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August 19, 2009

Heights' Lights

heights_081909.jpg
Brooklyn Heights has launched a $2.7 million campaign to replace its current, modern streetlights with antique-looking lampposts, the Brooklyn Paper reports. The Brooklyn Heights Association has already received $250,000 in public funds for phase one of the project, and will soon receive $400,000 more. The 229 posts to be replaced are aluminum, "cobra-head" style lights, and they will be replaced with replicas of the old bishops-crook style lamps that used to line the streets before the 1960s. Each bishop's crook light costs around $10,000, the Paper reports, while the cobra's head lights cost $4,000 each. “They are beautiful, they enhance the neighborhood, and they are consistent with the history of the Heights,” said BHA President Judy Stanton. The bishop's crook lights already line Montague Street, and the project does not have a set start date.
Light Pork in Brooklyn Heights [Brooklyn Paper]
Brooklyn Heights Becoming Bishop's Crooksville [Brooklyn Eagle]




Posted by jscheff at 11:15 AM | Comments (36)
Categories: Brooklyn Heights, Streets

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Comments

Affordable housing - that's great.

Now, is 110k for a one bedroom in very far out East New York that far below market value that this is a good deal?

Posted by: dirty_hipster at August 19, 2009 9:04 AM

“They are beautiful, they enhance the neighborhood, and they are consistent with the history of the Heights,”

So we should soon be expecting hookers dressed in appropriate period outfits standing under them?

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at August 19, 2009 11:17 AM

Bjork and light posts all in one day. I am not sure I can take all this

Posted by: brickoven at August 19, 2009 11:22 AM

That's not a hooker, that's Björk in a swan corset.

Posted by: DitmasSnark at August 19, 2009 11:26 AM

lol.

Posted by: PitbullNYC at August 19, 2009 11:33 AM

I think there's a lot of "flogging the bishop" that goes on anyway in BH so these bishop's crook lights are appropriate.

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at August 19, 2009 11:35 AM

The new Bishop's crook poles will be a lovely addition to the neighborhood. The old aluminum poles are falling apart and need replacement anyway. I'm all for this. It is the right thing to in the City's very first Historic District. The "blue-haired ladies" really started a trend back in 1965 with that historic district thing.

Posted by: Minard Lafever at August 19, 2009 11:37 AM

Mr. Lafever, you are the only one around here with any sense of what's right.

Posted by: Nomi at August 19, 2009 11:53 AM

Why do we put up with this fake history just because the building stock is historic? We live our contemporary lives in the midst of some very beautiful architecture with historic value. So preserve these buildings but adding "neo-historic" street amenities gives us fakery. I don't want to feel like I live in some planner's idea of 'ye olde towne'.
New street lights yes, but a simple contemporary design would be so much better.

Posted by: jefrey at August 19, 2009 12:05 PM

This will make Brooklyn Heights look more like Stuyvesant Heights. About time they caught up. ;-)

Posted by: Miss Chiff at August 19, 2009 12:06 PM

Miss Chiff lobs one from the ghettto at the high falutin BH crowd. :)

Snap

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at August 19, 2009 12:13 PM

jefrey: these stunning new contemporary lights that you are dreaming up, where will they come from? The NYC DOT? Ha!
I think we're better off with the bp poles.
Just because you do not like them does not make them "fake".

Posted by: Minard Lafever at August 19, 2009 12:14 PM

I'm not sure I like the idea of my tax dollars being used to prettify the wealthiest neighborhood in brooklyn. If the residents want to spend their own money enhancing the aesthetics of the neighborhood fine, but I would rather the city spend it on neighborhoods that NEED improvement. This is, after all, a neighborhood that opposed building a beautiful park for all of Brooklyn to enjoy...

Posted by: lalaland at August 19, 2009 12:23 PM

Fake history. That doesn't seem like what this is. They are reproductions, of course, but no one's pretending they're not.

Posted by: Nomi at August 19, 2009 12:25 PM

"This will make Brooklyn Heights look more like Stuyvesant Heights. About time they caught up. ;-)"

Funny.

Posted by: Nomi at August 19, 2009 12:25 PM

lalaland - your tax dollars already installed these retro-styled contemporary lampposts in bourgeois north Greenpoint a few years back. Not a wealthy hood.

Posted by: dittoburg at August 19, 2009 12:27 PM

Does Stuyvesant Heights have its original bc poles? Lucky!

Posted by: Minard Lafever at August 19, 2009 12:28 PM

I was hoping to see more posts like lalaland's.

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at August 19, 2009 12:28 PM

lalaland has a good point.

Posted by: InsertSnappyNameHere at August 19, 2009 12:29 PM

I'm with lalaland. $650,000 to replace street lights that are in working order? I can think of about 800 better uses.

Posted by: bkkkkklyn at August 19, 2009 12:30 PM

Yea, they could have bought a ferry for $900,000 which is only worth $25K. That would have been better.

Posted by: dittoburg at August 19, 2009 12:32 PM

lala: The Brooklyn Heights Association has been one of the biggest boosters of the Brooklyn Bridge Park. They are all for it and have been very public about it for years even though they have come under attack by groups in adjacent neighborhoods.
If you are going to insult an entire neighborhood, you should have your facts straight so as not to appear like a complete nitwit.

Posted by: Minard Lafever at August 19, 2009 12:47 PM

Minard: Our lamp posts are reproductions.

jefrey: I would argue that trying to maintain an historic look can benefit a neighborhood as it gives the residents a sense of history and their place in that history. I believe it creates pride in one's neighborhood. Such pride leads to respectful behavior and a sense of community that keeps neighborhoods alive, thriving and growing in positive and productive ways. Street lamps are a very small part of it, of course, but you have to start somewhere.

As to whether Biff and Bjork deserve such a nice street lamp, that is another issue.

Posted by: Miss Chiff at August 19, 2009 12:47 PM

Considering the tax dollars that flow out of Brooklyn Heights each year, new streetlights do not seem like such a big deal. Infrastructure is worth the investment and something like new streetlights enhance the quality of life in the Borough, which should be important to most brownstoners. Smith Street was improved by new lights, Atlantic Avenue too, Clinton Street in Cob Hill too, now they are doing some of the streets in the Heights....what should the money be used for instead? Wall Street bailouts?


Posted by: Minard Lafever at August 19, 2009 1:09 PM

how about you replace the light bulbs in my streetlamps before you give the heights some decorative ones.

thanks.

Posted by: dirty_hipster at August 19, 2009 1:25 PM

I too tire of our worship of all that is nineteenth century. If we citizens tolerate the disney-fication of our streetscapes and don't demand better up-to-date designs, then are we surprised there are no new attactive designs. This country is woefully behind east Asia and Europe when it comes to basic infra-structure - spending money on "ye olde" lamp posts is just a sign of degeneracy. Okay, back to my vacation reading...

Posted by: Putnamdenizen at August 19, 2009 1:29 PM

Maybe fix some of the effed up streets in Red Hook? Seems like a better idea than new lamps for BH. Yeah, I'm just hatin' on this in general, but still, there are better ways to use the money.

Posted by: InsertSnappyNameHere at August 19, 2009 1:31 PM

hipster, I waited and wondered for months about the dark streetlamp outside my window. then I had to novel idea to call 311 about it and THAT SAME NIGHT a cherry picker pulled up, a guy went up, and light was restored. I couldn't believe it.

Posted by: Ringo at August 19, 2009 1:33 PM

> I too tire of our worship of all that is nineteenth century.

So you are opposed to the proposed plan to decorate the streets of Brownstone Brooklyn with artfully placed horse poop?

Posted by: DitmasSnark at August 19, 2009 1:33 PM

they should put back all the SRO's....that was vintage Brooklyn Heights

Posted by: aj at August 19, 2009 1:43 PM

From my perspective, reproductions don't give residents a sense of history - they dilute it.

Posted by: jefrey at August 19, 2009 1:52 PM

If they were original, they'd be gas, not electric.

Posted by: daveinbedstuy at August 19, 2009 2:21 PM

jefrey- first of all, where do you find the originals and they would be far more expensive than repros. Then most of them would need a lot of work and refinishing. I am all for keeping the originals, but replacing them? I am more pragmatic.

That said, I also wonder why so much money is spent in BH when so many other places go wanting. Sorry Minard but your tax dollars comment is disingenuous. I don't see my tax dollars getting returned at the same rate to my neighborhood and we're a historic district too.

Posted by: bxgrl at August 19, 2009 3:10 PM

sorry- I meant that to read- but if you have to replace missing ones, I am more pragmatic.

Posted by: bxgrl at August 19, 2009 3:53 PM

Cool Ringo - maybe I'll try calling 311 rather than walking by them and cursing Mayor Bloomberg - which doesn't seem to be rectifying the problem.

Posted by: dirty_hipster at August 19, 2009 4:27 PM

Putnam: For someone like yourself who used to live in a brownstone, I find it laughable that you made the comment you did.

Jefrey: Please explain how a replica of an old lamp post dilutes history? And tell me what, exactly, is gained by some ultramodern design?

Posted by: Miss Chiff at August 19, 2009 6:12 PM

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