The Times Discovers Downtown Brooklyn
Downtown Brooklyn, or at least the batch of recent residential skyscrapers that now define its skyline, got its coming out party in The New York Times this weekend. There wasn’t much new information for anyone who’s been following along for the last five years, but there were a few data points worth noting. The Brooklyner,…
Downtown Brooklyn, or at least the batch of recent residential skyscrapers that now define its skyline, got its coming out party in The New York Times this weekend. There wasn’t much new information for anyone who’s been following along for the last five years, but there were a few data points worth noting. The Brooklyner, the 51-story tower on Lawrence Street is described as “fully occupied”; The Oro, at 306 Gold Street, has passed the 70 percent-sold mark (it was at 50 percent only four months ago); as we reported last month, be@schermerhorn is at 80 percent sold. The article also notes some recent or impending changes to the retail landscape in the area: Aeropostale, H&M and the mother of all gentrification signals, Shake Shack. Perhaps most importantly, the article confirms that, after falling through once, a supermarket is indeed coming to Toren. And with two huge new towers—one at 384 Bridge Street and one at 29 Flatbush Avenue—just getting underway, it’s fair to say that there should be a critical mass of residents to support it.
Suddenly, a Brooklyn Skyline [NY Times]
Toren, Oro and be@Schermerhorn are all advertisers
This is what I wrote last year when these projects were sucking wind.
” . . . most folks who move to Brooklyn come here for a particular kind of lifestyle, an alternative-to-Manhattan existence that prizes the iconic and historic low-rise architecture for which we’re known. Some would say developers failed to understand, or, to quote a former president, misunderestimated the demand. Many people want the quiet proud beauty of Brownstones, the stoops where families congregate and the multi-ethnic, multi-cultural neighborhoods they’ve heard about: the architecture of community.”
Well demand has obviously returned but the notion that these few towers will someday create a sense of neighborhood/community is still wishfull thinking as it has already been proven that towers don’t allow for community interaction at the street level. Lower density neighborhoods, like the ones throughout brownstone Brooklyn, do.
*I’ve been hating on DoBro’s high rise hell for years. Now it’s cool to hate it?
Why? What reasons do you have for hating a downtown area building high rises? Not to mention adding parks and useful stores.
in NYT – we just jumped the shark
Didn’t Brian Williams already jab the proverbial death knife into the Times soft underbelly for it’s moronic coverage of Brooklyn?
So be it. All those comments mimic most of the things I babble about on here. I’ve been hating on DoBro’s high rise hell for years. Now it’s cool to hate it?
bklynite, I think that’s because when you post a comment on the NY Times site, you get that smug sense of superiority that those idiots in the Times commercials have about the fact that they read the New York Times. Criticizing the Times in their minds means they’re smarter than the Times.
I thought Starbucks was the mother of all gentrification signals.
must be
37 is a magic number
why does NYT stop accepting comments after only 37 entries?