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From Streetsblog:
The Grand Army Plaza Coalition and the Design Trust for Public Space are launching an "Ideas Competition" called Reinventing Grand Army Plaza. Building on GAPCo's on-going effort
to re-envision this historic Brooklyn crossroads, the Ideas Competition
will solicit new, creative proposals for Grand Army Plaza's re-design.
Top submissions will be exhibited in the summer of 2008 at the Brooklyn
Public Library or the Brooklyn Museum of Art.
To document GAPCo's
progress to date, the existing context of the Plaza and the
competition's goals and aspirations, GAPCo is creating a Briefing
Booklet for competition entrants and they want your thoughts, ideas,
hopes, frustrations and visions for Grand Army Plaza represented in
this publication...
- What about Grand Army Plaza currently functions well?
- What existing problems could be addressed by a Plaza re-design?
- What potential uses or opportunities for the Plaza might a Plaza re- design incorporate?
- Please include your name, organization/affiliation, neighborhood and contact information in your response.
For more information, please visit: http://www.reinventingGAP.org. Or email info@reinventingGAP.org.
 Speaking of names and streets and people, Hawthorne Street residents Nicole and Jonathan have named their baby son after the street of his residence. How's that for Hawthorne pride!
Young Theo Hawthorne was born on Sept 5 and, rumor has it,
resembles a lobster.
According to Brooklyn By Name , our beloved Hawthorne Street was named after Nathaniel Hawthorne, an American author who appears to have no connection to PLG other than the fact that some of us have read his books. I do find it gratifying in a way, though. Now there's actually some basis for me telling customer service reps, "Hawthorne, as in Nathaniel" when they ask how to spell the street name... though, come to think of it, I don't think that response has ever helped anyone spell it.
If you were wondering if complaining about the noise in PLG is a gentrifier thing, it isn't: Flatbush leads the city in noise complaints. So to the people who think that complaining about loud music late at night is a form of cultural oppression, we say Shhhhhhhhhh!
In our little corner of PLG, we've been very lucky with respect to noise and rarely find any reason to complain. Last summer, we called 311 to report an outdoor party after it continued hopping past 3 am. But once isn't so bad, is it?
In an email announcing a telephone town hall meeting, Rep. Yvette Clarke describes her district as
Borough Park, Brownsville, Brooklyn Heights, Caroll Gardens, Clinton Hill, Crown Heights, South Crown Heights, Cobble Hill, East Flatbush, Flatbush, Fort Greene, Gowanus, Kensington, Midwood, Park Slope, Prospect Heights, Red Hook, Sunset Park, Weeksville, Windsor Terrace & Wingate
Are we "Flatbush" again? Or are have we become part of "South Crown Heights"?
In all seriousness, the telephone Town Hall Meeting is on Wednesday, December 12 at 6:30PM 7:30PM (thanks, anon). Call in to 1-866-447-5149, PIN# 13319 if you have any questions, concerns or suggestions.
The email says that she is focusing on "federal issues," so this may not be the time to ask about speed humps (though one could argue that it is never the wrong time...). Topics that she specifically refers to are Iraq, the environment, ENDA (a proposed federal law to outlaw sexual orientation discrimination), No Child Left Behind, immigration and gun violence.
For those of you who've ever bitched about how crowded, slow, and unreliable the B41 is, now's your chance to help solidify funding for more busses. Transportation Alternatives is seeking volunteers to survey riders of the B41 bus line on 12/11 (whoops, today!), 12/13, 12/17, and 12/19.
Email Transportation Alternatives if you can help: volunteer (at) transalt.org.
(Via Brooklyn Junction)
As you may know, it's now illegal for advertisers to leave fliers and grocery store circulars on your stoop if you have a NO FLIERS sign posted. The trick is finding a cheap way to post the sign that isn't too unsightly. I can't promise that I've succeeded on that count, but the signs I made for a couple of neighbors and I have worked wonders in cutting down the circulars we receive.
If you'd like one yourself, all you need to do is print this pdf out, cut out the signs, and get them laminated (I went to the Staples on Flatbush at Tilden). Next, poke a couple of holes in the top with a hole punch, put some picture wire through, wrap it around an iron gate and you're done.
I made a bunch of signs and it was only a few bucks. You can use the extra signs to give away or to replace the old ones after they succumb to the weather.
PLG documentarian Samara Smith has created a neato mp3 walking tour, Anyplace, Brooklyn, that chronicles the rapidly changing netherland around Downtown Brooklyn.
Through narration and interviews with area residents, activists and
shoppers, this walking tour asks the listener to consider the
anti-democratic nature of this urban planning process and the proposed
plans effect on street and community life, while beginning to imagine
the kind of public space and city they would like to live in.
(Via Brooklyn Paper)
From Flatbush Gardener: Next Thursday, from 10am to 12noon (at 250 Broadway, 14th Floor Hearing Room) there will be an oversight hearing on the use of artificial turf in NYC's parks."
You know, like on the parade grounds just south of Prospect Park.
Perhaps the most pressing concern here is the claim that synthetic turf is toxic, containing "highly carcinogenic benzo(a)pyrene" among other treasures.
New Yorkers for Parks has published, A New Turf War: Synthetic Turf in New
York City, which provides background on the pros and cons of sythetic turf and offers recommendations but leaves the health issue as a glaring open question. According to the report, no one really knows one way or another if this stuff is safe or not because its safety hasn't been adequately studied. (On the upside, no one has definitely proved it to be unsafe, either.)
If you live on a residential street in Prospect Lefferts Gardens but are outside of Lefferts Manor, chances are your place has R6 zoning. This makes it possible for a developer to buy houses strictly to tear them down and erect apartment buildings as high as 12 stories. Wood frame houses are particularly vulnerable.
Anyone interested in joining forces to make sure all of the residential blocks in PLG don't get eaten by the development monster should contact us: brooklynite282@gmail.com and we'll get back to you shortly about setting a date for an initial meeting.
The goal here is to downzone from R6 to R6b. (Residents of Fort Greene and Clinton Hill are currently undergoing this battle so you'll be in good company.)
To check out how you location is zoned, see Oasis.
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