Brooklyn: The Land of Milk, Honey & Celebrities
The New York Observer devotes quite a lot of ink this week to the County of Kings. In addition to analyzing the borough’s laissez-faire relationship with its celebrity residents, the article notes that the borough has become many people’s first choice as opposed to just a cheaper alternative for those priced out of Manhattan: Gentrification…
The New York Observer devotes quite a lot of ink this week to the County of Kings. In addition to analyzing the borough’s laissez-faire relationship with its celebrity residents, the article notes that the borough has become many people’s first choice as opposed to just a cheaper alternative for those priced out of Manhattan:
Gentrification has finally achieved what cracks, gangs, graffiti, bankruptcy, budget busting, Giuliani, the smoking ban and global terrorism could not: It has rendered Manhattan utterly uninhabitable. These days, the Upper East Side and the Lower East Side have both become the forward positions of what can no longer be reasonably called the bridge-and-tunnel crowd. No point in dressing in rags and belting out lyrics from Rent, because every block of the East Village looks like frat row at the University of Michigan. Brooklyn presents itself as a happy medium between surviving in Manhattan and sequestering oneself in the suburbs, between continuing to live like a college kid and sniffing enough carbon monoxide in your garage to become a happy zombie. In Brooklyn, New Yorkers can rehearse their adulthood without committing to it; can play in their brownstones without feeling trapped inside of them. And Brooklyn is no longer Failure-ville. Even the celebrities—people who dreamed of making it long ago, who came to Manhattan to get famous—show proof of their success in Brooklyn. It is the dream.
Welcome to Schnooklyn [NY Observer]
Brooklyn in not a city or a neighborhood – it is a major part of NYC – with about with about 30% of entire city population. It is not a whole – its part of the whole. As in any city certain areas are poor residential, affluent residential, commericial, industrial or whatever.
But Brooklyn in too large a part of NYC to characterize it as one of these. Certain nabes in Brooklyn, Manhattan, or Queens may be ‘cool’
but certainly not all of them.
Anon 1:38 having lived in Brooklyn since well b/4 it was trendy I too could subscribe to your (very cliche) attitude that Brooklyn was cool b/4 it was ‘cool’ and in some ways it was but the reality is that while the many newcomers didnt ‘save’ Brooklyn they are evidence that Brooklyn has been ‘saved’ – as are the facts that multi-national retail chains are willing to invest in expansion here.
If you were here as long as you seem to imply, then maybe you remember that less than 20 yrs ago, industrial-cities (like Brooklyn – and in many senses all citys) were presumed to be relics of the past; and the abandoned buildings, rampant crime, dearth of jobs and horrible government services only reinforced that notion. Maybe you forget when parts of Bushwick were burning with riots or that Mayor Dinkins let race riots run their course in Crown Heights.
So while all you nostalgists may lement when Brooklyn got ‘hip’, you should be very careful what you wish for b/c there are dozens of cities all over the Northeast that have never become hip – is anyone considering moving to Camden, Newark or Bridgeport?
Re:Ratnerville-
Exactly what annoys me about these media articles and good number of public.
All writen/view of NYC from very white-upper-middle class perspective. When we talk about Brooklyn its those very nabes you mention. When
people use the phrase ‘priced out of Manhattan’ – you know they are not referring to Wash.Hts or Inwood. Or a new neigborhood discovered- means some upper-middle class young educated white folks moved there. Certainly doesnt mean area was unpopulated before.
I wish they could really hear themselves sometimes. Its infuriating ‘class’ smugness.
“Is Peter Braunstein the last freelancer in New York who thinks he’s too good for Brooklyn?”
Apparently Mark Lotto has never heard of Jonathan Van Meter and doesn’t bother to read New York magazine.
I love articles like this. It’s so funny how people in bklyn love to say there goes the nabe. Many of them have only been here a couple of years or so. While others watch on enjoying how much ownership these newercomers feel over the hood. Been here for about 20 yrs. Change is a constant. Enjoy it. Unless yr name is Bruce Ratner of course.
The article was written as a troll to attract just this sort of banter. I agree that this is a tempest in a teapot. But amusing to read. My wife and I chose Brooklyn four years ago because we wanted the quality of life that comes with more space, including a garden, a workshop, a grownup sized kitchen, all at a price that while certainly not cheap, turned out to be a good value. We bought in the north side of Crown Heights. Funny though, four years later and I still don’t see trendy shops on Nostrand Ave., or hipsters or mobs of 30 somethings. The Brooklyn of the above article comprises probably five percent of the borough, if that. We chose Brooklyn because we had grown up. Not because we’re rehearsing anything. we’re both fifty after all. Oh by the way, did any others here see Patti Smith at BAM last night?
Oops, typo. I meant “their” not “they’re”
A place that chooses to tolerate them? Give me a break. I’m tired of those who feel some sense of entitlement because they’e lived in the Borough for they’re whole life. That’s just silly. People should be happy their is an influx of people who love Brooklyn and will continue to contribute to its vitality and vibrancy in the future. Yes, the article is a bit inane and rehashes things we’ve all read before, but comments about tolerating newer residents are ridiculous. This is a free country and people can move where they would like. I have lived in Brooklyn for six years so I guess that makes me one of the newbies – thanks for “tolerating” me. By the way, with the exception of my parents, my family has lived in Brooklyn since the 1840s. Maybe I should start complaining about all the people who have moved to Brooklyn since in the intervening 160 years for not maintaining the old neighborhood the way it used to be. Of course I don’t make such an argument, because it is ridiculous and pointless. So enough of the I’m a native and we don’t need you crap. The great thing about Brooklyn and New York is the vibrancy of the different communities and the way they change over time.
I think people are offended by such articles because they’re so superficial, artificial, and presumptuous. It’s not a matter of defending Brooklyn or one’s choice on where to live. It’s a matter of pointing out that there was meaningful life in Brooklyn before the 20- or 30-somethings arrived. They didn’t save Brooklyn or make it hip by moving here; they are living in a place that chooses to tolerate them.