Flatbush Rezoning Push Not Sitting Well With Some Locals
The Department of City Planning is working on a proposal to rezone a large swath of Flatbush that will affect neighborhoods known for their stunning collections of Victorian houses, like Ditmas Park West and South Midwood. Details about DCP’s plans are scarce at the moment—a spokesperson for the department said the city has studied 200…
The Department of City Planning is working on a proposal to rezone a large swath of Flatbush that will affect neighborhoods known for their stunning collections of Victorian houses, like Ditmas Park West and South Midwood. Details about DCP’s plans are scarce at the moment—a spokesperson for the department said the city has studied 200 blocks in the area in response to “community concerns about out-of-scale development”—and there’s no map available detailing the exact areas the city is likely to propose a rezoning for. What is known is that the measure is going to affect some Victorian Flatbush neighborhoods, and plenty of residents aren’t thrilled about the city’s vision, according to an article in Flatbush Life. Planning’s proposal would mean new developments in Ditmas Park West and South Midwood could only come in the form of one- and two-family detached homes (thus stemming the destruction of older housing stock for small condo or apartment building construction, as current zoning allows), but it would also allow new detached homes to be 50 percent bigger than is permitted by the zoning that’s now in place. PlanningSpeak on the matter is as follows: “The Department’s draft recommendations would map contextual zoning districts intended to preserve the scale and character of the area’s established neighborhoods. Contextual zoning districts are intended to result in new construction that is more in context with existing homes. Contextual zoning districts would deter tear downs of the existing detached, one- and two-family homes, where these homes are predominant. The Department has also recommended medium-density districts that would preserve the character of rowhouses and apartment building areas, where appropriate. In addition, the proposal would provide incentives for the production of new and affordable housing along portions of Flatbush Avenue, from Church Avenue to The Junction, as well as along portions of Coney Island Avenue.” Ditmas Park Blog has a link to an online petition asking Planning to rethink its proposal.
Community Board 14 Wrangles Over New Zoning [Flatbush Life]
Rezoning Victorian Flatbush [Ditmas Park Blog]
Photo by Flatbush Gardener.
The exact photo above is an a district–Midwood Park–that recently received Landmark status. And just this weekend owner of said property had builders in all weekend long, yes over the Memorial Day weekend, constructing a huge addition over the entirety of his back/side yard. He apparently even told a neighbor that he was doing it over the weekend because he had no permits but figured no one would be in town to call the DoB/cops on him. Once it was up, it would be a fait accompli and he’d get away with it. The owners of both houses immediately adjacent are livid, as he’s up to plot line w/out permits in a landmarked district designated so as to prevent this sort of unscrupulous behavior. It’s truly heinous.
This rezoning is more for Victorian Flatbush.
It doesn’t affect the area with the largest number of Orthodox families. As Xris stated above, those areas were already rezoned.
The southern half of CB14, with its large Orthodox community, already had a rezoning a couple of years ago. Most of it was rezoned to R4 and R5, which reduces open space requirements and increases FAR. There are no R2X areas there.
Polemicist,
Obviously you have not visited Flatbush lately. A number of single family homes were torn down and huge buildings have been built in the middle of blocks of Victorian homes and townhomes along Prospect Park, comparable in detail to any in Park Slope, were torn down to construct condos. This is not a case of NIMBYism as is the case with the residents of Brooklyn Heights and Cobble Hill not wanting a jail that prexisted the construction on the newer condo’s to reopen. It is about preserving the character of the neighborhood without resorting to the more restrictive Landmarking. There are obvious places for upzoning for development along Flatbush Avenue, Ocean Avenue and Coney Island Avenue and no one is averse to that.
PS: The petition is for Ditmas Park West, only. The house in the photo will not be affected, since it’s within the proposed Fiske Terrace-Midwood Park historic district.
R3-2 allows .6 FAR with a pitched roof, or did they change that?
You cannot write about this area of Brooklyn without mentioning the ongoing conflict between the growing Orthodox community and older residents, many of them also Jewish. It has been going on for 20 years.
The Orthodox tend to have large families, and if economically successful, often expand even large homes to accomodate them. For example, the R2X zoning district was created specifically to permit very large detached, one family homes on small lots.
Older residents often object to the expansions. And that’s the debate.
Meanwhile, many existing Victorians have been subdivided into apartments, sometimes in an “undocumented” factor, because they are too large for anyone but the Orthodox to occupy entirely.
The study area is the northern half of CB14. There will be a public hearing on the proposed zoning changes on 6/12, 7pm, at PS 249. The map will be presented to the public at that time.
Here’s a working link for the Flatbush Life article:
http://www.yournabe.com/articles/2008/05/23/flatbush/flatbush_life/news/flatbush_life_newsbiggerbutn05162008.txt
What’s really funny is Flatbush has hardly seen any new development since the 1920s. The NIMBY disease seems to be quite contagious, as these people really have nothing to complain about.
It’s preemptive NIMBYism!
Also, was it really necessary to provide a dictionary definition of “contextual zoning”?