A Last-Ditch Effort to Save Admiral's Row
Until the Navy Base at Wallabout Bay was closed in 1967, if you were a married officer, you got a chance to shack up in one of the ten historic row houses looking out over Flushing Avenue (drawn here as they were in 1855). When the Army Corp of Engineers took over the location, the…
Until the Navy Base at Wallabout Bay was closed in 1967, if you were a married officer, you got a chance to shack up in one of the ten historic row houses looking out over Flushing Avenue (drawn here as they were in 1855). When the Army Corp of Engineers took over the location, the houses were left to decay, though some Navy families continued to live in the houses into the 1970s. In 1996, the New York State Historic Preservation Office signed off on an agreement that gave the Army Corp the right to demolish the houses without any landmark review. The city, which took control of all of the Navy Yard except Admiral’s Row in 2001, is planning to knock the houses down to make way for a supermarket when it finally takes control. (The transfer is still hung up in bureaucratic red tape.) Despite the efforts of various preservationist groups in recent years, the Bloomberg shows no signs of budging, citing the $25 million cost of restoration as being prohibitively high. Now a group known as Brooklyn’s Other Museum of Brooklyn has made an eleventh-hour appeal to Governor Spitzer in a letter last month:
I am but one American, yet Admiral’s Row is mine and belongs to every citizen of the United States of America. Don’t allow the Mayor of the city of New York to demolish a national heritage site to satisfy a political favor. It appears you are the only person who, with a stroke of your pen, can undo this madness and insure longevity for Admiral’s Row. Please rescind the A.R.M.O.A. (Admiral’s Row Memorandum Agreement).
Does anyone know more about the “political favor”? How about a timeline for the expected demolition>
Admiral’s Row [B.O.M.B.]GMAP
Retail May Trump Admiral’s Row Preservation [Brownstoner]
City Trying to Demolish Admiral’s Row [Brownstoner]
Group Asks for a ‘Pardon’ for Admiral’s Row [Curbed]
12:49, show me your budget that shows it can’t be done. Nay saying, no imagination people are always looking for the easy way out – just tear ’em down. And to take my example of architects and sneer at it – lots of architects do just fine, besides which, it was an example of a creative occupation that would benefit from a unique space, not the only game in town. Really, can’t you do better than pick apart the details, and try to imagine an alternative?
If saving one house from Officer’s Row is all I can get, I’ll take it. Of course I’d rather see the whole complex preserved. I still think that it is possible to do in some creative way, shape or form. I would bet the LPC and the National Trust for Historic Preservation would rather see an adaptive use, if that was all that was possible, rather than a paved over lot. Preservation is not allergic to creative compromise. No one in the administration seems to want to even entertain the idea, or open the door to listening to alternatives. That is not a legacy I would want in my name, and I wish the Major would reconsider.
As bad a shape as these buildings are in, much has been done with worse. It takes the political will, as well as some creativity and vision, coupled with the funds to do it. NYC could save the Row if they wanted to.
All of you people who are trying to say that it’s not worth getting rid of all that history in order to get a supermarket are missing the main point. All that history has already been gotten rid of. It was destroyed bit by bit over the past 10-20 years by the army corps of engineer when they refused to maintain these buildings. It’s what preservationists call demolition by neglect. While the City is actually going to clear the site, they are not really demolishing these houses – they are already demolished in all but name. SO your choice is between a pile of rubble that used to be historic houses, or a supermaket on a site that used to contain historic houses. But the option of keeping those houses is gone. And of you who are upset about that should’ve tried to do something over the past 20 years while the Army corps of engineers let it happen. If you want to blame someone, blame the Army corps, not the City. The City is trying to make the most of a bad situation.
are you serious all that history out the window for a Keyfood?
I think it’s appalling that the City would do this. We spend so much money on crap in this City, (how much did they spend reworking the school bus routes, I wonder?) 25 mil – Bloomberg donates way more than that each year to arts organizations- it’s pocket money to him. So why tear down a huge piece of this country’s history, (and Brooklyn’s as well?) But Bloomberg’s history of dealing with these kinds of issues is not good. No money for Admiral’s Row but millions for the Ratner Project? He must think we’re all stupid.
I just contacted one of the veteran’s organizations I do vollie work for and asked if this was something they could help with.
11:08, would you tell me what community board meeting you are referring to so I can check the minutes? My recollection is the same as ella’s. In addition to the chains mentioned by ella, I think Foodtown is also in the mix.
As I have stated in earlier threads, show me your pro forma that makes a $5M/per renovation possible, even for a single building. Architects? Oh yeah, they usually pay a lot in rent. Not to mention the fact that saving one building is kind of contrary to the name “Officers Row.”
Anon 11:33 – No. The only details that are still intact are the moldings (which are nice, but did not blow me away – there are plenty of nicer moldings in thousands of brownstones in brooklyn) and the stair bannisters and rails (although many of those are in poor conditions. All of the fireplaces have been removed (by scavengers, I’m assuming). Much of the wood structure is half-colloapsed. Many floor boards are to weak to stand on. Many of the houses have large holes in the roof, so the interiors have been subject to the elements for over a decade of winters.
Until recently, there were actually some interesting plaster medallions around the lighting fixtures in the public rooms, but over the past several years they have started to fall off and break. If you look up Admirals Row on flikr, I think someone actually had some good photos of the interior – including the medallions.
10:16
Get yer hand off it, mate. Judging by your language, your “cultural DNA” is almost the same as that of Americans.
Anon 11:08 – what you’re saying is basically just an out and out lie. I have been to the community board meetings about this issue and have also been at other meetings involving the residents of the public housing across the street. The large majority of these residents want the supermarket and at one meeting I was at, actually applauded when the supermarket idea was announced. I’m sure you can find one or two public housing residents who are against, but it’s just dishonest to claim that all of the residents don’t want this supermarket.
And for those of you concerned about a Walmart or some other type of big box, you should look at the size of the site. It’s 6 acres, and the Navy Yard’s proposal is to use 3 of those acres to develop industrial buildings. That leaves 3 acres for retail development. That is nowhere near enough space to house a Walmart (which usually sits on 8-10 acre lots). So even if they wanted a Walmart (which they don’t) it wouldn’t fit.
At a community board meeting last year, someone from the Navy Yard said that, while they haven’t chosen a tenant yet, they’ve had initial conversations with Pathmark, Shoprite and Stop & Shop. That should give you some idea of the direction they are heading.
ella, are the mantles and wood work still intact?