Tuesday, September 4, 2018

Clearing the land for...what?

From George the Atheist:

All traces of the former owner, the late Armin Urban, now removed from the properties immediately south of the Steinway Mansion.

What next?

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thank god for this, that block gets cleaner everyday. Take some pics and call 311 for the dozens of cars the collision shops leave outside all day and night down the block.

Anonymous said...

Rumor has it the site will be a co-op Cucuzza farmers market.

Anonymous said...

Thank god for this, that block gets cleaner everyday. Take some pics and call 311 for the dozens of cars the collision shops leave outside all day and night down the block.

Damn right Tony, and we can sell granite blocks for those Walyo and Paki mansions out in the Island.

A nice big taxpayer will finish the job.

The community will notice nuthin.'

Anonymous said...

G the A: I thought Halberian was the previous owner. Who is Armin Urban?

Anonymous said...

We knew Armin and his family for many years and we left the community a few decades ago but still stayed in touch. We got family that worked at Steinway piano.

When the Steinway's sold in the 1920s Armin's family bought the parcel next to the mansion thinking it would be safe. Other nearby parcels with cottages were cut off (including a relative's) when they cut down 42nd Street. They had to use Armin's property to get access to the outside world. Halberian later bought some of them.

Armin was hell of nice guy and gave the outside world complete reports on who was going in and going out of the mansion at all times. You would be surprised the things that people said to him and what and who he saw. It would be a major scandal if Astoria knew which community 'leaders' are involved with this. Of course the local politicians, who owe them their spots, are neck deep in this basically doing stuff in Albany and locally as little more than errand boys for their 'handlers.'

They all would laugh at the community efforts. Armin had the impression they thought the locals were rubes. He just smiled and kept his mouth shut. He was a lot more astute then they thought and they blabbed everything. And he wrote it down.

We understand that everyone in the Astoria 'resistance' eventually got a copy of Armin's emails and are sitting quiet until the right moment to do a 'tell all.'

Armin felt, as most of us, that unless they turn this over to the community, which is what Mike wanted, they have every intention of destroying the building once they have wrung every last dollar they can out of the property.

We think the strain of all this is what killed the poor fellow. He loved that place.

If this story ends good or bad now depends on what the local 'bosses' do, and how stupid greedy or smart they all are.

As Mark Twain once said, "over reaching don't pay." Who knows? Maybe the community is in the 'catbird seat' after all.

Anonymous said...

Wow! So now the cat is out of the bag.

What happened to all those photographs he took?

georgetheatheist said...

Anonymous #5 (above) has pretty well nailed it down. Halberian owned the Mansion lots. Armin Urban owned the 2 lots immediately south of the Masion lots which Loria and Lucchese are now also developing. I met Armin 2x while photographing ing the 41st and 42nd Streets warehouse construction. He was just checking out the bulldozing and what-not. A very gentlemanly fellow he. R.I.P. Long live Armin Urban!

Anonymous said...

The front men are trying to unload the Mansion on the final purchaser who will ultimately do the nasty to the place - and get 'tha boys' out of responsibility (so they think) which is the reasoning on why they are going after all the auto body places. Their whole tone sounds in this effort sounds increasingly frantic, eh? After all, 'tha boys' are getting up there in age and more and more people are gossiping about what they did to the community.

No matter what happens, when the inevitable first fire happens or the interior gutting starts - whether 'tha boys' own it or pass the hot potato to some dumb schnook to take the heat - they will be blamed big time so it really doesn't matter 'boys' - you are going to be outed so prepare for it. Too many people know.

That is, unless you do the right thing.

Anonymous said...

All the need for art group space in Queens and you have a 26 room mansion empty and dark.

The local press doesn't cover it? Why?

The local community says nothing. Why?