 The Daily News has a followup to the "free building" story. Apparently, the owner is not very happy about the prank.
"People were calling all day," [Moses Fried] said. "I couldn't get through to my office."
[...]
Fried, who was fined by the city for running a hot sheet hotel in Clinton Hill ... ultimately scrapped his hotel plans for 205 Parkside, citing "community unrest."
"Community unrest" - ha! That's a funny way of saying that the community didn't want a whorehouse.
Meanwhile, Fried maintains that he's got plans to turn the building into a 20-family building "sometime soon." According to city records, the building is currently listed as having only 14 residential units. In 2006, a lawyer for Fried told Planet PLG that the income from 14 residential units would not offset heating costs and taxes.
Whether this hypothetical renovation would require a zoning variance (the building is currently R7-1) or be built higher is a question we'll leave to someone with a better understand of building code. I wouldn't get too worked up about it yet, though.
(Photo: Jeff Wilkins/Daily News)
 Spotted at 205 Parkside Avenue: FREE BUILDING
14 residential, 3 commercial units
Pre-War, 4 story, abandoned rathole
Squatters included at no charge
Moses and Bernice Fried
(718) 377-4444
There is also a sister advertisement on Craiglist with more detail. If 205 Parkside sounds familiar, that's the neglected building that Moses Fried tried to turn into an hourly "hotel" three years ago. For those who take the train at Parkside, the place is pretty hard to miss — it's next door to the Pioneer grocer on a busy, high-traffic commercial strip.
 We haven't heard anything out of 205 Parkside since 2007, when Fried's lawyer said that the owner was "reviewing his options" of what to do with the place. Apparently, Fried has been reviewing his options for some time. According to city records, the building has been "vacant and untenanted" since 1979. The building has been condemned and has no Certificate of Occupancy. Lights are often on at night, though, and clearly people are living there.
We're pretty sure this real estate isn't actually free (in any sense), but hope Fried is getting lots of calls. Property owners who let buildings fester for decades don't deserve to keep them. Fried clearly has no concern whatsoever for how his properties affect local the local community. But who knows. Perhaps a sly kick in the pants will get him to do the right thing and clean this s***hole up — or sell it to someone who will.
UPDATE: Fried response to "free building" prank
 Looks like rumors of a new supermarket in the neighborhood have been greatly exaggerated. Despite hearing on the local yahoo group about a new Stop&Shop on Empire Boulevard between Bedford & Rogers, when I searched Google the place just didn't exist. Maybe it was too new? We checked it out in person this weekend.
Well kids, if you want Stop&Shop you'll still have to head down to Tilden Ave. If you're just looking for somewhere to store your old comic books, then Empire Boulevard is the place to be.
 In case you've been living under a rock, PLG Arts has organized several local artists and children to paint a series of murals on the construction barriers along Lincoln Road and around the corner on Flatbush. After months of planning, production began last week and most of the murals are by now nearly finished.
Information about the artists and their bios can be found on the PLG Arts site. Also, Bob Marvin has posted a flickr photo set showing the mural project as a work in progress. It's anyone's guess as to how long the artwork will remain up. The fencing was installed as part the controversial Lincoln Tower project, which ended up a casualty of the failing economy. While there's sure to be a lot of disagreement over whether the return of the development project would be a good thing or not, we can all appreciate PLG Arts' ability to make lemonade in this case. (Photo: Bob Marvin)
Last Saturday, around noon, Carrie and I wandered past the site of the Concerned Residents of Greater Prospect Lefferts Gardens protest of the planned Lincoln Road tower. There were maybe a dozen or so people holding posters and beating on drums.
The 'Concerned Residents' claim that the tower will lead to higher rents and landlords harassing long-term tenants out of their apartments. The effect of the tower on rents is, at best, indirect and likely negligible; its effect on other landlords is irrelevant. For one thing, the building is likely to be mostly--if not entirely--condos. That means a possible net change of ZERO rental units. If the building is going to have any impact on the housing market it will be to slow the appreciation of value of properties for sale. Whereas there is currently a dearth of properties in move-in condition for sale in the neighborhood, there will suddenly be a burst of units available in various sizes.
Rising rents are a problem for some in PLG, just as they are in every urban neighborhood in a period when people are flocking to cities. PLG will continue to see rising rents whether or not this tower goes up. Tenant advocacy--and preserving the existing rent stabilized and rent-controlled apartments in our neighborhood--is a much more fruitful avenue for addressing the problem than trying to stop a single building that will itself displace nobody.
The real objective behind the formation of CRGPLG seems to be stopping a tall building from going up near Lefferts Manor. If that means shifting blame for the basic economics of supply and demand, exaggerated warnings about the coming avian holocaust, or stoking fears about gentrification, so be it.
It may all be moot anyway. As the protest was going on, a backhoe was busily moving about the site. It was probably getting the site ready for the foundation to be poured so that the developer can lock in the current zoning rules and make the next protest even more toothless.
Related:
Hawthorne Street's position on the Tower
First CRGPLG meeting recap
The first tower rendering
I was recently interviewed by Brenda Becker of Prospect: A Year in the Park for BCAT's A Walk Around The Blog, a cable TV show featuring Brooklyn bloggers. The show will air on BCAT (Time Warner 56 / Cablevision 69) for the next two weeks on Monday and Thursday, at 1PM and 9PM and on Friday at 3PM and 11PM. Try not to pay attention to my just-out-of-the-shower hair, which my wife warned me about, or my slouching/general fatness, which many people have warned me about.
As for my take on the clip itself, the editing left very little room for anything besides Brenda's general disapproval of the project (it would violate Olmstead's vision of a building-free oasis) and my general approval (it is better than a festering rathole). I'm not sure either opinion expressed here is particularly informative. To that end, I'll add this list of reasons why I approve of the project: * The location of the building—on a commercial strip next to a transit hub—is ideal for a large development. Clustering housing near subway stations and bus routes is environmentally beneficial; it decreases urban sprawl, makes maintaining transit infrastructure more efficient, and helps reduce auto traffic.
* Opponents of the building claim that the addition of luxury apartments to PLG will increase rents and price out many long-time residents. But limiting housing and refusing to build for density has the same effect. Fewer homes means greater demand for them and higher prices. The Tower is located right next to the subway; apartments on lower floors will, by necessity, be lower cost.
* The location, a prime commercial space, has sat dormant for at least a decade, a nightmare of asbestos, mold and vermin. Increased foot traffic will create a safer, more lively commercial block.
* The builder has not asked for any exemptions from FAR or public subsidy.
* The residential blocks of Lefferts Manor and larger PLG are separated by Flatbush Avenue.
* The building is not actually going to be built on Ocean Avenue; it is set back a block from the street, reducing its visual impact.
* The building is not unprecedented. Patio Gardens, located about a block away, is nearly as tall. And a number of tall buildings can be seen on all sides of the park.
Blog reader Timmy posted a recap of the PLGNA/CRGPLG meeting about the Lincoln Road Tower in the comments section of our earlier post. From the sound of it, our misgivings about the meeting were spot on.
We appreciate his comprehensive comments and, because his feelings mirror our own, we thought they deserved a more prominent placement. His recap is below the fold.
(Please make any comments about the meeting itself here, instead of below the meeting notice.)
Continue reading "Lincoln Tower Meeting: A Recap" »
PLGNA and a new group called "Concerned Residents of Greater Prospect-Lefferts Gardens" are holding an open meeting to discuss the proposed Lincoln Road Tower and its potential collateral effects. Tuesday, May 20th at 7:30PM
Grace Reformed Church
1800 Bedford Avenue between Lefferts and Lincoln
Hawthorne Street's bloggers have previously stated that we are generally in favor of the Tower, though we know that the feeling isn't universal. The tone of the flyer for the meeting implies to this reader that the hosting groups oppose the Tower. Notwithstanding Hawthorne Street's opinion, the issues raised in the flier—housing displacement, environmental impact and community preservation—are issues that need to be considered in any new development.
Brownstoner reports that Prospect Park Audubon Center senior naturalist Gabriel Willow fears that the glass design for the Lincoln Road tower risks killing scores of birds. Architect Tom Gilman hasn't responded to say whether he took the bird issue in consideration when designing the building.
I don't know enough about this issue to comment, but hope developer Henry Herbst was serious when he told the Brooklyn Eagle that he's considering holding a neighborhood meeting to discuss the project.
 Artist's rendering |
As first reported in The Echo, the Lefferts Manor Association has elected to go the final step in forging the identity of the deed-restricted enclave and will formally become a gated community.
While various versions of the plan have been floated over the years, the recent "speed hump controversy" proved to be the catalyst for change. While some residents were opposed to all forms of traffic calming, others were concerned about speed humps' impact on parking spaces, the potential for pollution and noise, the unattractiveness of additional road signs, and a possible invasion of bears. It was agreed that preventing all through-traffic in Lefferts Manor addressed these concerns.
"We've seen some beautiful ornamentation and ironwork in places like Sea Gate," said Lefferts Manor Association President Ben Edwards, "and we think we can put up similar, if smaller, versions around the Manor."
Another resident added that the gates would go a long way to "maintaining the country feel of the neighborhood against encroachment from developers."
Probably the most controversial part of the plan is the decision to exclude the North side of Fenimore Street and the South side of Lincoln Road. "We can't very well fence in the non-Manor residents living opposite those houses," claimed Echo editor Bob Marvin, "and it is equally impractical to run fence down the middle of the street. And the truth is, it will be a lot easier to explain the boundaries of Lefferts Manor now. If you had to type them twice a day in the Brownstoner comments section, you'd understand."
Reaction from outside of Lefferts Manor was mixed. Neighborhood coffee shop K-Dog and Dunebuggy announced a plan to begin deliveries into Lefferts Manor, while a doctor at Kings County Hospital said "I don't care; I drive down Winthrop."
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