Billy Stein will face on Aug. 28 the day he thought, he hoped would never come: the day he has to actually ask permission to build the building nobody in the Carroll Gardens universe ever wanted: the reviled 360 Smith.
Billy, who has paid a lot lip service to the angry community in the past, had pretty much been breezily moving forward with the unpopular, out-of-scale condo project because the plot, on the corner of Smith and 1st, because it was an as-of-right site. Nobody could do nothing to stop him.
Except that somebody did. Or something: City Council. In July it unanimously passed the "Narrow Streets" Zoning Text Amendment for some streets in Carroll Gardens. The amendment allows for buildings of 55 feet tops. Billy's was set for 70 feet. Awwww. DOB soon logged a complaint about 360 being out of keeping with the new zoning. And the site went silent and has remained dormant since.
Billy Boy will have to plead his case before the Board of Standards and Appeals at P.S. 32, 317 Hoyt Street (between Union and President), Thursday at 6 PM. (A bit suspicious that the thing is scheduled on the week when most New Yorkers are out of town on vacation.) He'll be lucky if he escapes an old-fashioned pelting of rotten vegetables.
Actually, I think you are overstating the hostility. Once he redesigned there were definitely people at the CGNA meetings who were supportive of the building. (Or at least had a "not so bad" attitude.) Of course the CORD crowd won't accept anything he does. I think he will get to build it as he planned, since it is on a corner, at the main shopping street of Court, over a subway station, and already in progress.
ReplyDeleteOnly 20 percent of the foundation has been built. I think the City's well within their rights to send him back to the drawing board.
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