This week’s Brooklyn Papers has a good column written by former Assemblyman Joe Ferris, who used to represent Park Slope. He compares the original Battle of Brooklyn, whose 230th anniversary is almost upon us, to the the current one raging around Atlantic Yards. We will quote in part and encourage a click so you can […]

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Williamsburg, Brooklyn

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Brooklinks is a selection of Brooklyn-related news stories, blog items and (especially on weekends) images. Look: BHB Photo Makes Brooklyn Papers [Brooklyn Heights Blog] Grand Army Plaza from the Arch (Daily Pix) [OTBKB] Public Pool Outside Reykjavik [Blue Jake] Sunset Park Gem [Sunset Parker] Gowanus Canal Sheen [Joe’s NYC] Closing or not [Lex’s Folly] Van […]

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Williamsburg, Brooklyn

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One of the more interesting things about those bootleg Coney Island drawings that were released without authorization is the news that the flashy firm Arquitectonica of Miami is working on Coney Island Plans for the Coney Island Development Corporation (CIDC). Arquitectonica has, in fact, been “quietly working” on Coney redevelopment plans for the CIDC since […]

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Brooklinks is a daily selection of Brooklyn-related news articles, blog items and images. Hard News: A Night Out with Jim Stuckey and His Entourage [Queens Ledger] Yale Red Hook Visions Go Over Like Lead Balloon [Brooklyn Papers] Hillary Clinton Slams Brooklyn Bridge ‘Park’ Condo Scheme [Brooklyn Papers] Easy News: Biking for Kebabs and Italian Ice […]

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We were taking in the latest details about how Forest City Ratner is being gobbled up by Forest City Enterprises in a complicated little financial transaction and restructuring that will work out as significant cash for developer Bruce Ratner, when we came across a description of Atlantic Yards that made us stop reading for a […]

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Gowanus Lounge is sorry we’re going to have to miss what promises to be a most amusing show on Saturday. No, not Jill Scott, Queen Latifah and Erykah Badu at Celebrate Brooklyn. That, we’ll catch. We’re talking about the Yale Architecture School grad students that created the unpleasant visions of Red Hook’s future and came […]

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Who says Atlantic Yards opponents don’t have a sense of humor? No Land Grab caught our attention with the, um, headline “BRUCE JOINS BANDWAGON, CALLS FOR MORE TIME FOR PUBLIC REVIEW.” Specifically: Developer Bruce Ratner stunned Atlantic Yards supporters and critics alike when he held a press conference yesterday on the steps of City Hall, […]

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Brooklinks is a daily selection of news articles, blog items and images that are related to our favorite borough, Brooklyn. Extremely Required Reading: Shrilljoy [Dope on the Slope] Bruce Joins Bandwagon, Call for More Time for Public Review [No Land Grab] Required Reading: August 23 Atlantic Yards Hearing to Cover a Lot of Ground [AYR] […]

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The first park planned for the Queens side of Newtown Creek–the sadly polluted body of water that forms the boundary between Queens and Brooklyn–is coming along. New Yorkers for Parks reports that residents and public officials met recently to talk about “conceptual plans” for a creekfront park at the end of Vernon Boulevard in Long […]

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Reminder: The B-52s are playing a free concert tonight at Asser Levy/Seaside Park in Coney Island. (If you haven’t been, it’s at West Fifth Street and Surf Avenue opposite the Aquarium.) It’s part of the 28th Annual Seaside Summer Concert Series. The listed start time is 7:30. The show is part of a very small […]

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We almost wet ourselves when we saw the story in the Sun that mentioned those ugly Coney Island drawings that we shared last week. You remember, the ones that made Coney Island look like a Times Square themed shopping mall? The drawings with highrises so tall they make the Wonder Wheel look like a little […]

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We’re not going to be too pissy about this because it’s in the context of a good article about Atlantic Yards–and a headline that turns Bruce Ratner into “Ratzilla”–but we had an odd feeling that we’d seen one of the renderings in the New York Magazine story on the Brooklyn mega-project before. Turns out that […]

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Brooklinks is a daily selection of Brooklyn-related news stories, blog entries and images. Gowanus News: Calling Gowanus Area Artists [423 Smith] Theremin Summit in Gowanus [Paste Magazine] Sneak Preview of Film Shot in Gowanus [OTBKB] Non-Gowanus News: Why Atlantic Mall is Blighted, Per Empire State Development Corp. [AYR] Former Yankee Jim Bouton Opposes Atlantic Yards, […]

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Do you take a dim view of 40-story buildings on the Williamsburg waterfront? If so, this is a week when you will be muttering, “There goes the neighborhood.” Construction is now underway on both the Palmer’s Dock/Northside Piers highrises and “The Edge,” a development between North 5th and North 7th streets. (Work has been underway […]

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City Council Member and Park Slope resident Bill de Blasio has endorsed Bill Batson for the 57th Assembly District. Batson is a grassroots candidate for the Assembly seat for the assembly seat, which is up for grabs this November. (The district includes the Atlantic Yards site.) Batson is an outspoken opponent of the Atlantic Yards […]

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Well, after a one-hour Bush-related delay yesterday, Gowanus Lounge and writer Gabriel Cohen spent twenty minutes talking about the past, present and future of Red Hook yesterday on Brian Lehrer’s WNYC program. It was fun, and Brian (above) was his always excellent, intelligent and engaging self. It was wonderful meeting Gabriel Cohen, who is a […]

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So, here’s a question: Do a seriously anti-Atlantic Yards article in the Village Voice, which put a very human face on the project’s impact, and a massive New York Magazine article, in which the writer finally comes down squarely against the project, equal an editorial endorsement from the New York Times? (Bonus Question: Does it […]

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Brooklinks is a daily selection of news articles, blog entries and images. The Future: Meier Getting it Up: Full Frontal and Rear [Brownstoner] New York Magazine on Atlantic Yards [streetsblog] NY Mag Gives Norm Oder His Due [OTBKB] The Shadowy, Noisy Future of Bears’ Garden [AYR] Dry Dock v. Ikea [A Brooklyn Life] The Present: […]

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The Center for an Urban Future, a Manhattan-based think tank, has further spelled out what most of us already know: Street fairs suck because they’re generic affairs dominated by a small group of vendors and produced by a few firms. So, it’s not just Gowanus Lounge that despises the vast majority of them. In this, […]

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Our friends at Coney Island Shortcakes are at it again, posting another entry in their Coney Island Interview Series. Today, they talk with Eric & Julian, who work as the “freaks” at “Shoot the Freak,” the Coney Island boardwalk attraction that offers the opportunity to shoot “freaks” with paintballs. You can watch the video by […]

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We were unhappy when we learned that the Empty Vessel Project, the restored World War II Navy rescue boat being turned into a community space on the Gowanus, may lose its berthing space on the Big G. We’ll let them explain: We have berthed EV at the disused end of First Street since January 2006. […]

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The Maclaren stroller pushing mommies of Park Slope–long the victims of a snarky comment here about their human-powered baby SUVs or a derisive put-down there about their gang behavior at neighborhood playgrounds–have arrived in a big way over the last few weeks. Of course, we had the Legend of Momma Bean, the Park Slope Mommy […]

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We don’t know what’s going on at 588 Union Street–which is across the street from the new Gowanus Holiday Inn–except that a reader emailed us with the following: If you haven’t seen, check out 588 Union St– just a coincidence that it’s across from the Holiday Inn but…You’ll hear from me again if anyone threatens […]

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