Wednesday, June 27, 2007

Sunnyside clears landmarks hurdle

A housing development in Queens constructed for middle-class families during a housing shortage after World War I was nominated Tuesday for landmark status by the city's Landmarks Preservation Commission.

Queens housing development nominated for landmark status

The board's recommendations must still be approved by city planners and the City Council.

Gioia said he will seek tax breaks for homeowners who make improvements that meet Landmarks requirements, as well as resident parking permits to offset the loss of illegal parking spaces carved into front lawns.

LANDMARK DAY IN QNS.

Supporters of the designation said the protections are needed to prevent rampant changes that compromise the neighborhood's original character.

"The only thing that's going to change is that people won't be able to break the rules," said Catherine O'Flaherty, a Sunnyside Gardens homeowner for eight years.


A landmark approval

Resident Jeffrey Kroessler welcomed the commission's unanimous vote, which recognizes the neighborhood's status as one of the first planned residential communities.

"All the little changes that have been taking place over the years diminish what's special about the neighborhood," he said. "We did it to protect our neighborhood from homeowners with an outsized sense of individual entitlement, without respect for the architecture or the history of the place."


Historic Vote For Queens Neighborhood

Susan Meiklejohn...sounded bruised by the experience. Ms. Meiklejohn, an associate professor of urban planning at Hunter College, opposes the designation, believing that landmark status will make life harder for the 70 percent of residents who rent, and the 11 percent who live below the poverty line.

Area of Sunnyside, Queens, Is Given Landmark Status

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Well......it looks like Meiklejohn and her "agenda" just got a royal kick in the ass !!!!

Too bad.....after all that "hard work" cooking up that obtuse, rambling, flawed, lengthy, hokus-pokus Hunter College anti-landmarking study of hers !!!!

Now she has the added option to move if she doesn't like playing(or living) by the new rules !!!

Anonymous said...

"resident parking permits to offset the loss of illegal parking spaces carved into front lawns"

You mean we could actually get the pavement torn up and those illegal driveways turned back into grass? Hallelujah!

Anonymous said...

Loss of those illegal parking spaces? Not likely. If the DOB won't do anything about it, the LPC can't do anything about it... maybe he should have been promising free grass seeds too along with his tax incentives to sway all the naysayers in the bunch.

Anonymous said...

Mieklejohn was just shilling for her book. She doesn't care, frankly. When the actual date of the hearing happened (where people spoke 2:1 in FAVOR of landmarking, FYI) she was absent.

As for renters, maybe now their multi-building landlords will stop skimping on repairs. That's right, I'm talking to you! Fix your sh*t!