Franklin Avenue Wreck to Be Torn Down for New Apartment Building
We’ve always wondered what would happen to the decaying, rat-infested brick low-rise at 681 Franklin Avenue in Crown Heights, and recently we noticed that the interior of the three-story building had been completely demolished. The brick facade is still standing, held up by scaffolding, but workers on site told us the rest of the building…
We’ve always wondered what would happen to the decaying, rat-infested brick low-rise at 681 Franklin Avenue in Crown Heights, and recently we noticed that the interior of the three-story building had been completely demolished. The brick facade is still standing, held up by scaffolding, but workers on site told us the rest of the building would come down too. It turns out the HPD ordered an emergency demolition of the long-abandoned structure in June.
But the forgotten property will have a new beginning. A construction supervisor showed us plans for a new three-story building, which he said will most likely be rentals. New building applications have not yet been filed.
The property sold to an LLC for $1,400,000 on September 15. As to why the building was neglected for so long, public records show a vacate order in 1985 and a transfer to a Florida-based estate in 2011 (when the absentee owner died, presumably). Boxes with x’s spray painted on the building show it was unsafe to enter. GMAP
I passed this the other day and was amused to notice they were doing excavation the old fashioned way — bucket brigade!