Bending the Rules for a Bank on Bedford
Last night Williamsburg residents got to hear about a developer’s plans to bring a large bank and residential development to a prime stretch of the Northside. A lawyer representing the owners of 118-130 North 4th Street—between Bedford and Berry—made a presentation to Community Board 1 in order to try to get board members’ blessings for…
Last night Williamsburg residents got to hear about a developer’s plans to bring a large bank and residential development to a prime stretch of the Northside. A lawyer representing the owners of 118-130 North 4th Street—between Bedford and Berry—made a presentation to Community Board 1 in order to try to get board members’ blessings for the construction of a new building that would include a 5,000-square-foot Commerce Bank branch fronting Bedford Avenue (as per the Bricolage rendering, above). The North 4th property is part of an Urban Renewal Area established in 1969 that prohibits any uses aside from manufacturing, which means the developers have to go through ULURP in order to build a new mixed-use structure, a stricture that expires in 2009. In exchange for bypassing the industrial-use requirement, the developers intend to offer 20 percent of their planned 72 units as affordable housing. A few board members expressed reservations about the bank’s design (the phrase it looks like a mall was said several times), though at least one person noted that Williamsburg increasingly needs services like banks and supermarkets. The developers’ lawyer emphasized that the design is still preliminary, and it’s likely that it’ll get tweaked in the coming months. What do you think of it in its current form? GMAP P*Shark
4:55 — right on, i like your attitude. there are artists and “artists”, and it only remains for time and dedication to sort them out.
really, arguing about artists? again?
they’ll sort themselves out. no need to prop them up. the good ones will make way more than the average NY’er with a college degree and a job anyway. and the bad ones need to take a good look in the mirror and change careers.
the guy who bought the condo directly above me in williamsburg is a gallery represented painter and works a freelancer on commercial projects too. he is definitely not broke and not leaving the neighborhood.
Bricolage?!!?!?
Why do people keep hiring this act? I want to see new design standards in this city NOW! The barrage of mediocre and poorly crafted buildings are poisoning the high quality built environment in this city. Its a mentality issue. City officials need to step out of the city and visit places with much higher standards and then come back so they can clearly see that throwaway, generic Fedders architecture in NY is beginning to cause serious damage to our streetscapes in all 5 boroughs. In many ways, our solid, well crafted building stock is one if NYC’s finest attributes, and it is being blemished by graceless, cheap and amateur structures that create an impression and impulse that they aren’t worth caring for. Help NYC create better design guidelines. Raise a fuss and insist something be done!
there is less needed in that location. there are several supermarkets, ATM’s, even a bank right around there.
services are really going to be needed over near bayard/roebling/union area. so many more condo’s are coming on the market in the next year or so.
would be great to see at least one developer put some retail on the ground floor. ie: deli, dry cleaner, good coffee shop, wine store, maybe a small restaurant. would actually take a bank in that area.
Ugh, I dont like a large bank footprint here. I feel that banks don’t add substance to neighborhoods like supermarkets and other infrastructure. I hope it doesnt turn into an empty ATM station.
Dear Artists,
I quite enjoy pricing you out of neighborhoods, while spending less than 10% of my salary to do so.
Let me know where you’re moving next so I can buy some warehouses there.
Love,
Your friendly neighborhood i-banker
10:19,
The North Side was not “founded” by artists. Believe it or not, the neighborhood was around for over a century before any “creative types” ventured there.
Why is it that artists constantly assume there was no valid life form before their arrival?
It looks incredibly boring and ugly. It really does look like a mall.
“a lot better than giving a few apartments to people who bring nothing to the communit y [sic]other than their poverty”
ooff! Hope you’re wearing flame retardant clothing today.
Of course those pesky poor people actually lived in the neighborhood for decades before any of us creative types showed up. But that’s no reason to find room for them to stay around.
And when you say artists “essentially founded” the neighborhood, I think you really mean “essentially found” – as in they got on the L train and “found” a whole neighborhood that no one was using.