Big Bucks for Jazzing Up 'Outdated' Fulton Mall
As part of a $40 million investment in the Downtown Brooklyn streetscape, the city’s Economic Development Corp. will pony up $15 million to spruce up the Fulton Street Mall. “You’ll have a great new open space a la Herald Square at 34th Street in Manhattan, and an overhaul of the Fulton Mall’s physical environment,” said…
As part of a $40 million investment in the Downtown Brooklyn streetscape, the city’s Economic Development Corp. will pony up $15 million to spruce up the Fulton Street Mall. “You’ll have a great new open space a la Herald Square at 34th Street in Manhattan, and an overhaul of the Fulton Mall’s physical environment,” said Joseph Chan, president of the city’s Downtown Brooklyn Partnership. The effort will include new bus shelters, benches and street furniture as well as the addition of new lights and trees. Another $3 million to $4 million will be out towards creating a 10,000-square-foot green space at the former Albee Square mall that could double as a place for public performances. Work is expected to begin a year from now. Even sooner, the greening of Downtown Brooklyn will also extend to two “gateway to Brooklyn” planting projects on Flatbush Avenue and Boerum Place.
$15 Mil for ‘Herald Square in Bklyn’ [NY Post]
I think it is interesting that in the very middle of gentrified and uber-expensive brownstone brooklyn is Fulton Mall, a poster child for the old, anything but gentrified Brooklyn.
If this were a war, the current merchants and their clientele should be worried because they are surrounded on all sides.
Ok my buddies, look here, once Ratner gets his money machine built it’s going to provide plenty of hot dog vending jobs and parking attendant jobs (not to mention bootleg t-shirt and video jobs) for downtown BK. Brooklyn don’t need play no second fiddle to no Manhattan! So maybe the idea is to put some outdoor cafes in Fulton Mall so all the hot dog vendors can sit down for an espresso.
The nearest lady on the bench appears to be black, not white. Just sayin’
Downtown Brooklyn is a problem, it’s not nice. It has not gotten the memo that today’s brooklyn is rich and hip.
It still gives the impression that Brooklyn is poor and tacky. So which is it? We seem to be a boro with a split personality.
The rendering is silly, someone was paid thousands of dollars to paint a grey sidewalk, with a darker grey street, and a grey bench with two people from Omaha, Nebraska sitting on it.
I would love to see Downtown Brooklyn come alive, but it looks like an uphill battle to me. Metrotech, and the attendant street closings, rendered many blocks sterile (thanks for that, Ratner). Long before that, downtown was gutted by the bridge approaches and highway linkages. The lack of office space means a dearth of lunch time and after-work shoppers, not to mention after-work bars and restaurants. Manhattan business district interests are happy to keep downtown Brooklyn a backwater commercially.
i’m hitting macys tonight, in that case!
Last time I was at the Fulton Mall Macy’s I went down to the basement to see if they had any couches on sale and it absolutely reeked of weed! We call it the “mellow macy’s” now.
I really miss A&S… the Garden Room…
great shopping… I do welcome a sprucing up of the area for all folks to enjoy.
“Brenda from Flatbush at May 21, 2007 11:19 AM”
Thanks for the post. Hilarious. I needed that laugh.