« Thursday Links Open Thread »

September 24, 2009

Affordable and Green in East New York

dumont_240909.jpg
Hudson Companies (yes, they of the Third & Bond blog) announced that ground was broken yesterday at the eight-story low-income housing development at 1490 Dumont Avenue in East New York. The 176 rental apartments, made possible by the LAMP program and several city agencies, will be available to households with incomes of $16,000 to $46,000, with 20 percent of the units reserved for formerly homeless tenants. The project (called the Elder Lane development) will include solar panels, bicycle and car parking, and a 6,000-square-foot enclosed, landscaped courtyard. It will also be "the first residential project in NYC to utilize a vibro-compaction system," which, as the name implies, uses vibrations to rearrange the soil, making it more dense and less permeable. According to the press release, this saved the project $1.5 million because "the procedure eliminates the need for 50’ piles, as well as structural caps, beams, and slabs." 1490 Dumont is being launched as part of Mayor Bloomberg's New Housing Marketplace Plan, which hopes to preserve or construct 165,000 units of affordable housing by 2014. GMAP




Posted by jscheff at 9:00 AM | Comments (31)
Categories: Affordable Housing, East New York

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.brownstoner.com/mte/mt-tb.cgi/11564

Comments

solar panels? bike and car parking? :-/

okaaaay. priorities much?

that said, affordable housing IS a good thing. and congrats to everyone who can snag one of these apartments that most of us work full time for a living could never even dream about of being able to afford great amenities.

yeah im jeallousing hahha


*rob*

Posted by: Butterfly at September 24, 2009 9:47 AM

rob - car parking would be essential because this area is further out and less served by public transit than park slope. people may need to drive to their jobs b/c that's the only way that they can get there in under 3hrs/4 busor subway transfers.

Posted by: CG_ups at September 24, 2009 9:57 AM

and i'm all for city projects utilizing solar panels or other green solutions.

Posted by: CG_ups at September 24, 2009 9:59 AM

does time warner cable service this far outreach of nyc btw?

*rob*

Posted by: Butterfly at September 24, 2009 10:00 AM

This location is a few blocks from the Grant Avenue station of the A train. Granted it's a long ride from there into the city, but it's not four bus or subway transfers. It would be a pretty rough place to live without a car, though. This is across from Magic Johnson's movie theater on Linden Boulevard.

Posted by: Sparafucile at September 24, 2009 10:13 AM

"does time warner cable service this far outreach of nyc btw"

I think it's cablevision

Posted by: dirty_hipster at September 24, 2009 10:33 AM

Sounds like a great project. If green solutions translate into homeowners/renters spending less on energy, then that's great all around. Anyone trying to survive on a $16,000 income in this city needs all the help they can get.

Posted by: Montrose Morris at September 24, 2009 10:34 AM

agreed MM. and if the city is subsidizing the cost of green solutions, it's better for the tenants as well as more environmentally responsible.

sparafucile - totally get your point about the A train but was thinking more for people that may have commutes not conducive to the subway / not going into manhattan. I had a friend who was a social worker comming from queens to the bronx and her husband was a teacher commuting from queens to south brooklyn. it was so much easier for them to take long crowded train rides through 3 borough. there are a lot of people who may not be working in manhattan. had another friend who was a home health care worker, her commute would have been beyond unreasonable without a car. i take 2-3 trains or 2 trains with an uncomfortably long walk to get to work and both ends of my commute are in MTA highly served areas.

Posted by: CG_ups at September 24, 2009 10:43 AM


Is this the same as a house project (e.g., The Gowanus Houses)? Those are "rental" units too, right?

I'm not being snarky here -- I actually wonder if there is a distinction between the two.

Posted by: tybur6 at September 24, 2009 10:49 AM

quote:
Anyone trying to survive on a $16,000 income in this city needs all the help they can get.


the same can be said for people on 30, and 40, and 70. and i know plenty of people making 16K a year surviving in the city without any form of government assistance, manhattan even if you can believe that! the difference is they aren't breeding and i guess have multiple roommates.

but, like i said, i really am all for helping people who need it. it's just that sometimes i feel like it's not an even distribution of helping people. i feel like the only people who get help are those who seem to intentionally do nothing productive.

also, im sorry if my viewpoints are a little askinder, that's just who i am and how i feel, disjointed on various issues.

*rob*

Posted by: Butterfly at September 24, 2009 11:04 AM


"b/c that's the only way that they can get there in under 3hrs/4 busor subway transfers."

Not exactly. The A train from Liberty Ave., a few blocks from here, will take you to Manhattan in about an hour. The #3 New Pennsylvania Ave. stop is also close, and will get you to Manhattan in about 1 hour. It is far out, and a car is good to have out there, but it doesn't take anywhere near 3-4 hours to get to the city from here.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 11:10 AM


"does time warner cable service this far outreach of nyc btw?"

No...it's Cablevision out here.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 11:10 AM

was hoping you'd weigh in ENY, though more on what I threw in as a totally wild guess transport example to explain why providing parking isn't a "luxury" but more a necessity. anyay, i pointed out in my 10:43 post, i was thinking of people who don't work in manhattan, i.e. people who have lower paying jobs in the other boroughs. it's hard to get from borough to borough without going through manhattan (in most cases, i realize that there are some exceptions, let's not nit pick people).

Posted by: CG_ups at September 24, 2009 11:13 AM


Sorry, I re-checked the map and it's the Euclid Ave. A train stop that's near here. Still, won't take you more than 1-1.5 hours to get to Manhattan.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 11:13 AM

Until the city is able to provide for all, stop making the unlucky/unconnected subsidize the scammers who work off the books and make like 100K.

Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at September 24, 2009 11:13 AM

"Is this the same as a house project (e.g., The Gowanus Houses)? Those are "rental" units too, right?"

Housing projects are run by NYCHA, i.e, the city. This place, it appears, will be run privately.

Rob, these places sound like they're in YOUR price range, actually.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 11:16 AM


"(called the Elder Lane development)"

Probably the ELDERT Lane development...name of a local street.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 11:17 AM


"i was thinking of people who don't work in manhattan, i.e. people who have lower paying jobs in the other boroughs."

Well, for one, a lot of the people who live here have lower-paying jobs in other parts of Brooklyn east from here, and in Queens and Long Island west of here. The Brooklyn people can still use the subway and the people going west can use the extensive bus network (including the private Queens buses that link to city routes). Granted, it's not ideal, but again, you don't NEED a car to live here. A lot of the people who live here also work at places like Kennedy airport, which is relatively close by bus.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 11:21 AM

Rob, you'd have to be stacked like cordwood in an apartment in order to make $1,333 a month, before taxes, work out for you.

The choice to "breed" is complicated, and hopefully involves more love and joy in life than just considering money.

I'm not going to tell you who you know and don't know, but I find it hard to believe that many people in your circle makes only $16K. If you, who I believe, told us on several occasions that you make in the high $40's, have to sell your metrocard and eat ramen noodles in order to make it through the month, imagine pulling in only a quarter of that.

You may feel those who do nothing get more than you do, but that opinion comes from not knowing anything about the people in question, and from getting all your info from stereotypes and television. No matter how unconventional, crappy or disadvantaged your upbringing may have been, there are plenty out there who would be happy to have had such a good life, compared to theirs.

Posted by: Montrose Morris at September 24, 2009 11:23 AM

quote:
Rob, these places sound like they're in YOUR price range, actually.


if i was a "family" of four, then yes, you are correct. but because i choose not to bring children into the world that i cannot afford, i would be poop outta luck to get into a building like this.

*rob*

Posted by: Butterfly at September 24, 2009 11:26 AM

" but because i choose not to bring children into the world that i cannot afford, i would be poop outta luck to get into a building like this."

I agree with you 100%

Posted by: dirty_hipster at September 24, 2009 11:45 AM

that figure you stated was when i also had a second part time job at a gallery. havent been there in quite a long time unfortunately :( that extra money SERIOUSLY helped. i also had it when i was paying a ton less in rent, ah well, i get your point tho MM. also why is it so far fetched that people in my circle might be making only 16K? pretty much all my old roommates in harlem (like all 5 of them at the time) made about that or less. and they werent students, one was, but the rest were working adults. hustling various ways of getting money tho. no one getting any kind of assistance, tho i now realize they all could have qualified for about 100-200 dollars worth of food stamps a month. this is such a weird topic.


*rob*

Posted by: Butterfly at September 24, 2009 11:54 AM

The parking seems weird to me because of how astronomically expensive it is to live in this city - I flat out don't understand how someone owns and maintains a car at $16-$46K a yr.

Ok, at $40K+, after rent and food, you can probably squeak by having a car, but anything less seems impossible.

Unless I missed it, we don't know the size of the units, so maybe they're for single people.

Posted by: crazypants at September 24, 2009 12:29 PM

Good point CP! Are these legitimate working poor or are they driving Mommy's 2000 Lexus? Who would ever trust our corrupt gov't to decide who's for real and who's not?

Posted by: Joe from Brooklyn at September 24, 2009 12:37 PM

"(called the Elder Lane development)"
Probably the ELDERT Lane development...name of a local street.
Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 11:17 AM

I was thinking the same thing ENY. I have heard of Eldert's Lane. My Mom, b. 1942, as well her father ( b. 1912) were both born & raised on Arlington Avenue near Barbey & Jerome St. ( formerly called "Arlington Section") , I believe the area is now referred to as Cypress Hill, it's near Jamaica Ave/ Miller Hill ( Ave) / Highland Blvd. Big old Victorians still found up there...my grandparent's ( now both deceased) sold the then 80 or so year old house, in 1969 and retired to Daytona Beach, Fla. The house still stands, having changed hands several times since then. It has been in a state of disrepair for some time having been chopped up into some sort of boarding house in the late 1970's. My Grandfather's parents, who were Italian immigrants, purchased the house shortly after 1900. Apparently , an Arlington Ave address was fairly prestigious in those days because they had to sell two small building's they owned, one on Vermont Street and the other on New Jersey Ave to afford the Arlington Ave house, where few with similar surnames to their's resided, (at that time.) Back to topic, I am always pleased to read about positive development like this in ENY and hope this project is a real success.

Posted by: Crescent Hill at September 24, 2009 12:38 PM


"The parking seems weird to me because of how astronomically expensive it is to live in this city - I flat out don't understand how someone owns and maintains a car at $16-$46K a yr."

For one, not everyone buys a new car. There are plenty of cheap used cars available. Secondly, a significant percentage of these folks are union people (working in hospitals, schools, for the city, etc.), with access to credit unions that can provide low-rate car loans. They may not have the highest salaries, but they often have good benefits and enough economic stability to own a car. Thirdly, a lot of NYers save on insurance by registering cars in other states, places where they have family or close friends. Those are just some of the ways low to middle income folks can afford a car. This is NYC - folks are normally very resourceful here, and where there's a will, there's a way. You just have to use a little imagination.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 1:04 PM


Thanks for your post, Crescent Hill. I grew up in a section of ENY ("Spring Creek") that's not too far from the Cypress Hill area, which I'm definitely familiar with. As you said, some of the great old Victorian mansions are still there, and parts of Cypress near Highland Park are quite nice. I'm not surprised to learn from you that it was a pretty prestigious area.

FYI, this picture might interest you: http://bit.ly/1Y8unC

Anyway, like you, I am glad to see this project come to fruition in ENY, and wish it nothing but success.

Posted by: East New York at September 24, 2009 1:10 PM

Thanks ENY- I am sure you are familiar with the few remaining large homes on one side of Highland Blvd. close to the park from whose backyards, due to elevation, are available some of the best views in all of Bklyn. These were the true mansion properties of ENY, but Arlington Ave as well as Jamaica Ave, in this section, ran a close second. Also, did you ever get a chance to visit the Public Library on Arlington Ave , I think it's near Barbey St. Ever notice the details outside and inside the building. It dates to the Arlington sections heyday, when nothing less than a grand structure would have been permitted there. Funny thing is that many Brooklynites who have never been to , or have certain perceptions about ENY dwellings , would never think that these large "true" Victorian , (many with unique and individual detail) homes would be there and at one time many more of them were.

Posted by: Crescent Hill at September 24, 2009 1:42 PM

Cypress Hills has some amazing homes, especially up on Highland Blvd, I love going up there on those rare occasions I have a car, and am in the neighborhood. Even down below, you can see a classic Victorian small town in the way the streets and homes are laid out. Brooklyn is much more unique and varied than people think.

Posted by: Montrose Morris at September 24, 2009 2:22 PM

Brooklyn is much more unique and varied than people think.

Posted by: Montrose Morris at September 24, 2009 2:22 PM

So true Montrose. I can recall the first time I drove up the very steep Miller Ave to reach Highland Blvd specifically to see those fine homes. I never knew they existed until I was told about them some years back. There used to be a spot where from the sidewalk on Highland , you could see an incredible view of surrounding area. You are so right, the many peeked Victorians seen below were a sight to behold.

Posted by: Crescent Hill at September 24, 2009 3:06 PM

I don't like the headline. It's not green if it includes parking. Sure, there are lots of good reasons why people out there might own a car, but that doesn't mean we should buy them a parking spot.

If someone doesn't want the apartment because it doesn't come with free parking, that's fine. Let someone else have it.

Posted by: mgm at September 24, 2009 6:19 PM

Post a comment

Please be patient while your comment is published. It may take a moment.

Latest Restaurant Additions