New Northern Crown Heights Hotel in the Works

Probably going to be a shelter of some kind. What's next for Crown Heights?

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:07 AM

10:07- hopefully not you.

Too true, dave- but I think it's gabby who wrote this one. becoming a one-trick pony, is she not?

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:28 AM

Room rates by the hour?

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:30 AM

i dunno, that's the location--2 blocks from the armory. would that make *you* want to stay in the hotel if the intake center's moved there?

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:37 AM

Doesn't the Long Island Rail Road have a station at Nostrand Avenue @ Atlantic Avenue? The view may not be splendid, but I understand that until the beginning of the age of jet airplane travel, it was commonplace for hotels to be built around train stations; consequently, other enterprises are clustered around such hotels. Perhaps, it's wishful thinking, but maybe it's a sign that this may be the start of a development plan for the Nostrand/Atlantic junction area.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:42 AM

Just what is the perfect number of blocks from the armory? Is 10 far enough? Or maybe 13,- 25. Whatever. You act as if the people from the shelter don't have feet. They can walk to anywhere. Also, since most of you on this site seem to think that no one in the Crown Heights area has any money, would'nt it make sense that the shelter residents would go to a more wealthy area to look for day work and beg for money? I don't get it 2 blocks away and property sucks. 6 blocks away and suddenly you should pay 600k for an apt. or a mill plus for a home.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:48 AM

Just what is the perfect number of blocks from the armory? Is 10 far enough? Or maybe 13,- 25. Whatever. You act as if the people from the shelter don't have feet. They can walk to anywhere. Also, since most of you on this site seem to think that no one in the Crown Heights area has any money, would'nt it make sense that the shelter residents would go to a more wealthy area to look for day work and beg for money? I don't get it 2 blocks away and property sucks. 6 blocks away and suddenly you should pay 600k for an apt. or a mill plus for a home.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:52 AM

there is a station right there and it's true- hotels were built near train stations at one time. remember the Judy Garland movie, The Harvey Girls? Not that I expect this will be quite so wonderful but I am happy its a beginning of good things to come in the area. With the first phase of landmarking done, CHN is getting better every day. I've also heard that a condo building may be going up behind the hotel on the Pacific St. side.

the intake center is a problem but the community is fighting it and working with other organizations so its far from a done deal.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 10:56 AM

I used to like that live chicken place.....

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 11:51 AM

Who knows if a hotel is the best thing in the world? But frankly, I am damn sick of looking at the empty lot every day. Makes the block look like sh*t. So, they will build a Best Western on Atlantic and Condos on Pacific, I've talked to the developer.

Unless you live right there, and have to look at the crappy lot, I don't think you should be so judgmental. Anything is better than what is there now. But I guess people have to complain about something.

Do you know how expensive the Marriott in Downtown Brooklyn is???? Maybe a hotel will be another option for people who cannot affort a $250 a night hotel in Downtown Brooklyn. It will be located right at the LIRR stop. Easy access from JFK and to A train.

Why any of you would rather see an empty lot there is beyond me.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 1:56 PM

Do you know that this hotel is going to charge by the hour??? Like I said, you don't have to look at the lot every day. Why don't you think of the quality of people that hang out in front of the empty lot??

What would YOU like to see built there???

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 2:11 PM

The Foodtown that is located two blocks away sells fresh, affordable fruits/vegetables. Their store is decent. But, maybe you should contact the developer and ask him to put in a fruit and vegetable store....

By the way, I would love to have a beautiful community garden or park instead of a Best Western Hotel. But does that mean drug dealers/prostitutes, unsavory characters would hang out in it?

We can all say what we want to be built there, but if we want to be "real" if any of us had the money to invest, someone should have done it by now.

I've been looking at the empty lot for 5 years, and my neighbors have been looking at it for much longer; you, nor anyone else, has come up with anything better up to this point, so..... I still cannot imagine that a hotel would lower my property values as opposed to a huge empty lot.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 3:35 PM

Oh, how do you know that the Atlantic Inn charges by the hour!!!!!

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 3:38 PM

I just bet she does. Maybe you two will be the new biff and dave.

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 4:04 PM

Brownstoner:

I remember this lot from days growing up in Crown Heights during the 1950s. It was, in fact, right across the street from the apartment where my family lived on Pacific Street. (The front of our building is visible in the left-hand corner of the photo above.)

Sure, empty lots aren't so great, but this one opened views of the Brooklyn skyline from the French windows in our living room and dining room. Pacific Street had several big trees at the time so the lot was pretty well screened, the sky above rolling to distant church towers and that grand daddy of all Brooklyn campaniles, Boys High School. Much better than looking at another apartment building!

When the leaves fell, the LIRR station on Atlantic Avenue appeared. This was a very old-fashioned number, made of wood with a shingle roof. It was painted green and yellow, cheerful to look at and a pleasant reminder of the trips the family took to visit friends on the Island or to go to the Hamptons.

Our living room had a very deep window seat, so it was possible to open the casement windows and look directly up to the sky and follow the paths of planes going to and from La Guardia. To this day, the sound of planes bring me back to my childhood and pleasant thoughts of travel, all derived from sitting for hours in that window seat, trying to do my homework.

(On a recent drive by the building, I was sad to see that the French windows have been knocked out and replaced with double hung ones. Also, the fire escapes have been removed, which means that our old place must have been gutted and completely rearranged. Too bad, because the apartments were spacious, elegant, and great for families.)

The photo also shows the

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 6:30 PM

Brownstoner:

(Apologies for the second posting, but some of the text was lost the first time.)

I remember this lot from days growing up in Crown Heights during the 1950s. It was, in fact, right across the street from the apartment where my family lived on Pacific Street. (The front of our building is visible in the left-hand corner of the photo above.)

Sure, empty lots aren't so great, but this one opened views of the Brooklyn skyline from the French windows in our living room and dining room. Pacific Street had several big trees at the time so the lot was pretty well screened, the sky above rolling to distant church towers and that grand daddy of all Brooklyn campaniles, Boys High School. Much better than looking at another apartment building!

When the leaves fell, the LIRR station on Atlantic Avenue appeared. This was a very old-fashioned number, made of wood with a shingle roof. It was painted green and yellow, cheerful to look at and a pleasant reminder of the trips the family took to visit friends on the Island or to go to the Hamptons.

Our living room had a very deep window seat, so it was possible to open the casement windows and look directly up to the sky and follow the paths of planes going to and from La Guardia. To this day, the sound of planes bring me back to my childhood and pleasant thoughts of travel, all derived from sitting for hours in that window seat, trying to do my homework.

(On a recent drive by the building, I was sad to see that the French windows have been knocked out and replaced with double hung ones. Also, the fire escapes have been removed, which means that our old place must have been gutted and completely rearranged. Too bad,

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 6:41 PM

Brownstoner:

(So here's a third try, this time consisting of the second part of my post.)

....The photo also shows the six story building next to the lot on Pacific Street. This is where the block's decline began during the time when Crown Heights was subject to block-busting and speculation by dummy real-estate companies fronting for absentee landlords. Here the apartments were chopped up and rented to transients, creating a gauntlet of young men swigging alcohol near the corner of Nostrand Avenue. A shame, really, because it was a nice looking building in a kind of Spanish Renaissance style, and with an elevator, which means it was among the newer buildings on the block (and certainly erected for a middle-class tenantry).

From this location, the block's problems spread as other landlords pressured long-term residents to move, cutting back on services and turning apartments into rooming houses. (I was happy to see on my drive that the building in the photo appears recently renovated and in much better shape than I remember.)

I hope that the hotel planned for Atlantic is legitimate and doesn't compromise its neighbors' hard work in bringing Crown Heights back. Condos along Pacific are a nice idea. Although it was good to have that view.

(To this day I have a painting my father, a Sunday artist, did from our front windows, one of several making our view his subject. The trees are lush, the railroad station trim and bright, and the tower of Boys High a punctuation mark in the sky. Nice.)

Nostalgic on Park Avenue

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 6:49 PM

Bxgl:

Yes, we had wood wainscoting, paneling, and faux fire places. Parquet floors, too. The lobby and stairs were marble and tile and there were two sets of heavy wrought-iron doors to the street, separated by a vestibule and several steps. (We kids would get our fingers caught trying to push the doors open while turning the key. Ouch!)

Don't know much about housing codes, but I do think that every New York apartment needs "two means of egress," making it likely that our building's floors were reconfigured to have a second stair. (I don't think fire escapes are permissable with new construction anymore, although they might be "grandfathered" with renovations.)

Odd to think, but fire escapes can be attractive. On our building they made a nice veil across the facade. The place looks poorer without them. Also, the big slate and stone stoop at the entrance has been shaved away and a flimsy iron fence put around the base. Not just the details, but the proportions of the building (and its twin next door) are very different now -- and not for the better, even if "modernized."

But I hope people are happy living there. We were. (I'm looking now at one of my favorite photographs. It's of my mother swinging my little brother, three years old, in her arms in front of the brownstones across the street. They're laughing with joy. That picture's Crown Heights for me!)

NOP

Posted by: guest at July 10, 2008 7:20 PM

That sounds about right, Montrose.

Some time before 2000 a cabbie drove me from JFK along Atlantic and I asked him to turn into Pacific to get a glance of the old block. I was shocked by what I saw: abandoned buildings on my side of the street and my own building looking like something out of the South Bronx!

So a developer or public agency must have rehabbed the whole row. Looks like an "affordable" or subsidized housing job to me. Still, it's good to see the buildings come back. And with the new condos, the whole block will be occupied, something it wasn't even in my day. (I often wondered what was originally on that lot. There was a granite parapet in front of its wood fence. One of the great old mansions, perhaps -- like 1290?)

Hope you and your neighbors are vigilant as to design. There are very nice brownstones and limestones next to that lot. The condos should round them out rather than overshadow them. Modern's fine, maybe the best way to go. But is should be good Modern.

(And congratulations. You had the foresight to buy and hold in spite of all the naysayers on Brownstoner! In future, most of the bloggers here won't be able to touch Pacific Street!)

NOP

Posted by: guest at July 11, 2008 1:25 AM

HEY! What's wrong with a hourly hotel? Must we all assume that it will be used for non-christian like behaviour. I for one, would enjoy having a place to stop and shower after taking the ride from 34th street to Nostrand Ave on the LIRR.

Posted by: guest at July 11, 2008 9:15 AM

WOW! I remember attending a public safety meeting about crime and the absense of police protection around the Nostrand Ave station. I guess their solution was to approve a short-stay hotel that will give the late-night creepers something else to do besides commit crime.

Posted by: guest at July 11, 2008 9:26 AM

Maybe the LIRR is beginning a new Stop & Shower service that will soon be announced by our "still in the closet" borough president.

Posted by: guest at July 11, 2008 9:32 AM

Crown Heights rocks. Go home haters.

Posted by: guest at July 11, 2008 10:04 AM