Closing Bell: Brooklyn Flea + Urban Arts Festival
It’s been a busy week behind the scenes at The Flea, what with last night’s community meeting and all. The meeting was conceived as a listening session for neighborhood concerns but word leaked out and a number of supporters showed up and it ended up feeling more like a referendum on the market. For a…
It’s been a busy week behind the scenes at The Flea, what with last night’s community meeting and all. The meeting was conceived as a listening session for neighborhood concerns but word leaked out and a number of supporters showed up and it ended up feeling more like a referendum on the market. For a couple of longer reports, you can check out Racked, Gawker or Reclaimed Home. Senator Velmanette Montgomery, Councilmember James and Borough Prez Marty Markowitz by proxy all stepped up to the plate on behalf of the Flea; the suggestions ranged from the incremental and addressable to the not-so-reasonable and deal-breaking. There’s a big NY Times story about it slated for this weekend, so keep your eyes out. The two themes we (and others) kept coming back to were community-building and the importance of nurturing small businesses. Along those lines, we hope that everyone who comes out to the Flea this weekend will also make it over to nearby Myrtle Avenue between Emerson and Grand where the first day of the Brooklyn Urban Arts Market will take place; the four other days are August 10, August 24, September 7 and September 21. The open-air market will feature live music, visual art performances, food from Myrtle restaurants, and about 50 local, primarily home-based artisans, vendors, and entrepreneurs selling fashion, art, accessories and more. The event runs from 12 to 7. First timers attending the flea may want to check out the Flea Blog first and get these essentials under their belt: Flea hours are from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday; it’s located at 176 Lafayette Avenue in Brooklyn. Closest trains are the C and G to Washington/Clinton. Or you can take any of the number of trains that go to Atlantic Station and make the 10-minute stroll up Lafayette Avenue from there.
Update: The New York Times article, by a reporter who took the time to sit down with us and was smart enough not to get himself kicked out of the community meeting, is here; a Daily News article by a “reporter” who was stuck chewing his cud outside the meeting is here. The most amazing part of the News article is the cherry-picked quote from Councilmember James that gives the impression that she’s against the market when she has championed it from the beginning. Some quality journalism.
Imagine what it’s like to live in the “parade zone” in Manhattan. How many times a year does that go on? There are people urinating in the streets, garbage everywhere, increased crime, no parking, the trains are crowded, etc. No political muscle in the world can change that. Now you have one day a week that 7,000 people come down vs. a hundred or so people from the church. Sure it’s a pain for some, but what about the benefits? It’s more than small business, it’s a great addition to the quality of life in the city. It’s fun for the whole family. For most going to church isn’t their Sunday priority, for whatever reasons they choose. That’s a reality. The problems are solvable but they are the ISSUE, not the SUBSTANCE of the problem. The true substance……think about the possibilities.
I going too tell you Asshats now. The Flea will be out of business by this fall. You see the people who live around there are not from the Projects. These are Professional Black people with plenty of political connections. Yeah Marty M have covert backdoor knife ready for Brownstoner and the Flea. You Asshats are so fucking retarded it’s scary. Politics rules in Brooklyn not a bunch of gentrificating Asshats.
People always had a Flea market around the school on Saturdays and when Brownstoner saw this he when and stole the show.
The Flea is over like the Mutant Real Estate Bubble.. Buh bye..
The What
Someday this war is gonna end…
Isn’t Queen of All Saints the landlord in this situation? If so, it seems like QAS must bear the heat of its congregation’s beefs regarding Brooklyn Flea. If BF, as tenant, has not honored the terms of the lease, then let it answer or remedy in a proper way. Obviously there are public concerns as well, which could certainly be handled in another type of forum with full and open participation of the community, the politicians, the press/blososphere.
Heres the real reason the church folks are upset:
That more people are interested in shopping at flea markets than going to church.
It is that simple.
It is passive aggressive and subtle, but this is the reason in a nutshell.
If the church was filled to the rafters every Sunday there would be no issue.
wait, i thought every time that one reader walked by, it was completely empty. how could it be a problem to the church if the flea is completely empty??
This isn’t a mob of 10,000 raving townspeople bearing down on the castle (the picture on reclaimed home is a hoot). They come throughout the day. The flea is not so packed at any one time that you can’t walk, and these are mostly families, students, artists, designers, and antiques buyers not the Mongol Hordes. The playground is larger than you think. Red Hook and the Navy yard are hardly the most convenient locations to get to.
From all reports the church parishioners made no bones about their own intolerance- and no one is dismissing them because they are parishioners. But c’mon, claiming you can’t attend church because you’re afraid of the bicycles, or you can’t be dropped off in front of the Church, is a little silly. I think people are being dismissive because the Church didn’t go directly to Jon or Eric, they went to Montgomery. That’s hardly the way a community-involved organization acts, especially in view of the warm welcome the community at large gave the Flea. You’re right, it may not be about insecurity or intolerance (although that was certainly in evidence), but it is about how much the Church feels it has a right to dictate to the community at large for its own convenience. And to be honest, when churches (yes, and synagogues, mosques and temples) decide to give up their special tax benefits and exemptions, and pay their full share, then they would have a better claim to make demands.
I used to live on the same street as a church- they were a huge pain in the ass and treated the street as if it were their own personal parking lot and yard. Not to mention years of playing a tape of church bells extremely loudly to mark the hour, half hour AND quarter hour.
I live nearby and completely disagree Mr. Banks. The church concerns expressed regarding parking, bike storage, litter and restrooms are completely rectifiable. I gather that the parishoners just don’t like the large function across the street on Sundays. Local businesses benefit from the foot traffic. Now the Flea and the church get to create traffic congestion together, lol. There are ways to control that. Thing is, it’s not some overly crowded or noisy affair. The primary concerns of the parishoners are easily addressed; however, if all they want is for the Flea to be gone, then that’s just not reasonable.
The area is zoned R6B for a reason. It’s residential and historical. A large commercial venture such as the flea market is just out of place there. It’s just not the right location. I’m all for local small businesses thriving but given the success of the market and the number of visitors, the space they are using is just not large enough. The immediate vicinity is not well suited for all the foot traffic and it’s consequences (noise, traffic, parking problems, trash, etc). Thousands of people basically standing in front of your house or place of worship all day is definitely going to disrupt your usually tranquil Sunday. I live very close and I can tell this is a quiet area (again it’s zoned residential and landmarked so there’s not a lot of commercial traffic).
Insecurity? Intolerance? People keep bringing up silly comments that those opposing the flea market are fighting against gentrification or minimizing their claims as silly because many come from church parishioners. It’s not about gentrification or fighting change. The simple fact is that little plot of land surrounded by residences and churches is not a good location for 10,000 people to congregate on a Sunday.
The ball fields in Red Hook or the promenade on the water along Columbia Street or the Brooklyn Navy Yard are more commercial areas in need of the foot traffic and would be better locations for the flea market. Unless the organizers want to decrease the scale of the event a new space will be necessary anyway. The area is just not big enough to handle all the people.
“Our conspiracy to destroy Christianity through flea markets is working. They better watch out for that farmer’s market we have planned.”
“What ’til they see the Islamo-fascist record swap we have planned.”
“Satanic antique dealers of the world, victory is at hand!”
Just a few of the utterly hilarious gawker thread comments.
I do think i would have been much more sympathetic to the church concerns if they had tried to communicate with Jon and Eric first in an attempt to rectify problems. After reading the report and some of the outrageous comments made, I’m far less caring.
if anyone cares to email their reps, these were posted on racked:
Borough President Marty Markowitz
marty@brooklynbp.nyc.gov
Council Member Letitia James
james@council.nyc.ny.us
Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries
JeffriesH@assembly.state.ny.us
State Senator Velmanette Montgomery
montgome@senate.state.ny.us