"The Connecticut Part of Brooklyn"

I have lived in Ditmas Park for two years now, having come from Manhattan with a very short interlude in Park Slope immediately prior. At first, I was a little disoriented, missed the ease of Manhattan, my old neighborhood haunts (I should mention I felt this way just as strongly in Park Slope, which I always felt was just a poor man’s Upper West Side or West Village). However, after settling into our beautiful house with a significantly larger family than I had when I lived in Manhattan, I can honestly say that I really love Ditmas Park. The people here really make it something special. There’s almost a sense of “freshman orientation” bonding here – lots of young families preserving homes in a fabulous but previously neglected neighborhood, working together to bring programs, amenities, etc… to the neighborhood. There’s a feeling of community here that I’ve never experienced ANYWHERE else. People are open, friendly, generally broad thinking individuals. New neighbors are officially welcomed several times a year and informal parties held in both private homes and at local establishments. The new Cortelyou Road businesses work hard together with the community to continually improve the quality of life. The Flatbush Family Network makes integration into the neighborhood very easy for new families. Flatbush Athletics, a fabulous FREE after school program founded by a visionary resident of Beverly Square West provides non-competitive soccer games, kickball, and other age-appropriate activies for kids who live in big rambling houses, as well as kids who live in the neighborhood apartments. This is a great family neighborhood – no two ways about it. As far as schools go, PS 139 and 237 get better all the time. And by the way, there are some legal two family houses here, which offer the rental income that appeals to so many buyers who can’t swing the $1 plus price tags otherwise. Don’t get me wrong, I think Brownstone Brooklyn is stunning. Love Fort Greene beyond words. But I don’t think these other neighborhoods (and I looked in all of them – and even considered historic Staten Island)come anywhere close to Victorian Flatbush in terms of community. Someone once told me there was a study done which said that neighborhoods exactly like Victorian Flatbush provided the architecural foundation to build a strong sense of community – fairly closely spaced homes with wide front porches, which demanded that you actually get to know your neighbors. Seeing neighbors enjoying their outdoor space lends a sense of cozy familiarity to the place. It’s hard just to walk by without saying “Hello”.

If I meant trendy, I would have written trendy. There is a difference between Suburban and Urban. One is not “better” than the other, just different. Urban means more foot traffic; a car is not a necessity. I go to the grocery store as well (not a Whole Foods btw), but I walk the 2 blocks to the store and bring the food home in a cart. I don’t drive 15 minutes to the grocery store like my mother did. To me, that is the difference between what “feels” urban vs. suburban.

Plus, I’m too old to wait in line for brunch…

Hi,

I am new to PPS (moved in a week ago) from Park slope (2 years) and before that pretty much every neighborhood south of 96th in manhattan. I kept moving into edgier and edgier neighborhoods, not for the clubs, restaurants, but for the old feel of the neighborhoods of nyc. Manhattan has become just one big island of transplants…there are no more local nabes with places like alphabet city and the lower east side completely gentrified. Brooklyn is the only place to find it and its dissappering fast, but its still very much here in victorian flatbush and I love it. Yeah you have to drive or get on the subway for a couple of stops to get a variety of restaurants (you do it in manhattan all the time), but we all know 90% of the time one is going to one bar, one brunch place, one deli, etc in your nabe so I don’t think its so different. As far as comparing it to the suburbs, I think most of us would agree that having a real house, yard, garage, driveway, sun on all sides, with 6-9 bedrooms is much better than any penthouse apartment or brownstone. What we’re all really avoiding is the homogenity of the suburbs which victorian flatbush certainly isn’t. Here you get the best of both worlds. I mean where else in nyc do you get your neighbors dropping by to say hello, instant play groups, and neighbors with similar age children asking to meet up all in the first week. This place rules at least for 30 year old set with kids who want an architectual gem of a house in a “real” nyc neighborhood and not one that just opened another cafe habana with some poser hipsters hanging in the garden.

To the folks who think it’s suburban, yes there are parts of the island which are, but no, the part I’m talking about, St. George, is just as urban as Ditmas Park, Williamsburg and other up-and-coming parts of Brooklyn, albeit with nearby greenery, 1905 victorian mansions, windowed loft spaces, views, etc. Within ten minutes’ walk from my front door are three dry cleaners, four grocery stores, Cuban, Mexican, Jamaican, Polish, Sri Lankan, Chinese, Indian restaurants, a hipster bar/restaurant (Ditmas Park has only one, as well), a post office, an Internet cafe, three pharmacies, a weekend greenmarket, four donut places, etc. etc. etc. It’s clear to me that, like so many others, those who conceive of SI as suburban and not pedestrian accessible haven’t really ever spent any time here. If you’re about to spend $1m+ on a single or multiple place in Brooklyn, like I was, it’s very much worth a trip to Staten Island. Urbanity is very important to me, and I wouldn’t have compromised without pedestrian access to everything I need.

The point is well taken about this site being dedicated to Brownstone Brooklyn, but the comparison I’m making is between Ditmas Park and St. George, and since brownstoner posted about Ditmas Park, it’s fair game. Both are burgeoning areas with promising but currently limited (compared to the places I left, Smith St., Fifth Avenue, Bedford Ave, etc.) commercial activity. Each has a few good restaurants within walking distance and a larger number of low-rent ones, beyond which a trip elsewhere is required. The houses in both are large and relatively spread out, though both also have blocks of urban geogrpahy with dense apartment buildings and businesses at street level. Both neighborhoods are racially and economically diverse. Yet, the prices in Ditmas are about twice what they are in Staten Island, because of the subway. I don’t think the differential is entirely over fifteen minutes more of commute (I can get to midtown in 55 minutes compared with the 40 it takes from Newkirk), but rather that Staten Island is somehow branded as an inferior good by people who have never been there. I remember the days when people from Manhattan wouldn’t even take the subway into Brooklyn to visit me, don’t you?

I’m not trying to convince everyone to move there, but it’s poignant that Staten Island is always conspicuously missing from the discussion of Real Estate in New York. It is New York City after all. Check out the NYTimes Real Estate section in coming weeks and you’ll start to see more of what I’m talking about. Until then, I’m enjoying it here very much.