Amusing the Zillion

Upcoming City Council Vote on Coney Island: Of, By and For the People’s Playground?

July 18, 2009 by Tricia

Councilman Domenic Recchia Reading "Save Coney Island" Brochure at City Council Hearing. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

At the July 1 City Council hearing on the City’s rezoning plan, Coney Island’s Councilman Domenic Recchia took a moment to study Save Coney Island’s pitch. The brochure, which you can download here, urges people to contact their elected officials and ask them to fix the plan. Save Coney Island recommends expanding the area for open-air amusements, moving the high rises from the south side of Surf Avenue, landmarking Coney’s historic buildings, and protecting small businesses.

Will these proposals make it into the revised plan that a City Council subcommittee votes on next week prior to a full Council vote on July 29? No one from Save Coney can say with certainty. Although the group’s reps met with sympathetic council members, they’ve been unable to get face time with Speaker Christine Quinn or Land Use Chair Melinda Katz.

Says Juan Rivero of Save Coney Island, “There is no surer way to ensure that the outcome of a negotiation will not be to your liking than to fail to participate in the negotiations. And thus far, we haven’t been invited to the table.”

Among those who have been invited to the table are labor unions, affordable housing advocates and property owners, notably Thor Equities. ATZ is worried that the City, which failed to appease Thor with the current compromise plan, will come to an even worse compromise with Thor to pass the rezoning. For the past two summers we’ve been documenting the real estate speculator’s deliberate emptying out and desecration of the amusement zone in the flickr set “Thorland.”

Tables & chairs for Thor Equities flea market across the way from shuttered Balloon Race Game. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

Tables & chairs for Thor Equities flea market across the way from shuttered Balloon Race Game in Thor-owned Henderson Building, Bowery at Stillwell in Coney Island. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

No matter how the zoning goes, if anyone is under the misimpression that Joe Sitt will ever build anything here, just Google “Albee Square Mall” and “Thor Equities” and read about how he flipped the property and made $100 million after getting favorable zoning from the City. Just imagine how many millions Joe Sitt expects to make from selling the rezoned Coney Island!

The City Council hearing on the Coney Island rezoning plan was my first time inside City Hall. During the eight hour long proceeding— my two-minute slot didn’t come up until seven hours had gone by— I had plenty of time to contemplate a ceiling medallion that says: “A Government Of the People, By the People, For the People—Lincoln.” Apparently I wasn’t the only visitor impressed by this tribute to Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. Someone mentioned it in his testimony. Councilman Tony Avella, Chair of the Subcommittee on Zoning and Franchises replied, “I hate to tell you how many times we don’t do that, but hopefully we can do it in this situation.” We hope so too.

A Government of the People, By the People, For the People--Lincoln. Ceiling of City Council Hearing Room, City Hall, NYC. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

Posted in Coney Island | Tagged City Council, Coney Island, Redevelopment, rezoning, Save Coney Island, Thor Equities | Leave a Comment »

Miss Coney Island on Jones Walk: 25 Cents to Fall in Love

July 14, 2009 by Tricia

Miss Coney Island, 25 cents to fall in love. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

This family paid their way, but you’d be surprised how many people who snap photos of Miss Coney Island are too cheap to drop 25 cents in the machine. If they happen to see the mannequin come to life and wiggle her hips, it’s on someone else’s quarter.

Remember, Miss Coney does not receive a salary. Her only way of paying the rent on Jones Walk is your spare change. Next time you visit, I recommend bringing a whole roll of quarters to spend on Miss Coney Island and her neighbor, Coney Island Always. As the sign says, “Don’t Postpone Joy!”

Coney Island Always, 25 cents to have fun. Photo © Tricia Vita/me-myself-i via flickr

Save Coney Poster of the Day: Jane Jacobs Would Save Coney Island

July 13, 2009 by Tricia

This morning a group of Save Coney Island activists disguised as Jane Jacobs took their message to the dedication ceremony for “Jane Jacobs Way” in Manhattan’s West Village. Wearing wigs and glasses and waving signs that said “Jane Jacobs Would Save Coney Island,” they caught the attention of city officials who had gathered at Hudson Street between Perry and West 11th. The block was dedicated Jane Jacobs Way in honor of the late activist and urban planner who battled Robert Moses. The sign’s message implies that if Jacobs were alive today, she would battle the City’s Rezoning plan.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, whose district includes the West Village, acknowledged the group’s presence by saying that Jane Jacob’s spirit was alive because her phone has been ringing off the hook about Coney Island. Last week, Save Coney Island made a video featuring Dick Zigun of Coney Island USA urging people to call their City Councilmembers and also call Speaker Quinn and deliver the same message. Save Coney Island is asking the City Council to fix the City’s plan by expanding the acreage for open-air amusements, removing four high-rise towers from the heart of the amusement district and preserving Coney Island’s historic buildings The City Council will vote on the rezoning plan later this month.

Save Coney Island also issued a statement from Jane Jacobs’ son, Ned Jacobs, a community activist in Vancouver, Canada, who assisted his mother with her last book, “Dark Age Ahead.” Ned Jacobs wrote in his statement:

In my view, this rezoning plan for Coney Island does not appear to reflect the urban values and planning principles she espoused. These include sensitivity and integration with the scale, character and performance of existing neighborhoods and their established uses; the need to retain aged but serviceable buildings for the sake of economic diversity and continuity, as well as for their history and charm; the benefits of planning and redevelopment based on organic, iterative change, and the inherent dangers of top-down urban renewal-type schemes, propelled by ‘cataclysmic money.’

“These considerations are just as valid today as in the past. I therefore urge Mayor Bloomberg and the New York City Council to prevent this dysfunctional, developer-driven proposal for the Coney Island amusement district from being adopted in its current form. Instead, the city should work with the community, who possess much local knowledge and appreciation of the importance that scale, atmosphere and heritage play in the amusement district’s success as an irreplaceable public amenity, and who have expressed considerable openness to change and new development, provided it is based on sound planning.