As the city, Thor Equities and other interested parties hash out a Coney Island redevelopment plan, Coney Island USA is moving ahead with redoing the building it bought earlier this year. This is the rendering just posted on the organization’s website. It’s bill as the first step towards the new, year-round Coney Island! It’s the […]

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The fact that Thor Equities is a sponsor of the Polar Bears Club New Year’s swim has sparked a debate between members of the Coney Island crew. We noticed this because of a thread on the Coney Island Message Board called “Coney Island Polar Bear Club are Sellouts!!!!” The first entry says: Never thought that […]

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A by some students visit to Coney Island on a cold, wet December day. Desolate.

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If you’ve followed the stories and posts about Coney Island’s boardwalk, you know the state of disrepair into which the city has allowed it to fall. Someone has produced a short, documentary-style vid about the issue that is very much worth watching. We came upon it on YouTube this morning. The producer also has a […]

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[Photo courtesy of Victoria Law/flickr]

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Here’s a fun vid, just posted on YouTube, of the Wonder Wheel, “as seen through the eyes of four-year-old.” Some of the footage was clearly shot in 2006, before Joe Sitt and Thor Equities did some demolition of rides on their property.

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Tonight (12/12), Coney Island historian Charles Denson will be doing a presentation about the “Genesis of the Coney Island History Project” at the American Folk Art Museum. (You can learn more about the Coney Island History Project by clicking here.) Mr. Denson, who is the author of Coney Island Lost and Found, “will discuss the […]

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Coney Island, Brooklyn[Photo courtesy of ConeyHOP/flickr and Kinetic Carnival]

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[Photo courtesy of Captain Nemo/Coney Island Message Board]Among the victims of last week’s high winds was one of the “Future of Coney Island” signs put up by developer Joe Sitt this summer. The post known as Captain Nemo at the Coney Island Message Board, who recently posted photos of Thor’s fallen construction fences, photographed this […]

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Here are a dozen music videos shot in Coney Island or with scenes shot there. Some of the vids go back a few years and show things like the Thunderbolt roller coaster that no longer exist. The vids were listed individually on a thread on the Coney Island Message Board this week. (Warning: There is […]

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Having had a previous meeting very publicly disrupted and abruptly canceled because of several hundred people bused in at the expense of State Senator Carl Kruger’s campaign committee, the Coney Island Development Corp. has scheduled three different meetings in January. This either means that there will be ample room for further bused in groups of […]

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Here’s a freshly posted promo video for the Coney Island Polar Bears New Year’s 2008 swim, which guess isn’t all that far in the future, after all. The Polar Bears will be swimming every Sunday through April. Money raised by the New Year’s swim will go to Camp Sunshine. Last year’s swim raised $25,000 for […]

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Check out Robert Mars’ cool collages of Coney Island. “Instead of trying to imagine Coney’s future, though, Robert Mars is commemorating its past. The Sunset Park artist (who contributed a book of prints to The Sampler) works within the school of California Pop Art, where Americana icons of the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s loom large. […]

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The Daily News’ Jotham Sederstrom has solved a Coney Island mystery. State Sen. Carl Kruger say that he “dipped into his campaign coffers and spent ‘several thousand’ dollars to bus more than 400 residents who stormed the city’s Coney Island redevelopment meeting.” Kruger paid for 10 school buses, bought hundreds of hats and printed leaflets. […]

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Some Coney Island Message Board regulars are urging that people send emails to State. Sen. Carl Kruger, who paid for the protest that descended on a Coney Island Development Corp. meeting a couple of weeks ago. The poster known as Captain Nemo has posted a link to the Senator’s online email page and is asking […]

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Among the many fascinating questions raised by the bit of political theater at the Coney Island Development Corporation’s canceled meeting about Coney Island redevelopment was the provenance of the hundreds of opponents bused in for the meeting. There was the issue of who financed the Kruger-led effort (which could become more clear after the State […]

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Looks like a certain major Coney Island landowner is having an upkeep problem on his properties. This photo shows some problems with developer Joe Sitt’s fences in Coney Island that appear to have developed in that long, harsh Coney Island off-season. It comes from the very active poster known as Captain Nemo (aka Bruce) on […]

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Here’s a fun Coney Island short that is nicely produced and just showed up on the YouTube last night. Anything that brings warm weather and Coney Island to mind on a cold December day is worth viewing, we think.

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We got an email from Lara Wechsler, who does the Park Slope Street Photography blog, about a exhibition of her Coney Island photos at the 440 Gallery in Park Slope. It will run from November 29 through January 6 and feature “present day scenes from Brooklyn’s fading fantasy emporium.” The opening reception is Thursday (11/29) […]

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All we can say is this Coney Elf Boys creation by the gang at Kinetic Carnival is pure genius. Go there, and it will lead you to Joe Sitt, Marty Markowitz and other dressed as elves and dancing to a Coney song. Click here to visit.

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That didn’t take long. Barely two weeks after the Bloomberg Administration’s announcement of Coney Island zoning recommendations and its intention to undertake a complicated process of land acquisition in the heart of the Coney amusement district, the battle lines are taking shape. Predictably, one of them is likely to be in Albany and one of […]

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[Photo courtesy of dnblog1/flickr] We have always joked that Coney Island was the “Next Atlantic Yards.” As it turns out, among those opposing the city’s Coney Island proposal that came to the canceled meeting on Monday night were members of BUILD, the pro-Atlantic Yards group that signed the “Community Benefits Agreement” for the project and […]

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Coney Island Development Corp. Chair Lynn Kelly sent out a letter yesterday apologizing for the cancellation of a chaotic meeting at Coney Island Hospital Monday night. She promised to reschedule the session about the city’s new Coney plan at a bigger venue. The meeting was scuttled after up to 500 people, many wearing identical yellow […]

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It sounds like it was quite a scene at Coney Island Hospital last night for the first public forum on the city’s new Coney Island zoning strategy and plan, which did not get off to an auspicious start. We couldn’t attend because we’re somewhat under the weather, but had been in contact with Coney Island […]

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Here’s all the detail you need about Blackpool, England, the coastal resort that is fascinating model for what Coney Island could be. It even comes with glitzy renovation plans.–Kinetic Carnival

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