffington Post

- There's a feeling of "rebirth" surrounding the Busy Chef/Oven/UCG trio of eateries in Brooklyn Heights -- and even talk of expansion. Brooklyn Heights Blog

- BCAT's Reporter Roundtable: A panel of reporters led by editor Gersh Kuntzman of the Brooklyn Paper weighs in on top stories making headlines this month. Topics include the development of Coney Island, Downtown Brooklyn and the upcoming elections. (Monday, November 19 at 1 p.m., Tuesday, November 20 at 1:30 and 9:30 p.m. and other times) BCAT

Bangladesh Cyclone Kills More Than 2,300; Estimates Range Up to 10,000

The death toll from Bangladesh's most devastating storm in a decade climbed to at least 2,300 on Sunday and relief officials warned the figure could jump sharply as rescuers reach more isolated areas. Teams from international aid organizations worked with army troops in a massive rescue effort that drew help from around the world. Huffington Post

- An "ecological disaster." Bangladesh is home to the endangered Royal Bengal tiger. AFP

- "Please also give us some clothes to wrap the bodies," begged one villager as he pulled a dead man from a river. Reuters

- Saudi Arabia announced emergency aid of $100 million to Bangladesh’s cyclone victims. ArabNews.com

- U.S. to donate $2 million to Bangladesh survivors. BBC

- To donate, please visit International Federation of Red Cross/ Red Crescent Societies

Wall Street Journal Does Brooklyn, With Hotel Le Bleu As Ground Zero

Say you were a tourist in for a weekend and you wanted to see the New Brooklyn everybody's been talking about. You've heard that Smith Street has great restaurants, Carroll Gardens is trendy and Gowanus has a lot of artists, but you don't know where to start.

You could start HERE. The Wall Street Journal has published a three day weekend guide (by Candace Jackson) as part of their free Saturday content.

Begin by checking into Hotel Le Bleu (yes, it's officially, sort of, open -- and it'll cost you at least $300/night), then wander over to Fifth Avenue and visit shopping spots like Brooklyn Mercantile and Cog & Pearl. For lunch, grab a lobster roll and fresh oysters at Brooklyn Fish Camp.

Get the idea?

And so it goes, a full three-day itinerary of walking tours, restaurants, drinking holes, museums and performance spaces. Of course there are things that I would have added (like Sahadi's, BAM and -- for the well-rounded --Bargemusic), and -- cheap me, I'd stay in a bed & breakfast and save a hundred bucks a night -- but it's a good jumping off place for the first-time visitor -- or even the Brooklyn native who really doesn't get out enough.

UPDATE: By an amazing coincidence, the New York Times has supplied the "Weekend in New York" Atlantic Avenue segment missing from the Wall Street Journal article above. Clip both and save. Here.

And Maybe a Side Trip to Manhattan? - WSJ
An Exotic Oasis in Brooklyn -- NYT

Map courtesy WSJ

Commerce Bank, Morgan Stanley, Sovereign Bank, Brooklyn Heights

And Massey Knakal. As seen from Cadman Plaza West.

Photo by MK Metz

Girl Caught Under Street Sweeper in Borough Park

A young girl was caught under a street sweeper at 16th Avenue and 34 th Street Friday. Reports say the driver was crying at the scene. The girl's condition is not yet known.

Park Slope Religious Store Burned Down

Montague Street's 'Island Grill' Long in Coming

The Greens, a kosher vegetarian Chinese restaurant on Montague Street in Brooklyn Heights, has been closed for maybe two months, and those newspapers in the upstairs window are getting old.

Rumor has it there's some kind of "property problem" slowing down the transition to the new "Island Grill" Singapore-style restaurant. Anyone know the timeline?

The Red Hook Matter -- An Alternate Explanation, Involving an Evil Spirit of Darkness

"What the hell is happening in Red Hook?" New York Magazine asks. About a year ago, this hard-to-reach part of Brooklyn was booming, a Fairway grocery store had just opened, and there was a "new pretty face" every day.

But for all the crazy hype, the neighborhood now seems to be going in reverse, says NYM. The Pioneer bar has shut down. So has the bistro 360 and, just recently, the Hook. Buildings put on the market for $2.5 million have stayed empty and unsold. In August the Post ran a story headlined "Call It ‘Dead’ Hook."

"What if gentrification isn’t self-sustaining after all?" NYM asks. And what if that's a good thing?

But what if there's an alternate explanation, involving Red Hook's "evil spirit of darkness and squalor?"

H.P. Lovecraft, in his "The Horror at Red Hook," wrote the following about Red Hook in 1925:

"Red Hook is a maze of hybrid squalor near the ancient waterfront opposite Governor's Island, with dirty highways climbing the hill from the wharves to that higher ground where the decayed lengths of Clinton and Court Streets lead off toward the Borough Hall ...

"It is always the same ... the evil spirit of darkness and squalor broods on amongst the mongrels in the old brick houses, and prowling bands still parade on unknown errands past windows where lights and twisted faces unaccountably appear and disappear. Age-old horror is a hydra with a thousand heads, and the cults of darkness are rooted in blasphemies deeper than the well of Democritus, The soul of the beast is omnipresent and triumphant, and Red Hook's legions of blear-eyed, pockmarked youths still chant and curse and howl as they file from abyss to abyss, none knows whence or whither, pushed on by blind laws of biology which they may never understand..."

This leads us to wonder: maybe Red Hook is not the best place to attempt gentrification. Maybe best leave it alone ...

UPDATE: "The death of Red Hook is highly exaggerated," says Dennis Holt of the Brooklyn Eagle. While major landowner Greg O'Connell is perhaps slowing down the gentrification process, "eventually there will be a second cruise line terminal, the city will get its act together on waterfront development, and a hotel will appear within walking distance of those terminals," says Holt.

Photo by MK Metz