A gate grows in Bay Terrace

Patch 

  Baysiders should sleep better now that a local parking lot is locked up at night, one politician promised.

Over the past several months neighbors have been complaining about noisy car meetups at the Little Bay Park parking lot at the entrance of Fort Totten, said Assembly Member Edward Braunstein, who represents most of Bayside.

Bay Terrace locals have filed seven drag racing reports with 311 in the past six months (more than triple the number of complaints in Bayside during that same time, data shows), and shown up at the local police precinct to complain about the noise, said NYPD Deputy Inspector John O'Connell.

To curb car noise (and complaints) Braunstein, alongside the NYPD and Parks Department, has helped set up a gate and lock at the entrance of the parking lot, which is shut by police officers at park closing, 10 p.m., and reopened by the Parks Department in the morning.

"The new locking system.... will hopefully put a stop to this quality of life concern for the long term," said Braunstein in a news statement.

The Grinch that killed a pizzeria

 

QNS

 
A longtime Bay Terrace pizza shop is closing its doors after nearly 50 years in business.

Earlier this week, it was reported that Jack’s Pizza and Pasta would be going out of business amid a dispute between the restaurant’s owners and Cord Meyer, the development company that owns the Bay Terrace Shopping Center where Jack’s is located.

The owners of Jack’s Pizza posted a sign outside of the establishment at the shopping center claiming that Cord Meyer’s CEO Matthew Whalen refused to renew the restaurant’s lease, effectively forcing them out after decades of business. The sign also stated that Jack’s had stayed open “at the height of the COVID pandemic.”

But Cord Meyer issued a statement saying that the restaurant’s lease had expired in September 2020 and they had failed to renew it.

“Their lease expired in September 2020, but in acknowledgment of their long history, we agreed to let them stay until the end of 2021 and offered them generous rent concessions. We are disappointed that our relationship with Jack’s has been mischaracterized. If a tenant refuses to meet agreed-upon obligations, we need to focus on ensuring that the Bay Terrace remains a vibrant shopping center,” said a Cord Meyer spokesperson.

Laura, the daughter of Anna and Jack Sapienza who opened the business in 1972, told Patch that finances were tight when they ran a takeout-only operation during the pandemic. During that time, Laura claimed that the Sapienzas paid Cord Meyer “as much as we could” from March through December 2020 but had their rent check returned in January 2021 followed by a 30-day eviction notice.

Several reports claimed that the owners of the pizzeria were planning to pay back Cord Meyer for the missing rent, which the company allegedly approved during COVID.

Cord Meyer said that they will allow Jack’s Pizza to stay in its current location until Jan. 15 before shutting down the operation for good.

 

Queens County dynasty freakout, Vallone edition

Ladies & Gentlemen,

Saturday I showed up with a group of volunteers working for Paul Graziano’s city council candidacy. In the recent Democratic primary he lost to the Vallone machine by a small margin. He’s got a real shot to win the General Election Nov 7th. But the tactics of Paul Vallone are thuggish as exemplified Saturday. Vallone and his campaign crew posted up outside of a Stop and Shop supermarket in the Bay Terrace Plaza which is in Bayside. They were first there so when we arrived we respectfully worked the back of the exit line from the supermarket.

Everything was going fine until Paul Vallone himself noticed that many of the shoppers were calling me over and having long conversations with me. He decided that he had had enough of freedom of speech and fair competition. He called the mall police on us who then instructed us that we were standing on private property and were without a permit which Paul Vallone had. I requested to see the permit but I was denied.

Rather than create a big scene since I was well aware that management was a Vallone crony we did the next best thing and marched outside onto the entering street and started to stop cars, talk with passengers and give out Paul Graziano literature. Thankfully the NYPD did not hassle us. Paul Graziano’s crew was working hard and rolled with the many changes that I had to make from our original plan.

This was New York State Reform Party teamwork at its best. We rolled with the adversity and turned it into a great campaign day. Now it’s onward to victory November 7th. (You can see in one of the pictures that Paul Vallone himself is leading the effort to remove us from us in front of the Stop and Shop).

- Curtis Sliwa, Chair of the NYS Reform Party

Developer scales plan down to 72 units from 187

From the Times Ledger:

The plans to construct three additional structures on vacant green space adjacent to Bell Apartments in Bay Terrace have changed to accommodate about 36 two-family homes, according to the architect.

Bell Apartments is a five six-story building, 300-unit co-op located near Bay Terrace Shopping Center.

Anthony Colletti, chief operating officer for Cord Meyer, said the original plans were scrapped for reasons of feasibility and community opposition.

Shareholders at the presentation in January told Cord Meyer war stories about the current parking situation and that adding 187 extra households would create too much deadlock, even with a new underground garage to match the number of units. Residents were relieved when the development company reduced the plan to 36 two-family buildings, Colletti said.

“It didn’t make sense for us either,” Colletti said. “It wasn’t working out financially, so we scaled it down and [the shareholders] were thrilled.”

Since the unveiling of the initial plans, the community has been informed of all new developments, according to Colletti, who added that elected officials such as state Sen. Tony Avella (D-Bayside) and Councilman Paul Vallone (D-Bayside) were kept informed as well.

New plan for new Bay Terrace units

From the Times Ledger:

The Bell Apartments’ board of directors and Cord Meyer Development presented preliminary plans to construct a 186-unit condominium on vacant green space adjacent to the residential complex to the co-op’s shareholders Monday.

According to property records, the deed for the Bell Apartments is registered with Cord Meyer, which also owns Bay Terrace Shopping Center. Under the land lease with Bell Apartments, which is a five six-story buildings, 300-unit co-op, the board of directors must enter into a new agreement to give Cord Meyer the right to build on the undeveloped land opposite PS 169 on 212th Street.

The plans have not been finalized, because no deal has been reached between Cord Meyer and the board, but the design team, Morali Architects, released a close-to-finished building proposal at the meeting.

Architect Anthony Morali said the 186 units would only cover 50 to 55 percent of the current available space, and plans would result in a building density that is half of what the current zoning rules allow for, so no zoning variance would need to be granted.

Morali said instead of one large building, he plans to construct seven separate building segments connected by corridors and parking structure underground with at least 186 spaces. The developers said there would spots available for at least 220 cars, including outside parking. The underground parking lot would only be accessible on 18th Avenue and 23rd Street.

If the developer and the co-op board reach an agreement, they expect to break ground by fall or if not then in 2017. Morali said construction should take a total of 15 to 18 months.

Once complete, developers said they expect the condos to sell for between $400,000 and $500,000. One- to three-bedroom units in the Bell Apartments now have an average value of $350,000.

Bay Terrace may see more development

From the Times Ledger:

The talk around Bay Terrace has been centered on concerns that developers are planning to expand Bell Apartments by putting up new buildings for 187 condominium units.

Cord Meyer Development, which owns the Bay Terrace Shopping Center, said it could not confirm plans to develop the vacant green space across from Bay Terrace Elementary School on 23rd Avenue and 212th Street because they have not been finalized.

But the developers and the architect for the project presented the plans to leaders of the Bay Terrace Community Alliance last month, according to Warren Schreiber, the civic president.

Schreiber said Cord Meyer wants to build the new condominiums on the same block as the five-building co-op Bell Apartments. The original plans for the co-op complex called for seven buildings back in 1961.

The developers want to build shorter buildings to accommodate the 187 proposed units, Schreiber said. He also said the plans call for 187 parking spaces in an underground structure.

No place left to shop

"There's No full service grocery store left in Northeast Queens. With Pathmark and Bay Terrace Waldbaum's sold to Stop 'n Shop and the rest of the Waldbaum's closing, they are not getting deliveries of most items.

They've already all run out of my egg whites and some other items..... The Whitestone Key food also is selling out of several items...

A & P pretty much had a monopoly in the North east part of Queens, at least. I don't know about other areas of Queens or the 5 boros.

Where are we supposed to go, to Los Angeles for groceries? Ha Ha Ha." - anonymous

Home Goods to replace Bay Terrace Barnes & Noble

From the Times Ledger:

The Bay Terrace Shopping Center will be losing its Barnes & Noble bookstore, which has called the Bayside commercial center home since 1993.

In its place, Bay Terrace owner and caretaker the Cord Meyer Development Company has signed with HomeGoods store, a company owned by TJ Maxx, on a new lease, but said it could not disclose the exact timeline of the move.

HomeGoods did not return requests for comment.

The new HomeGoods store should be expected to occupy the 25,000-square-foot commercial space by early 2016, Cord Meyer Leasing Assistant Joy Mangone said. Renovation of the space is not expected to incur any major reconstruction at the shopping center.

Barnes & Noble Vice President of Development David Deason said the decision to close was beyond the company’s control and a matter of cost for renting the space.

Bay Terrace Barnes and Noble loses lease

From DNA Info:

It’s a tough time for booklovers in Queens.

The Bayside Barnes & Noble, at 23-80 Bell Blvd., might close down soon, as the bookstore chain said it was not able to reach an agreement with the landlord over its lease.

The news comes on the heels of an announcement that the Forest Hills location, which opened in 1995, will close in January next year and will be replaced in July by Target.

So this happened again...

From CBS New York:

Witness Joe Illescas said his family was shopping when he believes the driver was trying to park in a handicap spot in front of the store.

“You can see that she was parking, trying to put it in park, she didn’t have it in park, took her foot off the brake and must have accelerated, right inside,” Illescas said. “Thank god there’s no tragedy, call it luck, a miracle, thank god everybody is okay.”

The driver was not injured.

About 15 people were inside of the store at the time. The manager reported she was cut by glass, but no one was seriously injured. Castro reports only the manager reported a small injury
The store is expected to be shut down for a week.

An old farm in Bayside

Bayside, Long Island 1928. On Bell Blvd Existed The Home And Farm Of Charles G Meyer. (Bayside began its course of development from an agricultural community to a suburb when the North Shore Railroad was extended in 1866. During the following several decades, the Bayside Land Association purchased farms for development. Bay Terrace, originally included within the bounds of Bayside, remained composed of farms and large estates until the 1950s, when Cord and Charles Meyer sold their 225-acre (0.91 km2) farm for development.

In 1952, residential development of Bay Terrace Sections began and continued into the mid-1960s. Commercial development also began in the 1950s, in the form of "The Bay Terrace at Bayside Shopping Center".

Chris Moss speaks in Bay Terrace

Candidates Forum held August 26, 2014 by Bay Terrace Community Alliance. © 2014 LoScalzo Media Design LLC. All rights reserved,

A man wearing too many hats

Warren Schreiber is not only the president of Bay Terrace, but he's also an employee of Paul Vallone and endorsed and is actively campaigning for John Liu.

I'm sure this candidates' night will be totally fair and unbiased.

Airplane noise is bad, but could be worse

An older flight map (l.) shows Flushing Airport just west of LaGuardia Airport, and its reserved airspace extending farther west over Queens. A later map shows the same airspace without Flushing Airport. Maps courtesy FAA

From the Times Ledger:

Many northeast Queens neighborhoods have complained recently about increased aircraft noise, but it could be worse.

Airspace regulations for a long-shuttered borough airstrip are actually keeping planes from flying closer to residential rooftops over parts of Whitestone, north Flushing, Bay Terrace, Douglaston and Little Neck, according to flight maps.

These maps are used by pilots to show where they can and cannot fly, and one place off limits to commercial aircraft leaving LaGuardia Airport is called the Flushing Exclusion Zone, the Federal Aviation Administration said.

This zone stretches from the site of the shuttered Flushing Airport — in-between Whitestone and College Point just west of the Whitestone Expressway — across the top portion of Queens. Over the areas of Whitestone and north Flushing, aircraft must stay above 1,200 feet, while above parts of Bay Terrace and northern Bayside, they must stay above 1,500 feet, according to the FAA and flight maps.

If the Flushing Exclusion Zone did not exist, the FAA would have the ability to fly aircraft as low as it wanted in these areas, although officials from the agency said at a recent meeting that they never route a plane lower than 1,000 feet above residential blocks.

The exclusion zone was created in the 1970s when airspace regulations were modified, according to the FAA, although Flushing Airport had been open since 1927.

The corridor was created as a pathway for smaller planes to get access to the airport through airspace normally used by larger commercial jets traveling to and from LaGuardia, the FAA said.

Avella suggests adding police precincts

From Bayside Patch:

Fed up with being too far from their designated police hub, a group of Bay Terrace citizens declared gehttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifographic independence from Flushing last winter.

A symbolic Declaration was even printed, and signed. It bore the main complaint that police presence and response times are critical to safety, but Bayside’s 111th Precinct was half the distance from their assigned station, Flushing’s 109th.

The 111th Precinct’s Community Council hinted at that time that they were open to incorporating the neighborhood under their protection, and were tepidly contemplating the logistics and extra manpower needed.

The office of Sen. Tony Avella, D-Bayside, said they were offering up an even better solution: cut the other precinct in half.

Avella and Assemblyman Ed Braunstein, D-Bayside proposed legislation to divide Flushing’s 109th Precinct into North and South.

Bay Terrace, Whitestone, College Point and Clearview would inhabit the North. The proposal would also divide the neighboring 105th Precinct the same way.

Those two, he said, have been tasked with overseeing the safety of twice as many people as some other Queens Precincts.

Is the MTA screwing Bay Terrace?

From the Times Ledger:

Riders traveling on the MTA’s Q28 bus from Flushing to Bayside are finding their feet on shaky ground when they arrive at the Bay Terrace shopping center.

For years the owners of the center have allowed the authority’s buses to use its private road, but now they are considering sending the Metropolitan Transportation Authority packing if the city will not pay to repair damages the vehicles are causing to the asphalt.

Cord Meyer Vice President Peter Galletta said he estimates it would cost between $20,000 and $30,000 to install a concrete bus pad, finally putting an end to years of repairing the streets at his own cost. He said he asked the MTA to pay for the bus pad, but the agency told him that the city Department of Transportation was responsible for repairing roads. When he contacted the DOT, he was told it did not fix private roads, Galletta said.

Galletta said he agreed more than 10 years ago to allow the MTA’s buses to turn off of 23rd Avenue onto 213th Place and make a left through the shopping center’s parking lot where they turn onto Bell Boulevard and head back down 23rd Avenue on their return trip to Flushing.

Galletta claims that representatives from the MTA said they would sign an agreement covering some kind of maintenance contract, but that did not happen, and in subsequent years he has written letters complaining about the damages.

Bike lane debacle on Bell

From Bayside Patch:

The City Council this week mandated that NYPD keep track of bicycle deaths, as Northeast Queens residents have expressed misgivings about bike lanes coming to Bell Blvd.

“After looking at the map of proposed routes, it appears that whoever created these paths has not travelled the routes themselves,” said Roz Sackoff, a resident of Bay Terrace.

If the Department of Transportation moves ahead with their plans, there will be marked bike lanes on parts of Bell Blvd., 212th St., 39th Ave., 32nd Ave. 26th Ave., 35th Ave, and the Clearview Expwy. service road.

A study done by the agency between 1996 and 2005 implicated large vehicles in 32 percent of bike fatalities, though they make up 5-17 percent of vehicles on the road.

Sackoff says she is concerned for the safety of bikers mingling with busses on 212th St., and 32nd Ave., which are bus routes.

“This is a curvy two way street with limited sight in some places,” said Sackoff of 212th St., also pointing out that there are many driveway exits from home garages that would cross paths with cyclists.

The proposed 26th Ave. bike path, which is near the Bay Terrace Shopping Center, would be harsh travelling on two wheels, she believes.

“I can definitely understand that a bus route would be a bad route for a bike lane, because the busses would have to keep coming in and out of the lane,” said Joani Emerson, whose husband, Jerry Emerson, owns Peak Bicycle Pro Shop in Douglaston, where the two met.

For Emerson, Bell Blvd., of all the new routes, would make for the most dangerous biking.

Council Member Dan Halloran, R-Bayside, had separate concerns about bike lanes on Bell.

“The last thing we need is to put up bike lanes — which nobody is going to use— to stifle business and take up parking spots,” said Halloran.

There is a bike path alongside Little Neck Bay which is separate from traffic and a lot more scenic. But I guess the city needed an excuse to use up a pile of money. (Wait 'til I show you where they plan to put bike lanes in Maspeth.)

Bay Terrace wants to secede from CB7

From the Times Ledger:

Bay Terrace Community Alliance members unanimously threw their support behind a declaration of independence that the group unveiled last week, calling for them to separate from Community Board 7 and join CB 11.

The Bay Terrace residents said at their Dec. 8 meeting at the Benenson Family Center of the Chabad of Northeast at 212-12 26th Ave. in Bayside that they wanted to join CB 11 because they felt closer geographically and culturally to the area represented by CB 11 than to CB 7. A number of the members stressed the move was important because they then would be covered by the 111th Precinct, which is physically closer to them than the 109th Precinct, which now has jurisdiction over Bay Terrace.

“CB 7 is a really hardworking board,” said Warren Schreiber, the BTCA president. “They have terrific, dedicated members, but it’s not where we belong.”

The 200-acre section of northeast Queens between 26th Avenue and Fort Totten was originally considered part of Bayside, but it has long been a part of CB 7 despite its being far closer to Bayside and Little Neck than to CB 7’s hub in Flushing. Bay Terrace is also near Whitestone, which is a part of CB 7.

CB 7 covers Flushing, Whitestone, College Point, Murray Hill and Bay Terrace, while CB 11 includes Bayside, Douglaston, Little Neck, Hollis Hills and Oakland Gardens. The two boards share Auburndale.

The declaration of independence, which BTCA members voted to adopt, revealed at last week’s meeting, begins in a familiar way.

“We, the people of Bay Terrace, hereby declare our rights as residents of the community of Bayside, Queens,” the document reads.

The declaration goes on to say that Bay Terrace has “always been part of the historical, geographical, governmental, social and religious fabric of the community of Bayside,” and residents have “been forced to remain within Community Board 7 against our will.”

The document states that police response time could decrease should Bay Terrace be covered by the 111th Precinct.

Bay Terrace better off in CB11?

From the Times Ledger:

Warren Schreiber, president of the Bay Terrace Community Alliance and a member of Community Board 7, riled some feathers last week by suggesting that his slice of the Bayside area be removed from the board’s coverage area.

The 200-acre section of northeast Queens between 26th Avenue and Fort Totten was originally considered part of Bayside, which is covered by CB 11, but it has long been a part of CB 7 despite its being far closer to Bayside and Little Neck than CB 7’s hub in Flushing. Bay Terrace is also near Whitestone, which is a part of CB 7.

CB 7 covers Flushing, Whitestone, College Point, Murray Hill and Bay Terrace, while CB 11 includes Bayside, Douglaston, Little Neck, Hollis Hills and Oakland Gardens. The two boards share Auburndale.

Schreiber contends that CB 11 is a better fit for his community than CB 7, where much of the board’s efforts are focused on the dense urban area of downtown Flushing while most of the communities served by CB 11 are more like Bay Terrace.

At the Oct. 25 CB 7 meeting, Schreiber advocated for his community to be removed from the board’s boundaries and transferred to CB 11. This would mean Bay Terrace would be moved from the 109th Precinct on Union Street in downtown Flushing to the 111th Precinct on Northern Boulevard in Flushing. For example, PS 169 in Bay Terrace is 1.9 miles from the 111th Precinct and 3.8 miles from the 109th Precinct to the school.

His recommendation caused a stir among other CB 7 members, however, including Vice Chairman Chuck Apelian, who said the idea was a valid one but took exception to the way it was presented to the board.

Before the meeting began, Schreiber asked for the agenda to insert an item saying that the board would be discussing a Bay Terrace move. When the document was printed, it read “Community Board 7 is wrong for Bay Terrace,” a wording Apelian resents.

“It definitely had a tone that he doesn’t like Community Board 7. I take exception to that and I continue to take exception to that,” Apelian said. “Community Board 7 has diligently supported the members of Bay Terrace just like the members of any other community in CB 7, and we have been staunch supporters of all the issues and concerns they have brought before the board. I don’t think we’ve misserved him, I think he’s gotten excellent service. If he wants a positive change, it should have been stated that way and instead he did it as a negative attack against the board.”

2 large fires burned in Queens today