Developers of Underground Railroad Building Under Investigation

The Manhattan building at the center of the Draft Riots of 1863 and an important Underground Railroad station is being illegally modified. DNAinfo reports in Developers of Underground Railroad Building Under Investigation:

The Department of Buildings is investigating whether a developer is illegally continuing construction on a 150-year-old Chelsea row house that was once a stop on the Underground Railroad.

The probe follows complaints by neighbors about ongoing work on a fifth floor addition to 339 West 29th St., also known as the Hopper-Gibbons House, which makes it taller than the buildings next door. That's significant to preservationists because former residents fleeing Civil War riots used the level roofs to escape.

"It feels like they are slicing away a piece of history with a serrated knife," said neighbor Fern Luskin, a CUNY art and architecture historian who said she had in recent weeks she repeatedly witnessed construction on the partially-built fifth floor. "It's very angering that this owner has not the slightest care in the world."

Willoughby Square Garage Development Opportunity RFP

Want to build a parking lot on the site of an Underground Railroad station? Now's your chance! Here's the Request for Proposals by the NYC Economic Development Corporation at Willoughby Square:

New York City Economic Development Corporation (“NYCEDC”) is seeking proposals for the development and operation of an underground parking garage (“the Garage”) and the construction of an approximately 1.15-acre street-level public space on top (“Willoughby Square”). Through this RFP, NYCEDC expects to select a developer to successfully develop and operate a below-grade garage under a long-term ground lease with the City. Respondents can submit garage proposals that accommodate up to a maximum of 694 spaces.

NYCEDC is currently developing schematic designs for Willoughby Square. The selected developer is expected to complete this design process at its sole cost and expense. The selected developer will also be responsible for the construction of Willoughby Square on behalf the City, for which the City expects to make funds available.

Observer on Willoughby Sq: Mayor's Latest Libertarian Park

Remember that the Bloomberg administration wanted to confiscate 227 Duffield to build a micro-park and parking lot? 227 was saved, but the Observer rips into other aspects of the plan.

Here are some highlights from "Brooklyn's Willoughby Square: Mayor's Latest Libertarian Park" by Matt Chaban:

[New NYC parks] are being built by the public sector but maintained through private development on or near the parks—in the case of the former, through multi-use piers; the latter, residential development, though the Brooklyn Bridge Park plan has drawn considerable scorn and is currently under reconsideration.

Never mind that there may not even be enough money coming in through said development to keep the parks going.

With Willoughby Square, and the much larger Governors Island just across the harbor, the city has taken its plan a step further toward the Libertarian ideal of private-public space, which is what concerns so many critics: that eventually such spaces will cease to be public at all, more admission-only amusement parks than public amenities. (This is already common practice at many National Parks.)

Hotels coming slowly, but stores are changing

One of the hotels being built on Duffield Street has new delays. Hotel reports in Brooklyn Won't Get Aloft Until January :

Opening a hotel in New York City is a treacherous business--there are always delays. Which is what Starwood is finding as it tries to get the city's first two Aloft Hotels up and running.

Aloft Harlem has had a busy dance card of opening dates, with the latest not too far off on October 21. That was also meant to be the big day for Aloft Brooklyn, but HC reader AboutGirl was right when she said that she'd heard this opening had been pushed back as well. According to its website, Aloft Brooklyn is now scheduled to open on January 20, 2011.

Aloft's delays haven't prevented existing businesses from being pushed out. NBC New York, as well as the Downtown Brooklyn Partnership, seem to think that certain shoppers are invisible. Fulton Street is bustling... unless you are blind to certain demographics, like the writer of Filene's Basement/Syms to Open in Brooklyn:

It seemed like only a matter of time before chain stores set their sights on the somewhat desolate strip of real estate at Brooklyn's Fulton Mall. Joining Aeropostale and H&M—both of which should be opening soon—Filene's Basement/Syms announced it will open its first Brooklyn store at the Fulton Mall in early 2012.

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote about Thomas Truesdale

Jim Driscoll, historian at the Queens Historical Society and a longtime advocate of the historical importance of 227 Duffield, pointed out that Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote about Thomas Truesdale, previous owner of 227 Duffield. Here is a quote from Emerson's journal from 1847 (pages 332-333):

Emerson was one of the most prominent American intellectuals of the time. He was one of the greatest spokesmen against slavery, and Mr. Driscoll thinks this passage might possibly indicate the attendees of an Underground Railroad meeting.

Brownstoner: V3 Hotel Rising

Brownstoner posted about the developments of the V3 hotel at 229-231 Duffield Street:

When we checked in on the V3 hotel in January, the foundation was just going in. Now, six stories (out of an eventual 19) are up. There's a small rendering of the what the finished product is supposed to look like here.

Brownstoner: EDC wants your help with Willoughby Square Park

Brownstoner posted this:

Help Design Willoughby Square Park

Calling all aspiring landscape designers and concerned residents of Downtown Brooklyn! Willoughby Square Park is getting a move on and the EDC wants your input. There will be a Community Design Charette held on Wednesday night at the Zeckendorf Health Science Lecture Hall of Long Island University. The park's designer, Hargreaves Associates will be on hand to steer the workshop participants through a serious of questions and considerations that will help inform the ultimate make-up of the 46,000-square-foot public space. Anyone interested in attending should RSVP to Josh Nachowitz at NYCEDC at jnachowitz@nycedc.com.

City Point Phase 1 Revealed

The NY Times blog and Brownstoner report on the latest iteration of the proposed City Point project, which is just behind Duffild Street. See

• CB2 Endorses New Fulton St. Shopping Center and
  
  
• City Point Phase 1 Revealed

40 hotels in Brooklyn... some imaginary

While the Brooklyn Eagle reported about all the upcoming hotel projects coming up in Brooklyn, they said this about the existing hotels:

They join The Marriott on Adams Street (656 rooms with its new addition); the conjoined Aloft/Sheraton on Duffield Street (500 rooms); Hotel Indigo, also on Duffield Street (164 rooms);

And Brownstoner dutifully republished the information here. These article follow up an Eagle article from December 2009 talking about the ongoing construction of Hotel Indigo.

The Duffield Street Blog now has exclusive photos from inside the hotel! It is the most cutting edge hotel, neo-post-modernist design, as you can see from this photo taken January 29, 2010:



Somehow, everyone missed the grand opening of this exciting new hotel.

....Maybe because the opening didn't happen. Brownstoner already reported on the BS of statements touting the opening of Hotel Indigo by the end of 2009. So I guess the folks at Brownstoner have stopped reading Brownstoner, and few bother to fact-check press releases.

Duffield Street photo essay

Here are photos from January 6, 2010.

The new gym:


The hotel at 237 Duffield Street. Several reports a few months ago said that this would be open by the beginning of 2010:



The foundation of the V3 hotel at 229-231 Duffield Street. The previous building had a false wall in the basement that several academics think could have been a stop on the Underground Railroad:


Another view of 229-231 Duffield Street construction:


This building is slated for demolition by the NYC Economic Development Corporation:


This building is also slated for demolition. The ground floor is home to an African-American themed bookstore:


Another set of buildings slated for demolition in order to make way for a mini-park and underground parking lot:


The former site of the Albee Square Mall. This is the planned location of the City Point project, recipient of Stimulus funds. For more on this project, read Feds’ CityPoint bailout is a bad use of taxpayer dollars:

Courier Life: Displaced tenants in Downtown Brooklyn rally against the city

There are many properties threatened with eminent domain in Downtown Brooklyn, not just the Duffield Street Abolitionist homes.

This blog is determined to shed light on examples of the Bloomberg administration's use of eminent domain to demolish homes and businesses without properly compensating the victims of the administration's "economic development" schemes. "Displaced tenants in Downtown Brooklyn rally against the city," published by Courier Life, touches on many of these issues:

Frustration is growing for several dozen families in three downtown Brooklyn apartment buildings who were promised new affordable housing digs in June 2008.

But the city maintains they are working as fast as they can to relocate them.

The buildings located at 402, 404 and 406 Albee Square off Willoughby Street are slated for demolition to make room for a park bounded by Fulton, Willoughby and Duffield streets.

The seizure of the homes is the result of the 2004 Downtown Brooklyn rezoning, and following a court battle, the city agreed to move eligible tenants in the buildings with substantial relocation benefits and protections including Section 8 subsidies and a preference in city-supervised affordable developments.

Eighteen months later, tenants allege that city workers have threatened to place them into the city’s shelter system or city-owned property in dangerous neighborhoods. They also complain the city’s department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) is not caring for apartments in the building, which now has molded walls, detached sinks and, in one apartment, a steam pipe that spews hot water from the ceiling.

For the full article, click here.

More deserved praise for Jennifer Levy

FUREE held a leadership transition celebration at the Museum of Contemporary African Diasporan Art (MoCADA) in Fort Greene on Friday 12/11. The Brooklyn Eagle reported on it, and mentions one of the heroes of Brooklyn history:

[the] event also featured a presentation to Jennifer Levy, acting director of South Brooklyn Legal Services for her work serving low-income Brooklyn residents, and particularly for her role in saving 227 Duffield St. from demolition via eminent domain.

More here.

Duffield holiday decorations

Here is a post from brooklynpix:

One block from Metrotech, you’re back in old Brooklyn. On Duffield Street, not far from here, there is a building that was part of the underground railroad. It is also in the middle of re-development zone. Watch for the eventually legal face-off between eminent domain and historical significance.

Voice: Duffield St. is "Best Argument Against Eminent Domain"

The Village Voice published its list of the Best of NYC in their October 21, 2009 issue. Here is what they say on page 26.

Best
Argument Against Eminent Domain
As part of the city's revitalization plans for Brooklyn, an eminent domain notice (seizing property for economic development) was served at a downtown building in January 2004- but the city picked the wrong people to mess with. Owner Joy Chatel fought to preserve 227 Duffield Street. Getting help from (among others) activist Raul Rothblatt, she beat back the threat in 2007. They weren't just fighting for a piece of property, but also a piece of history- the building was home to well known abolitionists and noted by historians as being part of the Underground Railroad. The Duffield collective is raising money to turn the building into a museum, which could become quite an attraction. The fight with the city hasn't ended though: Surrounding buildings, which also have abolitionist history, have been bought up by the city for hotel construction or are under threat of eminent domain. Though they'd like to work with the city, Rothblatt insists that the Duffield group will "fight to the end, promoting and protecting the property."

The Voice ends up by giving a link to this blog- Thanks!

Bk Eagle: Abolitionist History in Brooklyn Gets Fed Grants

The Brooklyn Eagles reports about new support for Abolitionist history in "Project To Commemorate Abolitionist History in Brooklyn Gets Federal Grants":

The Brooklyn Historical Society (BHS), the Weeksville Heritage Center and Irondale Ensemble Project have been chosen to receive two major federal grants to fund their joint project “In Pursuit of Freedom,” a multifaceted program that memorializes the history of abolitionism and the Underground Railroad in Brooklyn.

The U.S. Department of Education Office of Postsecondary Education’s Underground Railroad Educational and Cultural (URR) Program has awarded BHS $936,000; and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) has awarded $400,000 to the program, which was originally announced last year....

These awards complement $2 million already granted by the city in 2008 through a Request for Proposals that was initiated by the Downtown Brooklyn Development Corporation.

The project to commemorate Brooklyn’s abolitionist history stems, at least in part, from a controversy several years ago, over an urban-renewal plan to destroy several 19th century homes on Duffield Street that were reportedly linked to the Underground Railroad. The Duffield Street houses have since been saved.

One of the Duffield Street homes, number 227, was spared in a settlement with the city in 2007. Its owner, Joy Chatel, pledged to continue giving tours of her home and using it as a center where people can learn about the Underground Railroad and abolitionist activity in Brooklyn. Another known Underground Railroad site in Brooklyn is the former Bridge Street A.W.M.E. Church building, now part of Polytechnic University....


All aspects of the project will utilize historic artifacts and documents held by the Brooklyn Historical Society.

Among these are a rare copy of the Emancipation Proclamation signed by Abraham Lincoln; original letters written by Henry Ward Beecher and fellow abolitionist William Wilson; propaganda tracts; numerous slave bills of sale; as well as newspapers, anti-slavery pamphlets from the 1840s; and early photographs of the people and places crucial to the story.

To read the original article, click here.