The Light at the End of the Tunnel?

I am ashamed. For years, I've told myself: "One day, I'm going to get to the bottom of the mystery of 1890 Brooks Restaurant in Long Island City, and uncover its shrouded history." But sloth and inertia took over, and now intrepid reader Ian Schoenherr is having all the "Eureka!"s.

In late October, a reader wrote is to inform me that the Brooks used to be called the Court Square Restaurant for many years. I did some research and found this to be true. With that, the avalanche began. Earlier this month, Schoenherr wrote in with the vital revelations that the building that houses Brooks used to be Long Island City's old City Hall in the late 19th century, and that, in 1910, two men named Martin Heilbut and Herman Kleefeld of Long Island City secured a lease of the old building, "at the corner of Jackson Avenue and Anable Street (demapped, now part of Court Square), adjoining Court House Square." According to old articles, the address (which, annoyingly, was listed under different numbers over the years) was variously referred to as Kleefeld's Hall, and Kleefeld's Saloon.

Great stuff! Still, there were holes in the mystery yet. Most significantly: who belonged to the letters "K" and "N" found in the stained-glass canopy behind the old bar inside? "K" could be Kleefeld. But the "N"?

Did Schoenherr give up? Perish the thought. He dug further:

I found a good, long article on the building when it was sold to Heilbut and Kleefeld and quote a large portion of it below. And while I've seen several mentions of it from the 1910s as "Kleefeld's Hotel" I also found some references to "Heilbut & Kleefeld":

[Regarding the ball of the Owl Bowling Club, of Winfield, held at Court Square Hall, Long Island City] "...About 1 o'clock fifty couples sat down to a course dinner prepared by Heilbut & Kleefeld, the well-known Long Island City caterers...." (The Newtown Register, February 24, 1914)

"...The Long Island City Business Men's Association will be held at Heilbut & Kleefeld's, corner of Jackson avenue and Court Square, Long Island City..." (Brooklyn Daily Eagle, June 11, 1915)

"Heilbut & Kleefeld" also show up as certificate holders in the Annual Report of the State Commissioner of Excise of the State of New York (1912 and 1914).

Then Schoenherr makes a seemingly obvious suggestion, but one that had never occurred to thick ol' me:

All of which makes me wonder - I haven't seen the stained glass with the initials "N" and "K" at Brooks', but is it possible that the "N" is actually an "H"?

Egad! Holmes, you're a genius!

I plan to have lunch at Brooks this very week and take a good long long (and a picture) at those stained-glass letters.

In the meantime, enjoy this article Ian found:

Brooklyn Daily Eagle, May 24, 1910 (page 12)

GLEASON DAYS RECALLED BY LONG ISLAND CITY DEAL

...There is no building in Long Island City, not even the Court House, which has had so eventful a history as the old City Hall, which now passes into new hands. In the latter part of the 80s it was occupied by Alexander Moran, as a hotel. He was prominent in Long Island City politics, and served as a city clerk. The police court and the Common Council rooms were in the building with the hotel. Sessions of the courts and the Council meetings were held there until an act was passed prohibiting police courts from being held in the same building with hotels. Then Moran moved out.

After his removal all the boards of Long Island City and the mayor's office were moved into the building. The ground floor was taken by the city treasurer.

Among the police justices who sat in this building were Stephen J. Kavanaugh, Daniel Noble and Lucius N. Manley.

It was in this building that Patrick Jerome Gleason held the dual position of mayor and alderman, and defied any one to prevent him. Here, also, he barricaded himself after the election of Mayor Sanford, and held the fort for twenty-one days until he was thrown out by members of the police force. It was also from a window in this building that Gleason, after his election in 1896, made a speech that caused him to be sued for libel by former Police Captain Woods, in which the captain was successful, and he got a judgment which Gleason refused to pay, and upon which Woods succeeded in having a body execution issued against Gleason that confined him for a year to the jail limits of Queens County.

At many of the meetings of the old Common Council and the Board of Education there were such lively discussions that fights occurred, in several of which prominent citizens received serious physical injuries.

That Gleason. He was a pip.

Yet Another Breakthrough in Brooks 1890 Restaurant?

Writing in in response to my recent breakthrough in the ongoing historical mystery of Long Island City's Brooks 1890 Restaurant, Ian Schoenherr delivers a hell of a piece of information. Read:

This building seems to answer to descriptions of Long Island City's old City Hall building. The New York Times for May 30, 1902, states: "The old City Hall is a four-story double brick building, covering two full lots, at the corner of Jackson and Anable Avenues. It was vacated about a year after consolidation." Anable Avenue is now the part of Court Square that borders one side of Brooks 1890 Restaurant. And the Times for May 25, 1910, says:

"

Martin Heilbut and Herman Kleefeld of Long Island City have secured a lease of the old Long Island City municipal building, at the corner of Jackson Avenue and Anable Street, adjoining Court House Square.

"The building is historic as the old City Hall of Long Island City, and it was the theatre of action of the late Patrick Jerome Gleason and the other officials of the old Long Island City just prior to consolidation. The property belongs to Dr. James T. Trask [sic: probably Dr. James D. Trask].

"Under the lease, which is for a term of twenty-one years, the Long Island City men get possession not only of this building but of a lot adjoining the same on Jackson Avenue and and another fronting on Court House Square. These lots will be improved by the lessees."

The building also appears to have been known now and then as "Temple Court" and its address is variously listed as 250-52 Jackson, 250-252 Jackson, and 252 Jackson. It was also the sometime home or meeting place of the Queens County Bar Association, the Topographical Bureau of the Borough of Queens, the George A. Just Company, the Village Athletic Club, the Brooklyn Heights Railroad Company, the Queens Boro Board of Trade, the Bureau of Street Openings, etc.

The Queens County Plumbers Union met at "Kleefeld's Hall" at 252 Jackson (c.1925) and the Times mentions an incident at "Kleefeld's Saloon" (December 22, 1914). Perhaps the "K" was for Herman Kleefeld, co-lessee of the property? Then again, the Times article of May 30, 1902, mentions that James Kennedy, "a well known sporting man," was also connected with the place. And "N" is still MIA...

Holy shit! I'll let you know as I find out more about Long Island City's most mysterious old building.

Moreover, I found this shot of the building when it used to be the Court Square Restaurant.

Assuring the Palm Beach Crowd

The King of NYCabbies alerted me this article in the current issue of the Palm Beach Daily News ("The Shiny Sheet"), in which, as the KOC aptly put it, Department of City Planning commissioner Amanda Burden speaks to her true constituency.

I'm just going to reprint the article in all its astouding lack of irony, boldfacing lines that particularly give me the chills in their implied meaning. My totally measured and reasonable observations are in brackets. Please note that this article about New York's future is written by paper's FASHION EDITOR!

Planner Amanda Burden explains future of New York City to Preservation Foundation of Palm Beach

By ROBERT JANJIGIAN
Daily News Fashion Editor

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

Community planning, zoning and development issues are at the fore in town this season.

To reflect — and perhaps encourage ["perhaps" indeed; Burden doesn't want any dialog] — the ongoing dialog and to educate the public about the principles and goals of sensible growth strategies, the Preservation Foundation asked Amanda Burden, director of the New York City Department of City Planning and chairwoman of the City Planning Commission, to deliver the March 14 Gruss master architect lecture, traditionally presented by a distinguished practitioner of design.

Burden works for Mayor Michael Bloomberg, whom she calls a great figure "who wants to make a difference." [My God. He's a Svengali figure to his various commissioners.] She is charged with devising development strategies for New York City, with an eye toward improving economic conditions and quality of life. [Quality of life for whom? Folks of her tax bracket?]

An important part of her job is maintaining the city's position as a city of global stature, [Are we in danger of losing our position at a city of global stature? Will only overdevelopment save us?] able to compete with economic and cultural capitals around the world while creating and maintaining vibrant and diverse neighborhoods [Her plans, of course, quash diversity, not encourage it; what they create is homogeneity], waterfront sites and public spaces — and encouraging top level, sustainable design. [I'm not aware that much of the jerrybuilt crapitecture she engenders with her rezonings is sustainable or top level. I've always considered it bottom-run development never meant to last the ages.]

"We're trying to shape the city," said Burden, noting that 79 rezoning plans have been passed, with more than one-sixth of the city targeted for redevelopment.
[Holy shit! One sixth of the City's in Bloomberg's image. Hello, Atlanta!]
She discussed several projects, some nearing completion, each reflecting the goals that she and the city administration consider essential:

* Restoration and enhancement of Lower Manhattan.

"It was suffering even before 9/11," Burden said. "The area was all business and went to bed promptly at 5 p.m."

Burden's office has induced an increase in residential development downtown, with a potential to draw 10,000 families to new apartments and condominiums and, with them, an influx of a variety of restaurants and shops.

* Implementation of Manhattan's Hudson Yards district.

"There are no sites in midtown Manhattan for office towers," Burden said. "Zoning, which allowed only low-density buildings, on the far west side of midtown had killed the area." [Oh, ick! Low-density buildings! The work of the Devil, they are! They kill neighborhoods. Only tall buildings revive areas.]

She intends to redesignate 59 blocks on the West Side, extending the dense midtown skyline west toward the Hudson River. [Just what anyone would want, an extension of that suffocating skyline] The change would allow a potential 24 million square feet of office space, as well as a supply of homes.

"Yes, it's dense, but it's very key to maintain New York's competitive edge in the world, and this will address that aim," she said. [This represents a rare bit of questioning from the reporter in this article. Again, Burden is blinkered. She can see no other solution for improving New York than overdevelopment. Competitive edge=tall, shiny towers. How can someone so limited in imagination be in charge of city planning?]

Part of the plan includes parks along a new boulevard spine and extension of a subway line.

"Transportation access is very important," she said. "Weaving parks and open spaces into the plan creates real estate value."

* Developing regional business districts.

Burden's office envisions an office district in downtown Brooklyn, which she describes as having fabulous assets, including access to surrounding low-scale residential neighborhoods, superior transportation and the potential for plenty of residential development alongside commercial properties, with mixed-use development a priority.

Within that context, Burden advises town planners to "invest in public open space and transportation."

* For Long Island City, Burden envisions an office district [She sure likes office districts.] that combines preservation of the area's low-density character with growth. New buildings, some quite large, built in strategic locations will "give an identification to Long Island City," she said. [Long Island City residents already feel they have an identity, lady.]

* The city is rezoning the entire South Bronx to encourage residential and retail development in conjunction with the new Yankee Stadium.

Manhattan's 125th Street corridor "needs new zoning that will catalyze development," Burden said.

The historic street, home of the Apollo Theater, was described as a dull succession of one-story buildings [Again: small buildings=neighborhood killers] with no cultural center [WTF!], no residential development and no restaurants. [There it is again! Restaurants! She's obsessed with getting fois gras in Harlem!] Burden's plan offers developers a bonus for the inclusion of arts, entertainment, dining and retail elements, which are required to gain the necessary approvals from the city.

"Banks can deaden an environment, closing their doors at 3 p.m.," she said. "We've zoned for limited bank exposure on the street level, positioning the banking floors on the second floor to encourage more vitality." [This is the only good idea you've got, Burden! Make it citywide!]

Burden believes 8,800 new jobs and thousands of needed apartments will result from the 125th Street redevelopment plan.

She went on to detail plans for a waterfront residential development along the "completely abandoned" East River shoreline in the Greenpoint and Williamsburg neighborhoods of Brooklyn.

The High Line elevated railway park in Manhattan's West Chelsea district is intended to add value to the existing real estate, preserve the gallery district and create housing on the perimeter.

And rezoning Brooklyn's Coney Island will save it as a year-round community and amusement park site. [What? It was dead? I know lots of people who go there every summer. Sorry it it's too gritty for your clean white suit, Amanda.]

In the sustainability arena, Burden outlined plans for "greening" open spaces: parking lots will be required to include planted medians and shade trees, and 75 percent of residential front yards in the outer boroughs will be required to be planted, not paved over.

Ladies and gentelmen, this is what she actually thinks. Of course, they're not really her thoughts, any more than DOB head Patricia Lancaster's are hers. They're fed to them by Mayor Mike.

Only 651 days until he's gone, people.

The Mysterious Case of Long Island Star Editor Thomas H. Todd

Queens Crap reports that the handsome, four-square building that once housed the Long Island Star newspaper is coming down, down, down. Why? Just because the Queen political machine doesn't give a crap, and humanity needs another condo tower. That's why.

The developers can't be accused of ignorance of the building's past in this case. As QC points out, the building has a friggin' plaque on it, commemorating Star found Thomas H. Todd, who started the publication in 1865.

Wanna know about the Star and Todd? Why, sure you do. And you've come to the right place! The Star was founded before Long Island City was even incorporated. It was the only paper in the area at the time. Todd was schooled in journalism at the Flushing Journal. In 1876, the Star went daily. Its circulation grew from a few hundred to some twelve thousand per week by 1896. It also had a Greenpoint edition, the Greenpoint Daily Star.

And what of Todd? Well, here's the weirdness, and boy is it weird! The great citizen went missing in January 1901. Nothing was heard of the Long Islander until a body was found in Flushing Creek in June 1902 which Mrs. Todd and the two Todd sons identified as their husband and father. But, after hearing all the evidence at an inquest, the family decided they had been mistaken. It wasn't Todd after all. Meanwhile, other family members still swore is was Todd. But the inquest jury declared it wasn't and that was that.

By November 1902, there was a nasty battle of an "alleged will" presented by the two sons. It was opposed by the widow and her daughters. The sons charged that their mother was not competent to serve as administrator of the will. Ditto for the daughters (their sisters). Ooh, it was nasty.

But what did happen to Todd? No one knows. He was sick with "the grip" prior to his disappearance. The day he vanished, Todd reported for work in the morning, but looked so bad he was sent home. It was thought he would take the train to Flushing, where he lived, but instead he boarded a ferry bound for James Slip. One report portentiously noted, "He always carried one hundred dollars with him." Methinks Mr. Todd didn't want to be found.

The Star was bought by S.I. Newhouse in 1938. In continued on until 1968 at the Long Island Journal Star. A leading LIC citizen back in the day named Josiah M. Whitney once said "I would like to say that no man deserves more credit for the upbuilding and prosperity of Long Island City than Thomas H. Todd, editor of the Long Island City Star. He deserves great credit for public spirit and fair dealing since he first set his foot on Hunter’s Point soil."

Credit schmedit! Down with the edifice, plaque and all!

Heilbut and Kleefeld!

It is accomplished, Ladies and Gentleman.

On Thursday afternoon, there was a lunchtime summit at Brooks 1890 Restaurant to determine if the research efforts of Lost City reader Ian Schoenherr had indeed uncovered the true origins of the old building the eatery has long called home. In attendance were myself, Schoenherr, and artist Sharon Florin, a local artist who has painted the restaurant building, as well as many other Long Island City landmarks.

Much had been pretty solidly confirmed by articles Ian had dug up in the archives of the New York Times, the Brooklyn Eagle, and other newspapers. The address used to function as Long Island City's City Hall in the late 19th century (when it was not yet part of New York), where the local wily officials, like slippery James Gleason, conducted city business. In 1910, it was purchased by Mssrs. Martin Heilbut and Herman Kleefeld, real estate men. During the next decade, it was referred to by several names, including Kleefeld Hall, Kleefeld's saloon, Kleefeld's Hotel and just plain Hielbut and Kleefeld, until the 1920s, when it began to be referred to as the Court Square Restaurant.

The main order of business of the visit was to eyeball more closely the stained-glass canopy above the bar. In the past I had thought the initials etched into the canopy to be "K" and "N." Ian posited that the "N" might be an "H," as in Hielbut. And so we looked.


And we have daylight! Clearly, I need to improve my prescription, because that seeming "N" is indeed an "H." Heilbut and Kleefeld, you are remembered, as I imagine you wanted to be when you commissioned that fine piece of glasswork. Or should I say Kleefeld and Heilbut? The "K" is over the "H," and most news reports mentioned Kleefeld more than Heilbut. I think he was probably the less silent of the two partners.


We were particularly fortunate to have Sharon along, because she is friends with the longtime owner Bill "Brooks" Gounaris. Thus, we were able to share this information, most of which was new to him, certainly the identities of "K" and H." The bartender, too, was eager to learn, no doubt happy that now, when patrons ask about the stained glass, he has an answer to give them. (Gounaris, by the way, is not the original Brooks; he bought the restaurant after Mr. Brooks died, by his own hand, in the 1970s.)


Gounaris, seeing our interest, was good enough to share an old photograph of the area with us (above). He said it dated before 1902. The Brooks building is to the right. The Court House is not the one that sits there today, but the first one, which burned down. Quite a wide open landscape, wasn't it?


He also showed us some ticket stubs from events that took place in the building in 1916. From these we can deduce: the building was sometimes called Court Square Hall; the music was Prof. Parker was very popular in the teens; ladies didn't have to pay as much as men to get into things back then.

Gounaris also shared with me the fact that it is part of his deal with his landlord, the local Bricklayers Union, that the bar area, stained glass and all, never be altered or changed. Good men, those layers of brick!


We ate not in the bar room, but in the larger hall. This gave me the opportunity to admire some of the details in the room, such as the chandeliers and the beautiful, yellow-hued tin ceiling.

The events of the past week have been enormously satisfying. I love getting to the bottom of mysteries and making people aware of the history they have in their hands. The next logical step, it seems to me, is to get a building that is of such obvious importance to Long Island City's history officially landmarked.

Below, by the way, is Sharon's painting of the restaurant.

Lost City Asks "Who Goes to Brooks 1890 Restaurant?"

With Brooks 1890 Restaurant in Long Island City, the "Who Goes There?" feature I write for Eater ventures for the first time into Queens. (Manhattan has been covered fairly well, so far; Brooklyn has been the focus twice; The Bronx and Staten Island not at all. Suggestions are welcome!)

Few old New York restaurants look more like a movie set than Brooks 1890. One can easily imagine Big Tim Sullivan, smoking a big cigar, adjusting his derby, his huge stomach straining against a fine tweed vest, walking through the entrance and down the stairs of the boxy, red-brick building.

For whatever reason, Brooks 1890 has never been as celebrated, or even noticed, as much as its fellows of the same basic era—Peter Luger, Old Homestead, Keen's, P.J. Clarke's. You can barely find much evidence it even exists on the Internet. It has no website, and, in this day of Menupages and the like, there's no copy of its bill of fare on the web. Curious.

Here's what I found out:

Who Goes There? Brooks 1890 Restaurant

On approach, Brooks 1890 Restaurant can look like the Last Restaurant on Earth, so lonely and isolated does it appear on its dark corner of Long Island City’s Jackson Boulevard. But sitting inside, looking at the grand Long Island City Court House, clearly visible through the windows, and watching the commuters emerge from and descending into the 23rd St/Ely Avenue stop of the E and V lines—which lies directly alongside the north end of the building—one can imagine how, decades ago, this dark-wood bar and eatery reigned as the designated chop house of back-room Queens politics.

It still gets its share of jurists and local union officials, but they come mainly for lunch, when the trade is enough to fill out the larger dining room accessible through a door to the left of the bar. (There is a “Jurist’s Special” at lunch.) At dinnertime, the lights are switched off in that room, and the place is quiet as a graveyard, with a few loyal customers eating solo, and a handful of regulars holding up the bar. Traffic dies down so, that most nights, Brooks rolls up the sidewalk around 8 PM (though the management doesn’t complain if some wish to hang out a little longer).

The bill of fare is simple—burgers, sandwiches, Italian dishes, various cuts of meat. Portions are generous and prices are reasonable. The only exotic aspect of the menu is the offer to prepare any meat dish “Brooks style.” This involves the deployment of plenty of onions, oregano and lemon, and is not a bad way to embellish your dish. There’s also a “Bobby Burger” (fried onions, bacon and blue cheese), named after a frequent diner who likes his patties that way.

The bar room has all the Gilded Age touches you’d expect from a joint founded in 1890—tile floor, tin ceilings (painted a unique and engaging combination of ochre and sagebrush), touches of stained glass—but is more snug that is usually the case. The slightly elevated, L-shaped dining area is separated from the bar by a series of dark wooden pillars. The walls are unusually free of the typical historical paraphernalia you see in these sort of places—no plaques or old photos; just one newspaper clipping.

Which brings up to the most frustrating aspect of Brooks 1890 Restaurant. Its origins are an unsolved case, one which nobody working there seems very keen on cracking. Mr. Brooks (actually Bill "Brooks" Gounaris) bought the place in the 1970s and stuck his name everywhere—on the sign hanging from the building, even on the sidewalk outside the entrance. But what went on in the place during the 70 years before that is anybody’s guess. The letters “K” and “N” are part of a beautiful, stained-glass canopy behind the bar. These likely stand for the last names of the founders of the restaurant, but nobody knows who “K” and “N” were.
Did they serve pork chops “K & N Style”? Could be.
—Brooks of Sheffield

Breaking: Kleefeld Descendent Emerges

It happens from time to time. I dig around in the history of an old business, and then, shortly after, a descendent of the original merchant finds my posts and contacts me out of the blue.

Last month, when I posted my series of fact-finding posts about the formerly mysterious Brooks 1890 Restaurant in Long Island City—uncovering, with the inestimable help of reader Ian Schoenherr, that it used to be the old Long Island City City Hall, and then a bar/hotel/meeting place owned by Martin Heilbut and Herman Kleefeld (Whose initials can be found in stained glass behind the old bar)—I wondered if a Heilbut or a Kleefeld might be out there somewhere tracking the progress of the investigation.

Indeed, it was so! Today I was contacted by Kenneth Kleefeld, grandson of Herman, and he has offered another piece to the puzzle. Heilbut and Kleefeld bought the building in 1910, and I was speculated that, when Prohibition came, they turned it into a speakeasy. This is exactly what they did:

Thanks for the research. My grandfather was Herman Kleefeld. His restaurant became something of a speakeasy, frequented by judges from across the street during Prohibition, to whom beverages were served in teacups.

--Kenneth Kleefeld

So, Heilbut descendants—what's taking you so long?

Bloomberg is Corrupted and Corrupting. Period

Read this from the Times. Really read it. And understand what your mayor is and what he has systematically, purposefully, and in many ways illegally done to this City. How, in his view, he owns the town, and by right can do whatever he wants with it. How he has handed it over to developers. How he has squashed the rights of the little man left and right. How his vision must prevail. How no one must tell him no. And how he will lie and lie and lie about it when he is caught in the act.

Read it. And vote accordingly. Don't elect the Fox mayor of the Chicken Coop.

New York Paid to Lobby Itself, Group Claims

By RAY RIVERA

In late 2006, as the Bloomberg administration girded for what promised to be a bruising rezoning fight over the Willets Point section of Queens, it enlisted the help of Claire Shulman, the former Queens borough president.

At a meeting in City Hall that December, Ms. Shulman and Daniel L. Doctoroff, then a deputy mayor, agreed to form a nonprofit group with city and private money. Its primary purpose, Ms. Shulman said, would be to lobby on behalf of the mayor’s plan to turn the long-neglected area near the New York Mets stadium into a thriving hub of shops, hotels, condominiums and a convention center.

The group, the Flushing Willets Point Corona Local Development Corporation, eventually received hundreds of thousands of dollars in public and private money, and spent much of it to help push through the plan through the City Council.

It hired the Parkside Group, one of the city’s best-known lobbying firms. It brought in the Glover Park Group, the powerful political consulting firm, to bolster its media campaign. And Ms. Shulman, as the organization’s president, made countless personal appeals, promising to meet with every member of the City Council as it prepared to vote on the plan last fall.

“That was the whole idea,” Ms. Shulman said in an interview. “The idea I had with Dan Doctoroff was that we would help the city do what the mayor wanted, to clear Willets Point and develop it in the best interest of the city, and that’s what we’ve been trying to do.” In other words, Ms. Shulman added, “We lobbied the city for the city.”

Local development corporations like Ms. Shulman’s have been around for decades. Ranging from tiny neighborhood groups to giant quasi-public agencies like the city’s Economic Development Corporation, these loosely regulated organizations are designed to encourage businesses and industry to invest in local areas.

But one thing they are not supposed to do is lobby.

State law says local development corporations are not permitted to “influence legislation by propaganda or otherwise.” Ms. Shulman’s group eventually reported spending $450,000, roughly half its total budget, on lobbying, city records show.

Half the group’s revenues came from the Economic Development Corporation, which is also barred from lobbying. The other half came from corporate sponsors, including the Mets organization, which has long eyed the property, and several developers and construction firms that are expected to vie for lucrative redevelopment contracts when the city puts out requests for proposals in coming months.

Last November, the City Council voted 42 to 2 in favor of the plan, which authorizes the city to use eminent domain to remove the various auto repair shops and salvage yards that occupy the 62-acre portion of Queens. A group of business owners is suing to stop the city.

The group, known as Willets Point United, has asked Andrew M. Cuomo, the state attorney general, to investigate the organization’s lobbying efforts.

“They knew what they were doing,” said Gerald Antonacci, the leader of Willets Point United and the president of Crown Container, one of the area’s more than 250 companies that will be required to move when construction begins. “This was all planned out. They knew she was hiring lobbyists. This wasn’t a mistake.”

The attorney general’s office is reviewing the complaint. In recent months, the office has been looking into lobbying by local development corporations, and has identified a “small but not insignificant set” of groups that appear to be improperly lobbying, said a person briefed on the attorney general’s initial review.

The administration of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg says that it never encouraged Ms. Shulman to lobby and that the $450,000 it gave to the group was not used for that purpose.

“The city regularly partners with local organizations that promote growth and economic development,” said David Lombino, a spokesman for the Economic Development Corporation. In the case of Ms. Shulman’s group, he added, “we are funding a scope of work that includes public outreach, organizing community support and proposing and advocating for area improvements.”

Andrew Brent, a Bloomberg spokesman, pointed to a letter Mr. Doctoroff sent Ms. Shulman three weeks after their first meeting. It outlined the goals of her group, including conducting and leading “outreach, public relations and marketing efforts” to support the proposed redevelopment in Willets Point, but it never mentioned lobbying elected officials.

Mr. Doctoroff, who left the administration at the end of 2007 to run the mayor’s financial news and data company, Bloomberg L.P., did not respond to requests for comment made through the company and the mayor’s office.

Ms. Shulman, borough president from 1986 to 2001, provides a starkly different account. “We hired lobbyists from the time we began, because we were told it was something we were supposed to be doing,” she said.

Ms. Shulman, an 83-year-old veteran of Queens politics, seemed a natural ally for the city. After retiring from office, she remained well regarded in the community and continued to serve on various boards. And she had long had her sights on Willets Point.

As borough president in the early 1990s, Ms. Shulman rejected as shortsighted a city economic development study that said development would flourish on its own if the city provided sewers and basic services to the area.

Instead, she proposed her own plan, which included a pavilion for international trade.

But like various redevelopment plans dating back to the era of Robert Moses, who unsuccessfully sought to turn the area into a park and parking lot for the 1964 World’s Fair, her vision went unrealized.

Her lobbying for this latest plan became an issue this year when the city clerk’s office, which regulates lobbyists, fined her group a record $59,090 for failing to register her activities with its office. But the issue of whether the group should have been lobbying at all went unaddressed.

Even now, Ms. Shulman is not sure her group did anything wrong.

In its 2007 federal tax returns, the group claimed it had spent no money on lobbying. The group has hired a lawyer to help it comply with all laws and regulations.

The border between what is legally acceptable advocacy of a position and what is illegally trying to influence legislation is often blurry. But critics of the Bloomberg administration’s aggressive and varied development ambitions say these neighborhood groups are increasingly crossing the line.

In a recent example, the Coney Island Development Corporation, essentially a subsidiary of the Economic Development Corporation, hired three buses to carry people to a hearing last month on the mayor’s proposal to revitalize 19 blocks of the Coney Island amusement district. Officials say the buses were open to those who favored or opposed the plan, but council members say it was clear that most riders were supporters.

“I don’t ever remember L.D.C.’s lobbying council members or elected officials the way they have been to promote Bloomberg projects,” said Councilman Tony Avella, a Queens Democrat who is chairman of the Council’s subcommittee on zoning and franchises and who is a candidate for mayor.

The Coney Island group also paid more than $182,000 to Yoswein New York, another of the city’s major lobbying firms, to help promote its efforts to help the mayor gain public approval for his redevelopment plan, records show. “We do public relations as well, and for this client we were hired to do marketing and public relations,” said Jamie Van Bramer, who handled the account for Yoswein. “We did no lobbying on this one at all.”

Likewise, the Glover Park Group, which received at least $30,000 from the Flushing Willets Point organization, said it focused on “press relations,” not lobbying. Harry Giannoulis, president of the Parkside Group, which lobbying records show got $125,000, said Ms. Shulman hired it to lobby, among other duties.

“We didn’t want to do anything improper,” Ms. Shulman said. “We have been working very hard to try to do something that is in the best interest of the city, and we did what we thought was correct.”

Long Island City's Shannon Pot to Go Under?

A reader wrote in to tell us that The Shannon Pot, the reliable old tavern and grill in Long Island City, not far from the Court Street subway stop, will be razed, along with the building it's in, in the next months. Taking its place will be, yes, another condo tower.

The Shannon Pot isn't in the top tier when it comes to city dives or Irish pubs, but it's been a dependable presence in the neighborhood for some time, and served as the backdrop of a number "Law & Order" and "Third Watch" episodes. Artists from the nearby P.S. 1 sometimes hang out here on the weekends for a cheap beer, and the lunch trade is brisk with local workers. But mainly this is a local joints.

I can find no history of the building prior to its incarnation as The Shannon Pot. But the whole look of the building tells me its probably been a tavern for many years, and probably functioned under many names. The disused side door tells of an old-fashioned "Ladie's Entrance" that once existed. And there are tin ceilings and a room in back that looks like it may have been a kitchen or part of someone's former apartment.

Hart Island

I have many items on my list of New York City places I still must visit. But high on the tally for some time has been Hart Island.

Hart Island, at the western end of Long Island Sound and just east of the Bronx, is New York City's potter's field—the largest tax funded cemetery in the world. Gotham unfortunates who have died without funds and/or connections, have been buried on this flat, isolated piece of land since the Civil War. Rikers Island inmates conduct the mass burials. Hart Island has a spooky charisma and I've long wanted to visit, but the isle is off limits to regular citizens. The closest I've ever gotten was staring through a viewfinder at the southern tip of City Island.

The amazing Richard Nickel of Kingston Lounge, however, someone made his way ashore and took a raft of fascinating pictures. I've posted a few here, but go to his blog to see the whole collection. They're well worth it.

Novelist Dawn Powell, playwright Leonard Melfi and child actor Bobby Driscoll, each dying in relative obscurity, all ended up here. The former two were reclaimed and buried elsewhere. Oscar winner Driscoll still lies in Hart Island soil.

Lost City's Guide to Cobble Hill

To many, the realtor-hatched neighborhood names of Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens mean little. "What's the difference? It's all South Brooklyn in the end." Indeed, the nabes are so small and so close together, they might as well be categorized under one name. Still, over the years, I've discerned enough differences between the two areas that I think they deserve separate handles. Cobble Hill is tonier, its average street more architecturally beautiful; Carroll Gardens a bit more scruffy, closer to the highways and the docks. CG retains a stronger ethnic, Italian-American edge, while CH is more blandly heterogeneous. And CG, in my opinion, has more mercantile personality than CG, which just has, you know, a lot of nice shops.

Another way of saying that is there's just not as much living history on hand in Cobble Hill. Still, the area is a joy to walk through and there's enough to talk about. And so I will, in this, Lost City's fourth such guide to New York neighborhoods.

FORMER INDEPENDENCE BANK: Let's start on Court Street, Cobble Hill's main artery, as it is Carroll Gardens'. At the corner of Court and Atlantic is the former Independence Bank, now a Trader Joe's. Take a look, because the 1922 building, with its mighty white bricks and mightier arched windows, is impressive—but also because of the plaque honoring George Washington outside. Want to know why it's called Cobble Hill? Because a conical hill topped with a fort once stood roughly on this spot. Washington used it to spy the approaching British and watch his forces duke it out in nearby Gowanus. The British didn't like that. When they got here, they razed the hill to the ground. Thus, Cobble Hill has no hill.


METROPOLITAN ROD AND GUN CLUB: Take a brief detour to the right on Pacific Street. The name of this institution itself screams 19th century. Actually, the club was incorporated only in 1934. They bought the Pacific Street building in 1939. Inside, you'll find an indoor pistol and smallbore rifle range and archery range.

STAUBITZ MARKET: Back to Court. This butcher, the last holdout of what used to be a strong German enclave, has been near Warren Street since 1917. The McFadden family, which has owned the business for more than 40 years, has retained the old time feel of the place, and sells about every kind of meat you can think of. It—along with the 1960-founded PAISANOS MEAT MARKET a block over on Smith Street—are the last, best butchers in the area.

JIM & ANDY'S: An old-school green grocer, run by a family whose patriarch used to help sell vegetables from a horse-drawn cart and who recently died. Wall-to-wall produce, Sinatra on the radio, a big metal scale, paper bags, vague prices. Nice place.


SAM'S PIZZERIA: An old family eatery near Kane Street with faded decor and peculiar ways. Don't tell them how to serve you, they're going to do it their way regardless. The old man of the family still makes the pizzas, as he has done for the last 58 years. There's a wooden phone booth that doesn't work and a cocktail menu that apparently does. It's never busy.

KANE STREET SYNAGOGUE: As you pass Kane Street, glance to the right. The somewhat drab, but still majestic building on the south side of the street is the Kane Street Synagogue. It's real name is Baith Israel-Anshei Emeth, but no one really calls it that. At 152 years, it is the oldest Jewish congregation that still serves the Brooklyn neighborhood in which it was founded. The congregation has been in the current building since 1905, and was for a while called the Harrison Street Synagogue, during those early years when Kane Street was Harrison Street. The edifice was built in 1855 as a Middle Reformed Protestant Dutch Church. Aaron Copland had his Bar Mitzvah here in 1913.

COURT PASTRY SHOP: Some think this bakery near Degraw makes the best Italian pastries in the area. I'll vouch for the Svingi, apple turnovers and the unshowy, timeless interior. Anytime a Catholic holiday is on the way, look for specialized cakes and treats.

DEGRAW STREET FIREHOUSE: Walk east of Degraw a hundred feet and see the defunct Engine 204, which was shut down by the City amid much protest in 2003. It's a beautiful 19th-century structure, redolent of the days when firehouses were more private men's clubs than public institutions.

THE STREETS: Almost any block in Cobble Hill—which runs from Atlantic up north to Degraw in the south, and Smith Street at the western point to the BQE—is gorgeous. The trees are tall and old. Most of the brownstones have been well kept up, and were handsome to begin with. Churches, small and grand and old, pop up regularly. The grid is nicely interrupted by picturesque one-block streets like Strong Place (rich people), Tompkins Place (more rich people) and Cheever Place (some rich and some oldtimers). There are good patches of old bluestone left on the ground. The run up Clinton Street from Degraw to Atlantic always lifts my spirits. Try it on a bike; there's a lane.

CHRIST CHURCH: At the corner of Clinton and Kane is a Gothic masterpiece built in 1840 by Richard Upjohn, the guy who did Trinity Church across the river. The Upjohns lived nearby and were congregants. There are Tiffany windows inside, though it's hard to tell them apart from the fakes put in after a fire in 1939. Take a look.

CONVENT WALL: Turn left on Kane and walk to Henry. Lining this corner is a particularly ancient-looking wall, covered with wines, crumbling and with a metal door near the center. If it seems out of place, it's because the convent it once encircled is now gone. The Nursing Sisters of the Sick Poor order was started in France. They left sometime before the 1960s.


COBBLE HILL PARK: Thank tenacious residents that the church that used to stand on Clinton between Congress Street and Verandah Place wasn't replaced by a supermarket. If it had, we wouldn't have this lovely vest-pocket park, which—combined with the quaint nearby corner coffee shop and Verandah's exquisite alley of former carriage houses—has the quiet elegance of a piece of Parisian urban greenery. It's easy to forget that you work and have bills here.

DEGRAW MANSION: Walk further up Clinton to the southeast corner of Clinton and Amity. Freestanding homes are rare in South Brooklyn. You had to be super rich to demand an unattached swelling. The Degraws were and they lived here at 219 Clinton. It was built in 1844, and was later home to the first private elevator in all of Brooklyn. As recently as 1988, the house had had only three owners. Don't know if that's still the case.

LICH BUILDINGS: Walk west over to Henry Street. Long Island College Hospital has been busy lately trying to knock down or sell off all its magnificent old buildings. They're still stubbornly hanging on, though, including the 105-year-old Lamm Institute building at 110 Amity Street and the Pholemus building across the street. Gaze while you can.

WARREN PLACE: Walk west on Warren. Don't walk too fast, though. You'll miss the tiny, gated Warren Place on the left, a narrow alley of miniature brick "Workingman's Cottages." They were built by Alfred Treadway White, the 19th-century developer-with-a-soul, who thought laborers should live in dignity. A more beautiful mews you won't find. They go for millions there days. The gate's usually open. Go in and walk around. Just do it quietly.


TOWER BUILDINGS AND HOME BUILDINGS: Two magnificent, and magnificently red apartment complexes overlooking the BQE. They were built as tenements by that self-same White. Everything about the sturdy, yet appealing architecture is wonderful, from the outside recessed apartment entrances to the peekaboo stairwells to the castle-like turrets.

LONG ISLAND RESTAURANT: Walk back to Henry and up to Atlantic. The Long Island Restaurant at this corner hasn't been open for a year and a half. But it remains as is inside and the distinctive neon sign still hangs over the street. Gaze inside and sigh at the half-century old mainstay that has been lost.

ORIENTAL PASTRY AND GROCERY: Walk east on Atlantic to this small, crowded shop, one of the better exemplars of Middle Eastern foodstuffs on this avenue. Sacks of nuts, dried fruit, spices, everything. Sweets are in the back and worth sampling, including various pistachio and honey-based goodies. You can find a good many treasures here, if you know where to look.

LOST CITY'S GUIDE TO THE LOWER EAST SIDE
LOST CITY'S GUIDE TO CARROLL GARDENS
LOST CITY'S GUIDE TO TIMES SQUARE

Bring Out Your Dead! 2009 Roundup of Lost New York Landmarks

The shedding of Gothamite landmarks slowed a bit in 2009, as compared to previous years under the all-powerful Bloomberg-Burden-DOB Developmental Complex, but that was mainly because all the builders took a big sock to the kisser from the recession. Had they had the wherewithal and the Wall Street clients, developers would have happily planted thrice as many office towers and condo complexes and landlords would have kicked many more mom-and-pops to the curb.

Still, there was bloodletting enough for all in this sad burg that's so resigned and lazy that it endorsed land-grabber-empowering power-monger Mayor Mike to another, ill-gotten term on the throne. Here are the never-to-be-seen-again, New York City one-of-a-kinds on which, since Jan. 1, 2009, cruel fate has rung down the final curtain. (For previous annual Bring Out Your Dead tallies, check here for 2008, here for 2007 and here for 2006.):



Gone, Baby, Gone

Diamond Dairy, a Diamond District kosher luncheonette on the second floor at the back of a diamond exchange. One of a kind and utterly irreplaceable, gone after sixty years in business.
The Pink Tea Cup, a 55 year-old soul food staple in Greenwich Village, run by several generations of the Raye family, announced it would shutter for good on Jan. 1, 2010.
Armando Tailor, a vestige of old Italian Carroll Gardens on Smith Street, closed after Armando Nardi retired, taking with him decades of old-world skill.
Tavern on the Green (as it was). The City rejected the LeRoy family's bid to retain control of the famed restaurant, leading to a bankruptcy filing, legal warring with City Hall over the rights to the name, and a coming fire sale of the joint's many sparkly decorations. Goodbye, Crystal Room. My mother will miss you.
Cafe Des Artistes. Another bankruptcy case, George Lang, owner since 1976 of the posh UWS favorite with the wonderful murals, walked away in a litter of labor lawsuits. The Howard Chandler Christy murals belong to the Hotel des Artistes. No one's jumping on the lease so far.



Jay Dee Bakery, Forest Hills fixture for 60 years.
Joe Jr. Restaurant, a beloved Greenwich Village greasy spoon served its last July 4, after 45 years in business.


Joseph Patelson Music House ended 89 years of selling sheet music on June 7.
Manny's, mecca for generations of musicians, favorite store of hundreds of legends from The Beatles to B.B. King, the great store of midtown's Music Row, was mothballed by owner Sam Ash, who turned the storefront into—what else?—another Sam Ash. This was perhaps the greatest loss of the year, in my opinion.


Arnold Hatters, one of my favorite stores in the City, and one of the only real hatters left in New York, finally gave up the ghost, the Rubin family never having survived having been bumped from their previous Eighth Avenue home by the New York Times tower. 83 years the place was in the business of dispensing lids and skimmers.
Amato Opera, a musical beautifier of the Bowery, closed after 61 years.
Trunzo Brothers Meat Market and Salumeria, in Bensonhurst, now a 99-cent store, dunzo after 33 years.
Giambelli, a 50-year-old Italian restaurant in midtown, done in by the MTA, which needs to build a ventilation plant where the eatery stood, to serve the new Long Island Rail Road connection to Grand Central Terminal.
Frank's Fish Market, in Washington Heights.
The "21" Club's Tie Requirement. The venerable old restaurant, one of the last in town to insist on proper neckwear, knuckled under to the slothful anti-demands of the Great Underdressed.


Endangered Landmarks

The Eagle Theater, a classic old showcase of Indian films in Jackson Heights, closed in May. I suppose there's a chance it may reopen, but a slim one. The nearby Jackson Heights Triplex, in business since 1924, closed a few months later.
Gino's, which may become the victim on an ongoing union dispute.
48th Street's Music Row, the eternal strip of music stores on W. 48th between Seventh and Eighth Avenues, which the Sam Ash people don't think is long for this world.
H&H Bagels, the owner of which UPW legend keeps allegedly breaking the law, not paying his taxes, and pissing off the Feds.
Monte's Venetian Room, possibly the oldest Italian restaurant in Brooklyn, which closed under mysterious circumstances in fall 2008 and hasn't reopened yet, but hasn't been gutted either.
Nathan's Famous, the Coney Island icon, which is not landmarked, and, under the City's moronic new zoning of the area, could be replaced by a a hotel tower of up to 20 stories.
O'Toole Building, dirt under St. Vincent's feet if the Greenwich Village monster hospital gets it way.
The Brooklyn-side view of the Brooklyn Bridge, thanks to a 17-story DUMBO tower planned by the Walentases of Two Trees, and approved by City Planning debutante Amanda Burden, despite the disapproval of almost everybody without a motive.



And These Were Landmarked or Saved

Totonno's, iconic Coney Island pizzeria, which will finally reopen in December after suffering a fire in March.
Nom Wah Tea Parlor, the oldest dim sum joint in Chinatown, which was closed down twice by the DOH, but managed to reopen.
The former B.F. Goodrich building at 1780 Broadway, but not its sister building around the corner, 225 West 57th Street—Thanks, meddling City Council!
Paramount Hotel
La MaMa E.T.C.
Herman A. and Malvina Schleicher House
Ridgewood Heights North Historic District in Queens
St. George's Syrian Catholic Church
Prospect Heights Historic District
Fort Washington Presbyterian Church
The Bronx's NYPL Woodstock Branch and Hunts Point Branch
New York Botanical Garden's Museum Building
(Plus many more Landmarks Commission designations, but those were the highlights for me. The commission was fairly busy during the last half of the years, perhaps in reaction to having been taken to the woodshed late last year by the New York Times, which ran a series of unflattering articles.)

Saved But Left Town

Cheyenne Diner, which closed in midtown, and hoped to reopen in Red Hook, but ended up in....Alabama.

Saved But Altered

Theatre 80, former playhouse, former movie house, in the East Village, now still a theatre, but with a cafe.


Saved But Humiliated

The landmarked interior of the old Gage & Tollner on Fulton Street, now an Arby's franchise.



Resurrections

Vesuvio Bakery, the landmark, luckless SoHo bakery, which was bought and reopened by the City Bakery folks.
Holland Bar, Hell's Kitchen dive of dive, offered a new lease by the same landlord that kicked the decades-old bar out last year. Downside: the walls have been scrubbed clean of character.
Armando's, aged Brooklyn Heights restaurant and Dodgers haunt, found the courage to reopen on Montague Street, with a new interior and, better still, the same old neon lobster sign.
P&G Cafe, which was forced out of its longtime space at the corner of Amsterdam and 73rd, but found a new home (sans excellent neon sign, sadly) at 78th and Columbus.
Vermont Farmacy, weird Carroll Gardens relic pharmacy being rescued by new lease-holders, who hope to open an old time soda fountain.
Elk Candy Company, former Yorkville bastion of marzipan greatness, reopened as Internet company upstate.
Paris Shoe Store, which left its lovely, longtime Greenpoint home to move down the street a bit, to an unlovelier space.
Henry Miller's Theatre, gutted, aside from the landmarked 43rd Street facade, but given a new theatrical life. And the great old sign was saved.

Van What Park, Now?

There is a constant tug of war among New Yorkers between what places are officially called and what they choose to call them. That big thoroughfare between Broadway and Fifth may have signs along it that claim its called Avenue of the Americas, but locals still call it Sixth Avenue. The building that cuts Park Avenue in half may be owned by MetLife, but that doesn't stop long-memoried folks from referring to it as the Pan Am Building. The walkway along the water in Brooklyn Heights bears the name The Esplanade, but everyone calls it the Promenade.

I recently came to the conclusion that I and my wife are the only people who call Van Vorhees Park by that name. This strip of green and playground equipment is bordered by Columbia Street on the west, Congress Street on the south, the BQE on the east and north. It's well-used by parents and kids in Cobble Hill and along Columbia Street. It's been in its present location since 1956, and has borne its name—after local attorney and LICH president Tracy S. Voorhees—since 1941. But no one calls it that.

I was planning my son's birthday party, and when I told them it would be in Van Voorhees Park, almost every parent looked at me with confusion and said "Where?" I would explain where the park was. And they'd say, "Oh, Congress Park."

Makes sense. Congress Park. It's on Congress Street. But how do you use a park for years and completely miss the big sign that tells you its name? Maybe its the long, hard-to-pronounce handle. Van Vorhees isn't the easiest thing to say. That's probably why I like saying it. That, and the name reminds me of New York's Dutch past. Tracy S. Voorhees was part of a family that traces its lineage to Steven Coerten Van Voorhees, who settled in Brooklyn in the mid-17th century.

Here. Read more:

He established himself in the neighborhood of Flatlands, became a magistrate, an elder in the Dutch Reformed Church, and the head of a formidable clan. His ten children bore 20 grandchildren. The grandchildren amassed 85 children themselves, among them Tracy Voorhees, to carry on the family name. The “Van” was eventually dropped from the name.

Born and raised in New York City, Tracy Voorhees received his degree from Columbia University Law School in 1915, after which he began practicing law. From 1936 to 1944 he served as President of Long Island College Hospital. Voorhees joined the Army in 1942, one year later becoming the director of the legal and control divisions of the Army’s Surgeon General’s Office. As Director, Voorhees was responsible for the administration of the medical department’s affairs, including the care of the sick and wounded, and later, the demobilization of Army medical personnel.

When World War II (1939-1945) ended, Voorhees was assigned to oversee food relief in occupied Europe. A year later, he became a food administrator for all occupied areas. In 1948, President Harry S. Truman (1884-1972) appointed Voorhees Assistant Secretary of the Army and President of Army Emergency Relief, a semi-autonomous agency that provided financial assistance to soldiers and their dependents and supplemented the efforts of the American Red Cross. In 1953, Voorhees retired from the Army, and returned to private practice. During his long military and government career, Voorhees received the Army Distinguished Service Medal, the Army’s third highest award for devotion to duty, the Department of Defense Award for Distinguished Public Service, and the Army Distinguished Civilian Service Award.

In 1956 and 1957, at the request of President Dwight D. Eisenhower (1890-1969), Voorhees served as the President’s personal representative for Hungarian Refugee Affairs and as Chairman of the President’s Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief. Under his direction, 32,000 Hungarian refugees were resettled in the United States. Between 1960 and 1961, he continued to serve the Executive Branch, aiding numerous Cuban refugees much as he had Hungarian refugees.

Van Voorhees Park was originally known as Jeannie Scott Dike Playground and was located one block north, between Pacific, Congress, Columbia, and Hicks Streets. According to property records, the City acquired the land for this park in four parcels in the following years: 1864, 1941, 1942, and 1947. The land received in 1941 came as a gift from Long Island College Hospital during Mr. Voorhees’s term as President and the park received its present name. By 1956, the construction of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway expanded Van Voorhees Park to a total of 5.25 acres.

The Shameful Bus Called B61

I'm going to take a minute here to eviscerate the B61 city bus line. I know it's off-topic, but I don't care. This sorry-ass excuse for mass transportation has it coming.

I live on the B61's route, which is long and connects many neighborhoods, from Red Hook to Long Island City. This bus has a schedule, which can been seen in printed form at various bus stops through the city, as well as in handy pamphlets and on the MTA's website. Whether any of the B61 drivers have ever read it is doubtful. Whether or not they care that there is a schedule is not in question: they don't. The B61 comes when it comes. During the weekdays, that's supposed to be every 10 minutes—often enough for even the busiest lines. What you get in reality is one every 20 or 30 minutes and then—the B61 drivers' favorite trick—three frickin' buses in a row, following each other like duckling, the first filled to the brim, the second two utterly useless, holding a rider or two.

Every patron of the B61 has seen this phenomenon at least once a day and gritted their teeth in fury. It happens like clockwork. One person told me it's not the driver's fault—the route is too long, there's too much potential for delay as they travel through Greenpoint, Williamsburg, Dumbo and Downtown Brooklyn. To which I say: too fucking bad! It's your route! Learn it. Master it. Get it right. It's not rocket science to keep ten minutes between you and the bus in front of you. Brooklyn has traffic; figure out how to handle it. I have the chance to observe many bus lines in my daily life. Never once have I seen a B71, B63, B75 or B77 following by two empty examples of the same stupid bus. Only the B61.

And then there are the drivers. Stone-faced, sullen, indignant, unapologetic. They talk back to riders when they complain about the service. They never smile. I've seen them park the bus and get off to talk with friends without explanation when there was no cause for a break in the scheduled.

This morning I staked out my place early at a B61 stop, arriving at 8 AM to get to a 9:30 AM appointment in Manhattan. The 8:14 did not arrive. Then a completely full bus passed me by at 8:10. The 8:24 bus did not arrive. Another bus did not show up under 8:35. It was also full to bursting, but did stop. The driver continued to pull over at every stop even though there was no room in the bus. When he drove quickly over a pothole with a mighty "crash," someone in the huddled mass said, "I think you broke something in the bus." He replied, "I ain't broke nothing. There's too much weight on this bus. Why don't some of you get off?"

"Why don't some of you get off?" Well, driver, why don't you show up on time? Why don't all your friends show up on time, so each bus is evenly populated? Better yet, why don't you shut the hell up?

UPDATE (9/25/07): I read today, in AMNY, via Curbed, that the MTA plans to extend the schedules of the B61 and B77 to service IKEA. So a crowded bus will become more crowded. Nice work, MTA! Oh, well. Maybe something will change now that yuppies, and not just the working poor, experience what a sucky line the B61 is. Maybe, at the bequest of IKEA, it will become a tiffany line.

Goodbye to All That

Dear Readers:

I am ending Lost City. Most of the City is lost after all—the good parts, anyway—so you could say the course of history has put me out of a job. Ironically, the kinds of news that fills up a jeremiad like this will, if too constant and voluminous, eventually puts the enterprise out of business. It's like writing a volcano report from Pompeii; you know the communiques are going to end sometime.

I began the blog because I was incensed and alarmed at what the city was becoming. It was losing its grit, its fabric, its very character. It was losing its New York-ness, and gaining nothing but Subway franchises and luxury condos. Since none of my editors would let me write about it, I became my own editor. I was gratified to soon find that there were a lot of people out there who felt the way I did. And it wasn't too long before there were other bloggers who took on a similar mission, like Jeremiah Moss at Vanishing New York and EV Grieve at the blog of the same name. Taken together, we made for quite a few howls in the wilderness. And, tragically, we never ran out of things to report.

But, in the end, they were just howls, as ineffective at Lear's on the heath. I wrote thousands of words, and posted hundreds of pictures for four-and-a-half years—nearly 3,000 posts, all told. None of them made any difference. Not really. The press paid a little attention to our windmill-tilting, but City Hall never did. The City continued on its inexorable march to glossy mediocrity. Bloomberg, the billionaire, city planner Amanda Burden, the millionaire, and their cabal of equally wealthy real estate and Wall Street pals forged ahead and got the metropolis they wanted all along: homogenous, anodyne, whitewashed, suburban, toothless, chain-store-ridden, ordinary, exclusive and terribly, terribly expensive. A town for tourists and the upper 2%. He took a world-class capital of culture, individuality and independent endeavor and turned it into the smoothest, first-class, gated community Houston ever saw. Walk down Broadway on the Upper West Side, Sixth Avenue in Chelsea, Third Avenue in Yorkville—or look at the gaping hole of Atlantic Yards—and you will see the administration's legacy.

It is still inconceivable to me that New York could have (and elect, and "elect") a mayor who witnessed the extinction of such irreplaceable city landmarks—Chumley's, Gino, Gage & Tollner, Cafe Des Artistes, Manny's, Astroland, The Green Church, Cedar Tavern, Gertel's Bakery, CBGB's, Yankee Stadium, Shea Stadium and countless other institutions—and never uttered a peep. No comment, no stump speech, no recognition of what was passing into history on his watch. Not even lip service. He stood by and watched Coney Island, one of the most iconic neighborhoods in New York, utterly destroyed. He never saw the value of what was vanishing.

I'm proud of Lost City. As a writer, it's the purest and most idealistic thing I've ever done. It may not have saved a single building, or prevented a single piece of luxury crapitecture. But I know it occasionally caused discomfort to the powers that be, and that it alerted some readers to a few of the City's treasures. For that alone, it was worth it.

Still the blog has always taken a vast amount of time, hours upon hours each week, and it doesn't pay any bills. I'm tired and discouraged, and I don't relish hanging around just to record the last few living landmarks as they fall in this barren forest, making no sound that the City Fathers can hear. Nor do I much enjoy scouring the street looking for vestiges of the city I loved, vestiges that are harder and harder to find. Our "third-term" mayor has three more years to go; he's not going to ever see the light and things aren't going to get better.

I will use the time I put into Lost City on more lucrative ventures. It makes me sad to say that, but it's an imperative. I moved into Carroll Gardens 16 years ago. It was affordable, middle-class and wonderfully diverse. But it has been cruelly proved to me over and over in recent years that, today, I would not have a hope in hell of entering it without an annual net worth of $200,000 and a sterling credit rating. Like so many areas in New York that were once open to people of all incomes, races and professions, it has been "monetized."

I will also start reading books again, something that's been very hard to do the past five years. There was always an urgent item to post.

I will continue to write the "Who Goes There?" column for Eater, which runs every couple weeks, as I enjoy the series (even as the eateries quickly fold in my wake). I will also leave Lost City here floating in cyberspace for whoever wants to take a painful trip down the potholed memory lane of the City's inexorable losses. I may post an occasional item citing a particularly grievous loss to the burg.

Before I go, I'd like to thank the following fellow bloggers, who have always supported me with linkage, kind words and otherwise: Lockhart, Ben, Amanda, Elizabeth and Joey at Curbed/Eater/Racked; the folks at Gothamist; Jonathan at Brownstoner; Queens Crapper at Queens Crap; Jeremiah at Vanishing New York; EV Grieve at EV Grieve; Katia at Pardon Me for Asking; Kurt at Restless; Ken Mac at Greenwich Village Daily Photo; the folks at City Room; Kevin at Forgotten New York; and the late, great Bob Guskind of Gowanus Lounge. (If I forgot anybody, I'm sorry.) A fond thank you to the children and grandchildren of long gone New York businesses who reached out to me over the years. Some even sent me momentos from the past. I'd also like to thank the many readers who have regularly left their thoughtful, insightful and sometimes angry comments. I didn't mind people being angry. I was angry, too. Still am, though more often just mournful these days.

If anyone out there feels like quietly continuing to fight the good fight, take a look at the "Lost City List" below. Patronize those places. Let them know they're wanted and needed.

I wrote this farewell from top to bottom in one go, or, as a friend once said, "Obviously, this letter was written, not composed." I could polish it up, but I doesn't seem appropriate.

Sincerest Regards,

Brooks