The prime areas of rezoning interest in Gowanus will be the area around the Gowanus Canal itself, where some of the biggest projects might someday rise. City Planning envisions a canal that will someday have a 40′ foot wide public esplanade on both side (a Sponge Park has also been proposed independently) and buildings rising […]

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One of our favorite summer series, Rootop Films, is back for another season. Per an email: We’re back, kicking it off with a screening this weekend! On Saturday, May 31st, at 9:00pm we will be holding a FREE screening of the film “At the Death House Door” in Fort Greene Park, Brooklyn. The film: Pastor […]

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[Photo courtesy of Dalton Rooney/flickr] This gorgeous shot comes from Dalton Rooney via our GL Flickr Photo Pool. It is from Nevins Street and features the perfect combination of light, shadow and composition.

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Will the Gowanus hotel boom, which has been thoroughly chronicled and mapped out by Brownstoner, come to a premature end? It will if City Council Member Bill de Blasio has his way. Mr. de Blasio and commmunity members will be holding a press conference before the City Planning presentation on Gownanus rezoning this evening that […]

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The long awaited proposal for rezoning Gowanus should be revealed tonight in a community meeting in Carroll Gardens. It’s an “update and presentation” by the Department of City Planning on the next phase of the Gowanus Land Use Framework for the Community Board 6 Land Use Committee. The meeting will take place at PS 32, […]

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National Grid is drilling holes at Thomas Greene Park in Gowanus. The first round of holes is six feet deep. The next round will go to 60 feet. The utility is trying to figure out the extent of the toxic coal tar under the park, playground and swimming pool. It is said to be deep […]

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[Photo courtesy of arichman33/flickr] The Gowanus Goes Green event, which we have posted about before, is this Sunday, June 1, from 11AM-6PM. Our point here, though, is to show how the event is being promoted locally, as per this photo shot on Seventh Avenue in Park Slope. The sponsors are taking the green theme quite […]

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Is the Whole Foods site in Gowanus starting to look more abandoned? One might say, “yes.” The signs identifying the big and environmentally-challenged parcel of land on Third Street in Gowanus as belonging to Whole Food were taken down at the end of 2007. At some point more recently, however, all the permits (many of […]

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Check out an up to date photo gallery of the development goings on on Fourth Avenue between Park Slope and Gowanus. There are many buildings making progress.–Brownstoner

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Yes, the toxic coal tar beneath Thomas Greene Playground in Gowanus is said to be far enough underground that it doesn’t pose a threat to, say, children on slides. Still, it’s unsettling to find a sign about the “remedial investigation” of pollution there. A GL reader sent in this shot, which comes from the Third […]

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We’re going to go out on a limb here and say that Union Hall’s new venture on Seventh Street between Second and Third Avenues in Gowanus won’t be ready until fall. Yes, back during the Winter, they were saying that construction would last through spring. But a reader pointed us to this ad on Craigslist […]

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Are you a member of our GL Photo Pool? Please join and tag the Brooklyn photos you’d like us to see “gowanuslounge.” [Photo courtesy of JP Pagan/flickr] This is the full moon rising over Gowanus last night, as seen from Third Street

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We were a little surprised to see Public Place painted green when the F Train came around the bend from Smith-9th Street toward the Carroll Street stop. (Insert joke here about how this is why the Hudson Companies called their winning proposal to develop the property Gowanus Green.) We’d shot a photo of the site […]

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Here’s our regular weekly post from the Center for the Urban Environment about the great tours they run: Saturday, May 17, 1-3 pm – with Adam Schwartz Rust and Remembrance: Bushwick’s Southern End Bushwick is a bustling neighborhood with a sleepier southern side. The historic houses lining these leafy streets date from a late 19th […]

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Have you joined or new flickr Gowanus Lounge Photo Pool yet? Are you tagging photos that you want us to see with “gowanuslounge”? We hope that you will! [Photo courtesy of JP Pagan/flickr] The Kentile Sign is one of the landmarks of Gowanus. It rises over the landscape in many different ways, including very grungy […]

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Check out some photos of Gowanus where “there is a tremendous amount of texture and even the grays hint on various takes on color and expression.”–Sakura in Transit

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This is not a Brooklyn story except that a GL reader brought a post to our attention about solar lily pads that won a design competition for the Clyde River in Glasgow. He wondered if they had any use in the Gowanus. We don’t know about that, but we do know that you can read […]

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Just before noon our inbox lit up with forwarded copies of a press release from the Toll Brothers announcing their new tollbrothersgowanus.com website. The site has info about the developer’s big 460-unit development on the Gowanus Canal, a comment feedback form and promises updates about developments and meetings throughout the land use approval process and, […]

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The next phase of the long process of rezoning Gowanus will start on May 29. That’s when an “update and presentation” by the Department of City Planning on the next phase of the Gowanus Land Use Framework will take place. The meeting will take place at PS 32, which is located at 317 Hoyt Street, […]

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[Photo courtesy strohchop/flickr] A reader dropped this photo from the heart of the Gowanus Hotel District at Third Avenue & President Street into our photo pool. Although, the aerial view, so to speak, is a bit dated, it’s interesting and we’d just photographed progress on the hotel. The cafe replaces a sixty-year-old business that closed […]

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Here’s our regular weekly post from the Center for the Urban Environment about the great tours they run: Saturday, May 10, 2:00p- 4:00pm – with Dan Wiley Gowanus Neighborhood Walking Tour Dan Wiley will lead an interactive walking tour around CUE’s new backyard, to explore the legendary Gowanus Canal waterway and the area’s environment, history, […]

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If you take photos of Brooklyn and you post them on flickr, we’d love to have them in our new Gowanus Lounge Flickr Pool. Pay it a visit and tag them “gowanuslounge.” [Photo courtesy of Dalton Rooney/flickr] This is the placid Gowanus as it looks from the Union Street Bridge along with the pretty reflections […]

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We posted about all of tonight’s Carroll Gardens and Gowanus meetings a bit earlier, but we do want to focus a little on the one dealing with the site of the former Manufactured Gas Plant on Third Avenue under Thomas Greene Park and nearby blocks. It’s one of several toxic sites in Gowanus/Carroll Gardens that […]

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This is a very busy night in Carroll Gardens in terms of meetings, with three important ones at once: 1) Borough President Marty Markowitz will hold a public meeting to discuss the pending zoning text amendment in Carroll Gardens proposed by the Department of City Planning. Residents have been working hard to gather support for […]

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We were swamped yesterday and didn’t have a chance to post this photo that our Carroll Gardens Correspondent sent of a Sponge Park Sponge at the Court Street Fair. In case Sponge Park doesn’t ring a bell it’s a proposal for an eco-friendly park along the banks of the Gowanus Canal.

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