The Rezoning of Windsor Terrace
[nggallery id=”26310″ template=galleryview] With all the focus on Gowanus lately, we’ve neglected Windsor Terrace, which is also being considered for a re-zone. Monday, City Planning Commissioner Amanda Burden started up the public review process for about five blocks of what they’re calling East Windsor Terrace. Looks like this would mostly be down-zoning, to prevent the…
[nggallery id=”26310″ template=galleryview]
With all the focus on Gowanus lately, we’ve neglected Windsor Terrace, which is also being considered for a re-zone. Monday, City Planning Commissioner Amanda Burden started up the public review process for about five blocks of what they’re calling East Windsor Terrace. Looks like this would mostly be down-zoning, to prevent the higher rises of Ocean Parkway and Coney Island Ave from seeping into the low-rise side streets (seems like the Caton Place condo projects, forever stalled and the scourge of the neighborhood, might be an issue here). “The current zoning has permitted construction of buildings that are not consistent with the area’s prevailing built character,” DCP writes. “Of particular concern is the R6 zoning mapped in portions of the rezoning area, which can permit the construction of apartment buildings without height limits that are out of character with the surrounding built context.” Besides appropriate height limits, the rezoning would add a commercial overlay for part of Caton Avenue (not to be confused with Caton Place), to keep business viable. The application had gone to CB7 for a 60-day review. Meanwhile, CB7 holds a board meeting tonight at 6:30PM, 4201 4th Avenue at 43rd Street, but the public hearing for the rezoning is on December 10. For more info on ULURP, click here.
This is a residential community not a commercial area. I’ve lived here for 30 years and I do not recall a clamoring for for all of these changes. I don’t want this to into Park snobby Slope. Changing the name changes the faces of this community and what it means. Growing up with Irish,Turkish, Russian, Jewish, Arab, Indian, Blacks and Puerto Ricans, all sharing sharing the space and finding peace and building a community. Developers and greedy landlords chased the old residents of Williamsburg and Brownsville out for hiipsters and now its spreading to Caton Avenue. There are more condos being built than schools but the last time I checked, there were more children under the age of 16 in Kensington, than hipsters crying out for Lattes or Brooklyn Lager. The bridges are beautiful, running across it at night with my sister and being smacked in the nose by the scent of Kensington Stables was a part of my childhood. Acting West Side Story scenes running across it at night as teen and no one could see it. How dare you UNStable Brooklyn Community Group speak of taking this away.
Plus, north of Caton Ave. is Time Warner Cable, and south is Cablevision.
This re-zoning is the happy conclusion to a long process of community planning conducted by residents of the immediate neighborhood. The Stable Brooklyn Community Group conducted planning workshops in 2005 and developed the plan under the guidance of Prof. Tom Angotti (Hunter College Center for Community Planning and Urban Development, author of “New York for Sale”–MIT Press). Since then, we presented it to City Planning, DOT, and elected officials. The zoning aspects that are a part of the current ULURP come directly from the plan. We purposely did not want to rezone the stables area because we want to protect it from residential development.
If anyone is interested in the original vision, a copy of the community’s plan can be downloaded from stablebrooklyn.com. Besides the zoning, it includes our ideas about bike/pedestrian/equestrian access to Prospect Park and a handful of other things.
As for the name of the neighborhood, we aren’t being snobby. We feel like part of Kensington, but the neighborhood line is drawn at Caton Avenue (as is the Community Board line). The Ft. Hamilton Pkwy and footbridge from the Robert Moses era is what severed the neighborhood originally. We also advocate tearing that barrier down (see the report). Even still, the folks who live here say “Windsor Terrace/Kensington border” which is really what it is, or “the stables area”. Real estate agents always make up their own names. We know where we are–on the border of everything.
Park Circle is almost sold out, there are a couple of units left.
Well, interesting that they and also residents who have all grown up in the neighborhood all say that WT goes down to Caton. How do you know that WT ends at Fort Hamilton Pkwy?
NYC Parks is wrong….Windsor Terracs boundaries are Prospect Park West, Prospect Park, Greenwood Cemetery and Fort Hamilton/Ocean Parkway.
simple enough.
Actually, according to the NYC Parks, Windsor Terrace’s southern border is Caton Ave.
http://www.nycgovparks.org/sub_your_park/historical_signs/hs_historical_sign.php?id=12420
Hey–I live near the monstrosity. Is there any chance the structure as it now stands could get torn down? If it stands in limbo for too long? Please?
Lalaland,
Thanks for the information.
I had heard that the East 7th street building was possibly going to be a nursing home…but nothing more than that…and I figured something else happened since the
Yes, it’s too bad that the other stable was knocked down for the ‘monstrosity’…but I agree, it looks like kensington stables will survive!
Have they sold all the park cirle unit’s, last I heard and looked there still seemed to be a bunch left?
Thanks.