LPC Makes It Official at Alice & Agate Courts
Yesterday LPC head Robert Tierney, Council Member Al Vann and about two dozen people celebrated the designation of the Alice and Agate Courts Historic Districts with a ceremony to unveil two new street signs and an announcement that five residents had won LPC grants totaling $84,000 to help restore their historic, 19th century homes. The…
Yesterday LPC head Robert Tierney, Council Member Al Vann and about two dozen people celebrated the designation of the Alice and Agate Courts Historic Districts with a ceremony to unveil two new street signs and an announcement that five residents had won LPC grants totaling $84,000 to help restore their historic, 19th century homes. The grants, which come from the Commission’s Historic Preservation Grant Program and range from $12,000 to $20,000 apiece, are going to be used to repaint, repoint and repair the facades of five homes on both of those streets. Alice and Agate Courts are the 21st historic district designated under Tierney, 12 of which have been outside of Manhattan. Guess how many have been in Brooklyn? Seven. Top notch!
LPC Moves Ahead With Two New Historic Districts [Brownstoner]
Alice & Agate Courts Proposed for LPC Designation [Brownstoner]
LPC to Consider Ocean Avenue Historic District [Brownstoner]
New Bed-Stuy Historic District in the Offing [Brownstoner]
So you’d give up “the projects, schools, food stamps, and section 8” because you don’t like them but at the same time you want to live in Bushwick??
I can’t keep up with you.
These all or nothing arguments are really kinda ridiculous.
BOTH of these things are important so cut it out.
Yeesh.
quote:
what would you be willing to give up to get your subway and other infrastructure?
parks, the projects, schools, food stamps, and section 8.
*rob*
Checks and balances are necessary in this day and age. We won’t accept a “King” like Moses making enormous decisions about our neighborhoods and lives without our imput, especially with our money. That is the reason AY is still a hole in the ground. It may make it difficult to get anything done, and I understand the frustration, and often agree with it, but in the long run, this is fairer, better, and forces some serious thought as to the long term consequences of what we do, and what kind of city we want to live in.
We can’t rebuild Penn Station,(not Moses, I know) or the thousands of homes lost in all of the boroughs when those roads were cut, when alternatives were not considered, solely because Moses didn’t have to be bothered to do so. But this is now, and we don’t have to be as beholden to authority and power, and thus powerless, as in the past.
Many years ago when LPC started seriously trying to landmark neighborhoods, one of the stumbling blocks was the fact that homeowners were pursuing low-cost solutions to upkeep and maintenance on their homes rather than those solutions that were in keeping with what landmarks wanted to see. Examples were painting brownstone to prevent decay, replacing wood framed windows with storm windows, adding modern exterior lighting fixtures rather than period appropriate fixtures, putting gates on previously ungated yards, etc. Community activists claimed (rightly) that lower and middle class homeowners should not be sentenced to living in drafty, falling down homes simply because they had purchased a home in a community that was subsequently landmarked and they could not afford expensive restoration or repairs.
As a remedy, money was set aside to assist homeowners in landmark districts with repair costs. The reasoning was that people would be more likely to accept landmark-type renovations if they could be made affordable.
This type of program was intended to allow architectural preservation to continue in ALL parts of the city. Contrasting this with the 2nd Ave subway (a subway line which will run only through Manhattan, does not connect with any transportation hubs and which has been in the works for over 20 years) is folly. This $84,000 is less than 1/10th of the total compensation package for the new head of the MTA.
I’d like to see more money spent on infrastructure. In my world we’d have new water tunnels in Brooklyn, light rail in South Brooklyn, a tunnel from NJ to Brooklyn, a new bridge from LI to CT and a freight rail system east of the Hudson. But in order for that to happen we’d have to give up something. I don’t want the city to stop funding public education, close more hospitals, shut down libraries, stop providing public housing or decide that the answer is less police or fire protection. So my question Rob and Benson is assuming we stop funding all landmarks grants (which I’m sure total less than a couple million a year), what would you be willing to give up to get your subway and other infrastructure?
benson, thanks.
I’m managing a 450k construction project and am seeing firsthand how much red tape there is to every single inch.
Bxgrl;
You are repeating tired arguments against Robert Moses.
The age in which he operated was that of road-building. It was a NATIONAL priority (see:Interstate highway act) and he EXECUTED those priorities – he didn’t set them. The main thing is that he got things DONE.
Yes,today we are much more enlightened. All the “stakeholders” are consulted, and consulted, and consulted, and NOTHING gets done. Howlong has it taken to get the 2nd Ave subway built?
Finally, that overpass argument has been proven false. Please check up on recent scholarship on the issue.
So we should millions to a rich private developer to have a vanity arena for his team but we can’t give some people in a poor neighborhood a lousy 84,000 to fix their facades? Gee- I so not get that.
Yes, Benson, but hardly the Hoover Dam in scale. The fact remains that tax photos served both the public and private good during the Depression, in smaller projects, as well, which is the same thing that lampposts and intact facades do.