My Life In Brooklyn

A few weeks ago I uploaded a series of images on my Flickr account, documenting the number of tear-downs and new builds of a particularly ugly nature between Maple and Midwood streets, New York and Brooklyn Avenues.  You can have a look at the images or map here, if you wish.

In the middle of this area I noted a section that is not being touched (on the linked map, the area is in green).  It is an interesting group of smaller homes, almost cottage-like in nature, clustered together.  There are definitely some element of this area that has declined and would benefit from general clean up, maintenance, and landscaping, but for the most part the buildings seem intact.  Given a little TLC, this would be a very cute little enclave that — for some reason — brings to mind Pomander Walk on the upper west side.  Anyway, I like walking around here now and then, and hopefully the grouping will prevent tear-downs.

Last week amid general business and friends from Australia visiting, I managed to spend a little bit of time at the BPL, where I have been researching non-real estate topics.  Looking though a 1925 reel of The Brooklyn Eagle, I happened upon a press release for the building of this very block.  Having this unexpected bit of info, I just thought it worth the share. 

I did wonder about the names I had seen: Miami, Tampa and Palm — and seeing it was named “Coral Gardens” did make me smile.  I walked over and photographed the same group of houses appearing in the 1925 article, remarkably similar as you are able to see from the two images.  This stretch is actually on New York Avenue — the worst part of this particular block is they must live amid the ugliness of Feddersland.  High res images are linked, though the panorama itself is far from perfect, you will get a sense of the place.

Entire article is reproduced on the jump.

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Its October 31st after all. A Flatbush Legend Substantiated by Ancient Chronicles.

TRAGIC FATE OF THE FAIR ALVA.

Immured in a Secret Chamber She Died Of Starvation and for Many Years Her Restless Spirit Haunted the Old Mansion, Which Still Stands on Bedford Avenue, Between Clarkson and Winthrop Streets.

No one would suspect that the peace of that venerable, orderly, conservative old town of Flatbush has ever been disturbed by a ghost, and if it were not for the haunted house, part of which stands to this day, and the testimony of well authenticated chronicles, nobody would believe it. But there are those in Flatbush at the present time, intelligent, educated, and quite sane, who would make a long detour rather than pass a certain spot there between 12 and 1 o’clock at night. That spot is the old site of Melrose hall on Bedford avenue, between Clarkson and Winthrop streets.

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Westbury Court is a short street, a dead end overlooking the subway tracks (Q & B). The building in the image is situated at the southwest corner of Flatbush Ave (684 Flatbush is the primary address). Quite often there are groups of young men and SUVs hanging around, not necessarily in front of this building, but definitely on the street giving it a somewhat ominous appearance.

We nearly moved to a similar dead-end street in this neighborhood when we were house hunting and now rejoice in the fact we didn’t. The local precinct commander once told a group -– when he was asked about dead-end streets and criminal activity -– whether we ever considered why cowboys in old westerns liked to take refuge in canyons. Simply put, it is a means to advantageously use the natural configuration of the land to observe all activity: who enters, departs, etc. I guess the theory has some logic to it.

Anyway, this building is dated 1929 and PropertyShark reports 95 residential units and 10 commercial units. I keep trying to imagine what it would have looked like in 1929. It has a certain charm to it, even with this paint.

When I started walking about Alvord’s development, I began researching it as well.  I know John Aitken landscaped much of that area originally.  This interested me for genealogical reasons that I will not detail here except to say he was a Scot with an impressive list of credentials from the Glasgow area.  As an example, this tidbit was in the 06 May 1900 edition of the Brooklyn Eagle.

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Brownstoner published a post today that talks about Victorian Flatbush.

I’ve been walking around Victorian Flatbush once a week for a while now. It made me want to sell our house and move to that neighborhood the first time I walked along Buckingham Road. I love the sense of suburban enclave in the midst of the city. The houses are drop dead gorgeous. Most anyway, some of the streets have some significantly newer homes that just do not fit in. Plus the appeal of a larger yard is always a huge draw for me because I love gardening. In fact yesterday my husband and I drove around that area just looking — he was tired of hearing me talk about it and wanted to see the place.

I do wonder what it is like actually living there. Having lived in the suburbs of western Massachusetts for many, many years, moving to Brooklyn—albeit from Manhattan—has been an interesting experience. People walk here. They walk past your house, sometimes everyday, and get on the subway or bus to work. They walk to stores. They walk to the park. And most of them say hello at least, and sometimes they stop to chat for a few minutes. After a while you learn their names and the names of their kids. There is a sense of connectivity. The houses here are significantly closer to the sidewalk than those in Victorian Flatbush and ultimately—like it or not—you get to know your neighbors.

In all honesty I know more people on my street now than I knew on the street where I lived for 10 plus years in Massachusetts. And that goes for Manhattan too, though I did know a group of alternate side parking regulars who were a friendly, entertaining group.

Some closer levels of community and neighborhood are not for everyone and I get that, but I have never felt the level of familiarity here something that was suffocating in any way. Still I cannot help but wonder what it is like to live in Victorian Flatbush in terms of community and the day-to-day familiarity. I could be wrong, but it just seems the physical layout of the place might not be conducive to interacting with neighbors in the same way people do here. Despite the fact so many homes have the Great American Front Porch. Of course if you it could be perfect for you, but as someone who has mostly lived in suburbia it isn’t something I am ready for again. Not yet. Though I won’t lie to you — there are occasions where I would have happily traded neighborhoods for even the suggestion of quiet.

At any rate, I would love to hear what it is actually like living there, not in the houses, but the community.

It has been five years since we were in the midst of a real estate search here in Brooklyn.  I was looking through my former blog and decided to post the preceding entry because now it just seems absurd, though at the time was far from it.  Definitely one of the more frustrating NY experiences.  I guess ultimately the final success allows one to let go of the “in process” negative experiences.

Being a homeowner from a smallish town in Massachusetts, it was a bit of a surprise to learn the mechanisms of realtors and house-buying in NYC metro.  That is, of course, an understatement.
 
We nearly bought a place at Newswalk.  Walking in the first day, we made a tremendous error. We spoke to the agent on the premises and she managed to acquire our names.  Now, this seems incidental to you perhaps, but the company for whom she worked from that point on refused to allow us to speak to any other agents employed by that company.  It isn’t like we contracted with her or anything, and I  understood the competitive nature of the business and the rationale of the policy. Still, it was downright odd from a consumer point of view.  This realtor was, we felt, inept and way more concerned with her personal social calendar than actually working.  Ultimately she had an incident of hospitalization, during which time the company only allowed another agent to speak with us after we screamed (very loudly) about it several times.  A couple of days with no one to contact in that market can make a huge difference.
 
We didn’t buy a Newswalk condo.  And we vowed not to deal with that real estate company, and by some miracle, managed to uphold the  decision. But our time at Newswalk was memorable and if there is one valuable lesson I learned it was to never permit a realtor to think there is any kind of commitment by you to work with him or her exclusively.  We were not in a position to hire a buyer’s agent.  Honestly, from that point on in the house-hunt, we feared being stuck with a lame agent.

By the way, the preceding post is not at all embellished.

[reposted from my former blog, Oct 2001.  Funny now, frustrating then.]

I walked to Broadway to get what I expected to be the number 1 train, knowing I would have to change at 72nd street to pick up the number 2 express to Brooklyn. But there was never an express that showed up. So I ended up on the number 2, which stayed local, to Atlantic Ave. It sucked and I was a few minutes late meeting husband and the realtor.

But I made it. We love the space in Newswalk and want to buy. But in the current New York market, the price of the place suddenly increased about $150,000. I couldn’t believe it.

Our “realtor” was so lame all she wanted to do was get to a friends house where someone had saved her a piece of cake. This is no exaggeration, she kept talking about the cake.  She looked at her watch every five minutes, I assume to assess her potential loss of cake. God knows, why would one expect to spend no more than 45 minutes to sell something that would potentially reap a bakery full of cakes in her commission? I essentially ignored her time angst. After we viewed the two units again and made a final decision on the one we wanted (this is our third visit here. Hint: this means we may be interested buyers) husband, our lame realtor who I shall call Eileen, the company broker and I gathered around the polished black granite countertop. It went something like this:

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On Wednesday as I was walking around Albemarle and environs, I forgot to mention the black squirrel.  I saw several of them scampering about as all squirrels do this time of year.  I haven’t seen any black squirrels in years, but I saw three of them and tried to grab a pic without success.  It surprised me for some reason, though really they are not so unusual.

This time of year I place chicken wire over my gardening containers to protect the spring bulbs from the squirrels.  We only have grey squirrels here, but they are bold. The black squirrels look so pretty but are certain to be just as destructive.  Makes me think of my Scottish grandmother who, in her later years living in the country, kept a slingshot handy and developed skills that amused the rest of us.  No, she never actually killed one.

I keep forgetting to make mention of these large projects in process of being constructed, but I saw each one of these again yesterday, so duly reminded, just a mention before I forget again (images below the cut):

1. Northeast corner of Church and Ocean Ave — this has been ongoing for a while now.  Retail and office space certain, uncertain if there are residential units on upper floors.
   
2. Bedford Ave, corner of Caton (where it meets with Linden) — Residential.  This seems to have gone up pretty quickly.
   
3. Ocean Ave (Across from 560 Ocean) — This is a huge lot, located almost directly across the street from the notable “Cathedral Arms” building and next door (south) to the lovely “Embassy” building, number 555 Ocean. I assume it will be residential.
   

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After a non-walking day with the rain yesterday, I was itching to be outside. I headed south thinking it would be fun to revisit Victorian Flatbush.  In my collection are a couple of vintage postcards showing corners of Beverley and Albemarle.  For a while it has been on my mind to attempt an “after” recreation of the “before” scenes in the postcards.

Anyway so I was walking along Church and I saw the army guy from Chateau Frontenac drinking coffee on one street corner (we surreptitiously nodded acknowledgement) and not five minutes later another person from a prior walk saw me from across the street.  She crossed over and we talked for a while and now know each other’s forenames.

I wandered around Albemarle, Buckingham, Rugby and a couple other streets.  Totally forgetting to set up the photo image, so therein is an excuse for another visit.  There is just so much to look at in that area. Another time I may post commentary on some of my street observations of the surrounding area as well.

Eventually, heading home, I decided to walk North on Bedford, where I found some notable graffiti.  Then I saw this new ugly building located on the east side of Bedford between Tilden and Albemarle.  No sooner had I snapped the pic shown above when a group of people I had not noticed previously, sitting on a stoop across from the building, called me over.

“You want to buy that place?” one guy asked me.
“No, I don’t,” I answered.  “Would you want to buy it?”
Everyone shook his or her head no.
“Well, we saw you take a picture,” the same guy said.
“I like to take pictures of ugly buildings sometimes,” I answered.

Well, that comment opened the floodgate. The stoop-sitters are not happy with this building by any means.  One woman told me the owners were asking $850k, “Each!” she said emphatically.  Only no one wanted to buy it.  And long story short the developers  sold the building to the city and now it will be transitional housing.  Something the stoop-folk are not so happy about either. So there you have it, another sour deal for the locals. 

Though the selling the building to the city part is an interesting concept.  I bet the developers still did okay with it financially – I loathe thinking this (the city purchase) could be a routine event.

Of course I have to add a disclaimer that this is unverified stoop talk, but food for thought nonetheless.