FGA Pushes Preservation Plus Market for Admirals' Row
The Fort Greene Association spent much of its monthly meeting last night promoting the position (which we share) that Admirals’ Row is a “valuable historic asset” that can and should be preserved without having to forego the creation of a supermarket for the area. Howard Pitsch, former chair of the FGA, made the argument that…
The Fort Greene Association spent much of its monthly meeting last night promoting the position (which we share) that Admirals’ Row is a “valuable historic asset” that can and should be preserved without having to forego the creation of a supermarket for the area. Howard Pitsch, former chair of the FGA, made the argument that the market plan put forth by the BNYDC was unneccesarily large. Rather devoting six acres of land to the market and providing parking for 300 cars, a more modest market on a scale of the Park Slope Key Food (which has about 80 parking spaces) could easily be built on four acres while saving the existing Admiral’s Row houses on the remaining two acres. Pitsch also pointed out that the Army Corps of Engineers is obliged under Federal law to entertain all reasonable proposals in addition to the one already put forth by the Brooklyn Navy Yard Development Corporation; the FGA is currently reaching out to developers and supermarket companies in an effort to drum up alternative proposals. Pratt prof Brent Porter followed up with more drawings and studies of how the officers’ houses could be adaptively reused for shops and community purposes while building a new green supermarket and creating space for a weekend greenmarket. The phrase “Have Your Cake and Eat It Too” was used more than once.
Admirals’ Row: Debate Still Framed as Either/Or Decision [Brownstoner]
Officers’ Row: Let’s Have Our Cake and Eat It Too [Brownstoner]
Fort Greene Association [FGA Homepage]
Those buildings are not in as poor condition as Markowitz and the Development Corporation would have people believe… Keep your eyes on this site:
http://kingstonlounge.blogspot.com/
where more will come to light.
Zach,
It’s on the table because the buildings are run down and falling apart.
About last night – I wasn’t there. Can someone who attended report back – was there any discussion about how this would get paid for? I think it’s pretty obvious that if you shrunk down the size of the supermarket, you could fit it on the parade grounds behind it. I don’t think that’s ever been disputed, so I don’t think this meeting revealed anything new. The Navy Yard’s position, as I’ve understood it has always been that the high costs of renovating the houses would make that project financially unfeasible. The drawings you show don’t dispute that. Also, zoning requires 1 parking space for every 300 SF of supermaket, and in general 1 parking space uses up around 250-300 Sf of space so you’ve got to realize that for every SF of supermarket building you need about an equal amount of parking lot square footage. That means that you are significantly shrinking the supermarket size in that drawing.
Also I’ve heard the Navy Yard say that they don’t think that such a development would be appropriate because it would “look silly” and I tend to agree. Having a huge blank side wall running adjacent to the backs of these house will look weird.
Ella
Did they pass the hat last night? I assume that the people who want to preserve Officer’s Row are paying for it too, right?
I’m not much of a preservationist, but knocking down gorgeous buildings to build a parking lot in the middle of Brooklyn is so ridiculous that I don’t understand why it was ever on the table.
I like it. At least it’s a plan, visualized for serious discussion. I hope something similar happens to the Row, and the community gets a market, and we all get to keep history. Added bonus – tourist attraction and desirable retail destination. Good for Brooklyn and everyone.
Preservationista