As anyone who has been paying attention (or read my last article) knows, the neighborhoods of Greenpoint, Williamsburg, LIC (and soon Astoria) have been seeing massive increases in population without significant associated increases in city services (first responders, transit, schools, hospitals, etc).
We already know this is a problem. This article is will focus on LIC and clarify the scope of this problem.
Let’s look at several large planned development projects – many of which have already begun and will be completed in the next 3-5 years:
- The residential towers being built at the former 5ptz will result in 1000 new apartments.
- The residential towers being built at the former C.N. West factory will result in 1,789 new apartments.
- The building going up next to where 5ptz was will have 182 new apartments.
- The former site of one of the Eagle Electric factories on Queens Plaza will have 400+ apartments.
- The former site of another Eagle Electric factory will have 780 apartments.
- A new tower on Purves street (former site of 3 low rise factories) will have 270 apartments.
- Two other towers will bring 119 new apartments near Queens Plaza and on Vernon.
- There are dozens of smaller projects in LIC as well – enough to keep an entire blog very busy with updates. Together they add up to hundreds more new apartments.
Just the above large projects alone will result in 4,540 new apartments. If we assume two residents per apartment, that will be 9,080 new residents moving to LIC within the next 3-5 years. When you consider there’s at least a dozen other smaller ‘development’ projects in the works my estimate of 9000+ new residents is actually a conservative estimate.
- There are no plans for any new first responders to support these residents.
- There are no plans for any new first responders, or even additional trash collection to support these residents.
- There is currently one new school planned which will have 456 seats. It will be in a leased space and not a proper city owned school building.
The ‘Hunters Point South’ area was under water during Hurricanes Sandy and Irene, and is a ‘Zone A’ flood zone.
Read the whole thing. It's quite informative and 100% on the money.
21 comments:
Soon the streets will be as passed as the 7 train during rush hour,Enjoy the destruction of your culture and way of life.
Everything in this post is 100% true! I have lived here in LIC for years and I have been saying the same thing. The city and our councilman have given total control to developers (at the taxpayers expense). It sucks!
The services will come because if they don't new residents will not stay. Should they be in place the day the thousands move in?-- of course they should. But if they're not, they will have to soon follow because people will vote with their feet and wallets and developers and landlords know this.
Unfortunately NYC is 'the place to be' so there will be no shortage of people moving to NYC who do not realize they don't have basic services.
I was in LIC the night of Sandy - water all the way up to and past vernon in some spots. I didn't see one cop on the streets, and the fire dept was probably somewhere else because I didn't see them either.
Where is that troll Van Bramer? Probably re-counting the cash the developers are giving to his 'campaign fund'.
Don't forget the TWO separate towers going up right next to each other on 44th Drive near Thompson Avenue. There will be no room for services at this point. THANKS JIMMY VAN BRAMER. Greedy politicians.
They cannot expand the subway lines immediately, that takes decades at best. They can add bus lines immediately I guess but at least half of these new people will own cars so they will be clogging the roads every morning and afternoon so the bus rides will also be rediiculusly slow and torturous. The rush hour traffic has already become significantly worse in the last couple of years. It is going to get much much worse.
And yet people are flocking to move here and pay absorbent amounts of money to live here.
They can add bus lanes to move the buses faster too. Toll the tunnel and bridge enough and you can cut down on congestion there without having to take a lane for buses.
Good Heavens, I never in my wildest dreams thought something like THIS could happen! Sheesh
I was in LIC the night of Sandy - water all the way up to and past vernon in some spots. I didn't see one cop on the streets, and the fire dept was probably somewhere else because I didn't see them either.
Of course you didn't, it was a hurricane. What did you expect cops and firemen to do about flooding? Did you see any civil engineers out there? Come to think about it, what were YOU doing out in a hurricane?
Fuck 'em! Let them eat cake! Dumb hipsters!
Thousands more piling into the already bursting #7 subway cars. Enjoy the ride.
My ride from the Broadway LIRR station is both comfortable and speedy. Only 23 minutes from Broadway to Penn.
Who says as the crow flies is the nearest distance to Manhattan?
Good luck Queens West condo buyers. All the density of Manhattan without the cache.
"What did you expect cops and firemen to do about flooding?"
Oh, I don't know, maybe rescue people who were stranded and assist with the evacuation?
There was an evacuation and people who needed to be rescued in that area that day? First I'm hearing of it.
All of Zone A was ordered to evacuate. They had one lone patrol car drive through LIC and blast that demand. There's a video on YouTube of it.
There was little doubt that the press in NYC decided not to cover the flooding from the storm - remember how much footage was wasted showing fallen oak trees in Connecticut?
They also tried to suppress all the disabled and elderly that were left stranded in high rises when the electricity ran out.
But what was most galling was - within weeks - everyone talking that the storm did not abate the city's desire to build on the waterfront. If one thing caused me to lose respect for the city leadership - political, academic, and media, it was this.
With that development, we have entered into a new and troubling era.
Put more pressure on your elected officials. Go to their offices, call them, have protests in front of their offices. Your tax dollars pay their salaries, they must do right by their people. You can't sit back and let them sell out your neighborhood.
There is no interest in building infrastructure. There will never be services here. The game plan is as follows:
1. market the area as high end so premium rents can be charged to pay off the construction debt.
2. after the inevitable flooding, and and lack of repairs (Sandy in the Rockaways - have we seen borough hall do anything right but self-promote?)
3. after the sudden rise of infant and child health concerns from the toxic brownfields under the buildings
4. the hipsters will flee and the area becomes a haven for the support staff of the Manhattan elite.
5. LIC will be transformed from 2 story buildings with back yards for working people to 50 story souless barracks.
6. in 2115 our generation will be cursed for building the worst slums since 5 points.
Put more pressure on your elected officials. Go to their offices, call them, have protests in front of their offices. Your tax dollars pay their salaries, they must do right by their people. You can't sit back and let them sell out your neighborhood.
People in Queens are so squeezed they have no backbone when it comes to this - now a kitty found in an empty building, a new ice cream place opening, why the thread will go to 100s of likes and dozens of comments.
Didn't the rezoning of LIC predate Van Bramer's election to the council by eight years?
BLockbusting by any other name
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