They Meeowed at Cat-Kicker in Court, and Other Brooklyn Briefs

“Painted Phone” by Mark Handforth at Governors Island. Photo-MK-Metz

- Murder verdict overturned because his mom couldn't find a seat in crowded Brooklyn courtroom. [NY Post]

- Meanwhile, angry spectators meeowed at cat-kicking perp in Brooklyn court. [Daily News]

- Former Brooklyn cop reportedly assisted drug dealers in New Hampshire. [Union Leader]

- NYC will spend $100 million to make Sunset Park trendy. [Gothamist]

- This is why public housing buildings are falling apart. [WNYC]

- The Bard appears outside a bar in Park Slope. [Brooklyn Eagle] 


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A 'Shrike' Drone Will Be Flying Over Governors Island Tuesday and Wednesday

This shrike will be buzzing Governors Island on Tuesday. Photo courtesy NYC

Looks like FDNY is gearing up to use drones when fighting disasters.

We just received word that an "aerial survey will be conducted" (weather permitting) over Governors Island beginning TOMORROW (Tuesday, May 13th) from 12 – 5 p.m. and on Wednesday, May 14th from 9 a.m. – 12 p.m.

According to NYC, the survey will consist of;
"One (1) unmanned rotary-wing quad copter known as a “shrike” in support of a Major Accident Response Exercise (MARE) hosted by the Fire Department of New York (FDNY). The unmanned shrike will operate at or below an altitude of 400 feet and will remain over Governors Island for the duration of the survey."

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Weekend Fun: NYC Poetry Festival on Governors Island Saturday & Sunday, July 21 & 22

The weather forecast is perfect for the 2nd Annual New York City Poetry Festival this Saturday & Sunday, July 21st & 22nd on Governors Island.

Hop the free ferry from Pier 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park and enjoy enjoy "more series, more poets, more headliners, more vendors, an additional arts and crafts village, and healthy and delicious food options" this year.

For the first time, the event includes a children's festival: a village of teepees and a forest of balloons prompting kids to write poems about what it would be like to be a fish, or what the sky looks like at night. The children's area will include poem helpers, readings, movement and performances.

All comers will have a chance to read their own poetry at the open mic. For a schedule of events click here.

Tickets are $5 per day. Hours: from 11am-5pm. A ferry also leaves from Manhattan's Battery Maritime Building.

Photo courtesy of Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation

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Ward: 'Red Hook Must Be Connected to Governors Island'

Christopher Ward, departing head of the Port Authority of New York & New Jersey, said Thursday that "one of the final open questions facing the city is what to do with the Brooklyn waterfront."

Mr. Ward compared it to Vietnam, a place where no one has been able to declare a victory, reported Crain's NY.

According to Crain's, Mr. Ward said, "Red Hook must be connected to Governor's Island," adding that if that doesn't happen, the island “will never reach its full potential.”

He also suggested moving the Red Hook container terminal somewhere else, like Sunset Park. More insight into this speech at the Observer.

Photo of Red Hook from Governors Island courtesy of Google Maps

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City of Water Day Festival 2011, Brooklyn to Governors Island

McBrooklyn joined the thousands of New Yorkers who got out on the water Saturday for the City of Water Day to remember our maritime roots. Our first stop was the Waterfront Museum (aboard the 1914 Lehigh Valley Barge No. 79 shown above, left) and the 1907 Tugboat Pegasus, which were docked at Brooklyn Bridge Park's Pier 6.

The Waterfront Museum and Pegasus will both remain docked at Pier 6 through July 24. You can tour them most days from 3 to 5 p.m., and on several of these days there will be shows and workshops -- more details here and here.

The barge is quirky and there's an art show (Creatures of the Deep), so make sure you go on board and ask lots of questions. A family lives in the museum, down in the hold, and though they don't have windows down there they do have wi-fi.

Check out the kinetic sculpture by George Rhoades in front of the painted stage. You have to stare at it for a couple of minutes to see what happens to the balls after they crank up to the top.

Then jump aboard the Pegasus. You can wander all over this old tug. Look at the beautiful old wood interior and engine room.

We would kill for this stove.

There were projects and activities at Pier 6 Saturday for kids and adults. One of the projects was constructing your own fishing gear from recycled bottles. There was a lady who cut up something fishy which went on your hook, then over the side it went. We were terribly afraid we would catch something.

From there we decided to take the ferry to Governors Island, where the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance and its partners were throwing a giant maritime festival.

There were exhibits and activities all over the island. The Army Corps of Engineers set up tanks filled with living creatures that swim in the ocean right off Brooklyn.

These included rays (left) and horseshoe crabs (right), which you might accidentally step on while swimming at Coney Island.

Among the advocacy groups was the Stop Fracking Now organization. Do you know that New York City's drinking water may soon be polluted with toxic chemicals used to squeeze natural gas out of rocks underground?

Sign an anti-fracking petition now (and view the Colbert Report's interview with ex-Gov. Tom Ridge, a powerful pro- fracking lobbyist).

There were lots of kids activities. Disney gave away toys and books.

There were games for older people too. This one was called "hunter-gatherers."

After a day of wandering around the island we were tired and happy to hop back on the ferry to Pier 6 and home. It was a fun and education day -- and it was all free, including the ferry rides.

City of Water Day Festival was sponsored by the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance. Pier 6 activities provided by Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy.

Photos copyright MK Metz

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Good Show: Figment Art On Governors Island

Hundreds (thousands?) of people got the same idea we had when it didn't rain after all on Sunday -- we took the ferry from Pier 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park to Governors Island for the annual Figment Art Show.

Figment is a feel-good art event where hundreds of art projects, plays, performances and improv experiences take place all over the island. Governors Island is magic anyway, so add some art and it's just about perfect.

Many of the participants wear costumes.

A lot of the works use recycled materials. The piece above, for example, is called "Plastic Fantastic" -- a geodesic dome made from over 6,000 used water bottles. People kept contributing their bottles all day.

Or you could write a message and put it in a bottle, like these inside the dome.

The True Mirror Palace was one of our favorite exhibits. You never think about it but normally, when you look into a mirror, you actually see yourself backwards. Subtle irregularities make the two sides of your face slightly different. So your true image looks different than your mirror image.

But when you look into a True Mirror, you see yourself the way you really are -- the way other people see you. You probably look better than you think. (Or at least different.)

It was a great day. If you missed the show, you can still experience a little bit of it when you visit Governors Island. Some of the exhibits, like the mini-golf course and the tree house, will remain up for the summer. (Here's a list of these pieces.)

Here's a list of all the exhibits and happenings that took place at this year's Figment.

Photos by MK Metz

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Civil War Weekend on Governors Island

Along with thousands of other Brooklynites, we took the ferry from Brooklyn Bridge Park's Pier 6 this weekend to Governors Island for Civil War Weekend.

The 119th New York Volunteers and  Battery G of the First Pennsylvania Light Artillery were encamped for the weekend on the island. As we walked among them, they reenacted life during the 1860s, demonstrating weapons, tents, and provisions.

The soldiers actually slept in open tents (on pillows made of stuffed ticking) all weekend. They drilled and fired their cannon, cooked over open fires, played music and recruited for the war.

 Across the island, groups of civilian reenacters held picnics in period costumes or formal lunches with all the fixings and fresh-baked apple pie. The ladies from the local aid society distributed care packages to Confederate prisoners inside the courtyard of Castle William.

Governors Island was the perfect setting for this kind of historical fun. Besides the Civil War festivities there were art exhibits, mini-golf, tours, biking, kayaking, concerts and much more. Fred Van Lente, author of The Amazing Spiderman, gave a talk on Sunday. The Big Apple Circus was conducting a free trapeze workshop.

To learn more about Governors Island activities see here.

Photos by MK Metz

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New Water Taxi Dock at Brooklyn's Pier 6

A new water taxi dock at Pier 6 is scheduled to be announced this morning at Brooklyn Bridge Park. The new dock will provide direct ferry service between Brooklyn Bridge Park and Governors Island.

Pier 6 is just a stone's throw from Governors Island, so this should be the shortest ferry ride in New York City.

Expected to gather at 10 a.m. for the announcement are Chris Ward, Executive Director of the Port Authority; Regina Myer, Brooklyn Bridge Park Development Corporation President; Leslie Koch, Governors Island Preservation and Education Corporation President; Assemblywoman Joan Millman; NYC Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe; and Brooklyn BP Marty Markowitz.

UPDATE: More details here.

Photo copyright MK Metz, 2009
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Five Boro Bike Tour, and More Brooklyn Briefs

- A 43,000-square-foot beach and outdoor entertainment complex is in the works for Governor’s Island this summer. Water Taxi access to the beach from Brooklyn “is being looked at right now,” according to the Brooklyn Eagle.

- New York's "wobbliest" banks include Emigrant Savings Bank, founded in 1850. Crain's NY

- Child-age muggers near the Myrtle Ave. subway beaten off by feisty women. Bed-Stuy Banana

- Too cold for YogoMonster! BK11201

- BQE Watch blogger semi-retires. Good work, Mr. Cohn. BQE Watch

- High chair on St. John's Place. Really. Brit in Brooklyn

- Now for Lent, Crazy Stable connects us to LOL Saints.

- They're taking early registration -- now! -- for the Five Boro Bike Tour. CycleChickNYC

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Brooklyn's Economy Has 'A Few Bright Lights,' Including Governor's Island -- Uh Oh

Things will get worse before they get better, but there are also a few bright lights in Brooklyn’s economic future, according to the Brooklyn Eagle, reporting from Tuesday’s Economic Outlook Breakfast sponsored by the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce and Sovereign Bank.

The city’s downturn, which started later than the rest of the country’s, will be “sharper and will go further, ” said George Sweeting, deputy director of the NYC Independent Budget Office.

Among the bright lights, however, are the successes of manufacturing and industrial businesses at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, and the (re)linking of Brooklyn to Governors Island.

Uh Oh: According to the Observer, there's no money to develop Governor's Island, and it's ferry will be put up for auction on EBay. That's one bright light that's looking kind of dim.

More here.

Image: Google Earth

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Governors Island, Transformed

Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Gov. Eliot Spitzer Wednesday announced the selection of a design team that would remake Governors Island, a former military base, into one of the city’s most fabulous parks.

Materials from demolished military barracks would be recycled into fill for rolling hills and climbing cliffs; public art would inhabit a forest; and wooden bicycles would be available for free. The design, led by Dutch firm West 8, calls for 90 acres of parkland and a two-mile promenade. More at the Brooklyn Eagle

- Water Taxi from Brooklyn to Governors Island Starts Saturday

- Chapin Family to Gather on Governor's Island for Big Sing

- Circle Line Statue of Liberty Tour Boat to Leave from Brooklyn Bridge Park?

Rendering by West 8

Chapin Family to Gather on Governor's Island for Big Sing

The Chapin family (Tom, Steve, Jen, daughters Abigail Chapin, Lily Chapin and Jessica Craven, plus longtime bassist Big John Wallace) are all coming together on Governor's Island to celebrate the music of Brooklyn's late beloved Harry Chapin. The family (and Harry's original band) will be singing "Taxi," "Cats In The Cradle," "Mr. Tanner," "Circle" and other favorites.

The concert will take place 1:30 July 14th as part of the Island's American Folk Music Festival, called "Folks on the Island."

See Brooklynvegan for other Governor's Island concerts.

Photo of Tom Chapin and friends by Mil8, Creative Commons license.

Water Taxi from Brooklyn to Governors Island Starts Saturday

By legend, a secret escape tunnel links the the Governor's Mansion on Governor's Island to Red Hook, Brooklyn. The island is only 400 yards from Brooklyn -- so close, that when the military base was still active a few years ago (it closed in 1996), neighbors in Red Hook would be awakened by bugles playing reveille every morning.

To celebrate our close alliance, the New York Water Taxi will start weekend service from Brooklyn to Governors Island with a free trip this Saturday from the Red Hook stop (behind Fairway) and from Fulton Ferry Landing, reports the Brooklyn Eagle.

Previously, this trip was only available from lower Manhattan and took forever. But from Brooklyn the trip will take only 4 to 15 minutes. And just in time -- a Family Festival to celebrate Governors Island opening day takes place from 12:30 - 4 p.m. Saturday. See the Governors Island web site for details.

And here's some news about big changes coming to the island: Five design teams have been asked to come up with a new landscape for the southern end of Governors Island, its promenade, and the open space in the northern historic section, reports New York Magazine. Visit the web site for photos of the proposals.

Photo of Governors Island from Red Hook Marine Terminal by MK Metz