Tin Pan Alley Crisis Now Has Its Own Website

The Historic Districts Council has launched a website to draw attention to the plight of the imperiled row houses at 47, 49, 51, 53 and 55 West 28th Street, formerly home to much of what was Tin Pan Alley. You can find the site here. There's a petition you can sign in support of the preservation of the buildings.

Writes Simeon Bankoff, Executive Director of HDC:

We have also been in touch with a tenant who informed us that the tenants recently won a court case which granted the current residents legal status (the buildings are zoned for commercial or manufacturing use). The current scaffolding has been erected so that the owners can do necessary repairs to the buildings (they are now required to bring the buildings up to code after decades of minimal maintenance). The immediate danger is that without appropriate oversight, the repairs could potentially damage or disfigure the historic facades of the buildings.

Additionally, HDC has been touch with the Landmarks Commission and alerted them to our concerns about the row. We understand that the agency has a file on them, and over the years, some requests for landmarking have been received. At the very least, in 2001, HDC recommended incorporating this row in the Madison Square North Historic District when it was being considered for designation. The next step is to raise public awareness of this significant row and get the agency to act.

Good work, HDC