Historic Districts Council Newsstand

We just received word that the Landmarks Preservation Commission is planning to calendar a  historic district in the Addisleigh Park neighborhood on Tuesday. This suburban neighborhood in Southeastern Queens was home to numerous major African-Americans figures such as James Brown, Roy Campanella, W.E.B. DuBois, Count Basie, Lena Horne, Jackie Robinson and Ella Fitzgerald (to name just a few).  In 2007, HDC partnered with the Addisleigh Park Civic Organization and obtained funding from the Preservation League of New York State and the National Trust for Historic Preservation to produce a survey and history of the area and its significant residents.  Once completed, we submitted all the material to the LPC, who held a community meeting last October to announce their interest in moving forward with designation. We’re thrilled and very thankful that the LPC is taking this important step to protect this remarkable area – which, if designated, will be the 8th historic district in Queens (and the first in Southeastern Queens).  For more information on the area, including photos of some of the houses, see http://www.hdc.org/addisleighpark.htm

The Landmarks Preservation Commission will hold public hearings on the proposed designations on Tuesday, February 9 ,2010.

Hearings will place in the Commission’s offices in the Municipal Building, 1 Centre Street, 9^th Floor North, Manhattan.

Information and photos below courtesy of NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission.

Jamaica Savings Bank: Public Hearing Item 1, 9:45-10 am

One year after the end of the Civil War, the Jamaica Savings Bank was founded in the basement of the old county clerk’s office (later the Registers office). The growth of the Jamaica Savings Bank paralleled the growth of the Borough of Queens. As the bank steadily prospered, business necessitated the establishment of several branches to accommodate the expanding company, and to better serve their customers. By 1939 Jamaica Savings Bank was thoroughly invested in the community of Jamaica, New York, with one large main office on Jamaica Ave. and another branch in Queens Village. The lot was purchased in 1934 in anticipation of the rapid growth of Jamaica. The erection of the general court house on Sutphin Boulevard, and the extension of the Eighth Avenue Subway line, all had influenced the bank’s decision to build a new branch on the northwest corner of Jamaica Avenue and Sutphin Boulevard.

Morrell Smith, celebrated for his designs of commercial bank buildings, designed this branch of the Jamaica Savings Bank in 1939. Set on a trapezoidal lot, the monumental one-story building faces the intersection with an angled façade and corner entrance. It is clad in Indiana limestone with a polished granite base, and has a longer frontage along Sutphin Boulevard. Tall rectangular windows present a vertical rhythm across the façades and a stylized Greek entablature provides a crown to the building. The windows are slightly recessed with spandrel panels at the top that are ornamented with stars and a geometric design in low relief. The entablature is suggested by decorative bands in low relief, and an eagle is located above the entrance, which is through an ornamental bronze doorway. A flagpole on the roof is part of the original design. The building, now North Fork Bank, has minor alterations that include the addition of removable signage. In 1939, the Chamber of Commerce of the Borough of Queens gave the bank—as one of seven recipients for different building types—an annual architectural award for a commercial building showing excellence in design and construction.

Moderne in style, with simple details and dignified proportions, the building at Jamaica Avenue and Sutphin Boulevard utilized the most modern building design and construction methods of its time, from the state-of-the-art air conditioning system designed specifically for this building, which controlled temperature, humidity, also removed dust and odors, to the introduction of new sound absorption materials. All of these elements; contributed to the unique design qualities of this impressive bank building.

Grace Episcopal Church Memorial Hall: Public Hearing Item 2, 10-10:10 am

Grace Church Memorial Hall forms part of one of the most historic church complexes in New York City. The church itself and its historic graveyard are already designated as a New York City Landmark.

Founded in 1702, Grace Church is one of the country’s earliest Protestant Episcopal parishes, the oldest parish on Long Island, and in New York State second in age only to Manhattan’s Trinity Church. The existing Gothic Revival style church building – the third on the site – was constructed in 1861-62 to designs by Dudley Field. In 1901-02, the church was expanded with the addition of a chancel, designed by the firm of Cady, Berg & See. Behind the church stretches the graveyard, whose burials represent many families important to the history of the city, including Van Rensselaer, Gracie, Delafield and King. At the far end of the graveyard sits the Memorial Hall.

The Memorial Hall was built in 1912 to provide a meeting place and social center for the congregation, including a gymnasium, an auditorium, meeting rooms and offices. The three-story tall brick structure was designed by the architectural firm of Upjohn and Conable in the Tudor Gothic style, to complement the design of the existing church. It consists of two gabled sections with three-sided bays joined by the central auditorium/gymnasium section. Architectural details include a handsome gabled wooden portico with Tudor detailing; a double-height bay window; a large slate roof, with a smaller slate roof over the porch; stone banding; and stepped buttresses echoing those along the nave of the church.

Queens General Court Building: Public Hearing Item 3, 10:10-10:20am

The Queens General Court Building is a grand, neo-Classical, Depression-era monument built in the late 1930s, paid for half with City funds and half with a Federal grant from the Public Works Administration. Mayor LaGuardia laid the cornerstone in 1937, and presided over the building’s dedication in 1939. The new courthouse was considered a major public improvement, and convenience, for the borough of Queens, consolidating various court facilities in downtown Jamaica. The building originally housed the offices of the Queens County Clerk, the City Court, the Supreme Court and the Surrogate’s Court, and was meant to handle all the civil cases in Queens.

Architect William W. Knowles was a native New Yorker and Queens resident, educated at City College and the Ecole des Beaux-Arts. Knowles designed several important Queens County buildings including the Queens County General Hospital, the Terminal Buildings in Flushing, the Flushing Post Office (in association with Dwight James Baum) and a Children’s Shelter in Jamaica. Alfred H. Eccles, also a Queens resident, served on a number of architectural committees during the 1930s, and was chairman of the Long Island Real Estate Board’s building code committee.

An excellent example of American Modern Classicism of the 1920s and 1930s, the courthouse is faced with Alabama limestone and is articulated with Federal-style ornament. Its most prominent architectural feature is a triple-height colonnade – not quite half the building’s total height – composed of monumental fluted Corinthian columns supporting a heavy entablature with a bracketed cornice. Within the colonnade are handsome stone balconies and arched openings set off by sculptural panels depicting famous lawgivers. The colonnade reflects a long New York (and national) tradition of modeling government buildings on classical precedents, almost always focused on imposing colonnades. Other notable features include swagged relief panels beneath many of the windows, the heavy cornice with block modillions above the seventh story and the balustrade extending in front of the eighth-story windows. The blocky-massing, emphasis on flat, planar wall surfaces, simple ornament, and lack of window trim reflect both neo-Classical precedent and the growing taste for reductive design in the 1930s. The result is one of the most imposing public buildings anywhere in the borough.

(hearing times are approximate)

For more information click here

From the Clyde Fitch Report’s Preservation Diaries

By Susan Kathryn Hefti

Betting on an uptick in New York City land values in 1939, the Hippodrome, a 5,200 seat theater inspired by the open air arenas of the same name in ancient Greece, was forever reduced to rubble by real estate developers. They had speculated that the land, upon which the theater stood on the east side of Sixth Avenue at 44th Street, would prove to be worth more than the ornate edifice itself. And so the Hippodrome, like countless other structures throughout New York City’s history, was summarily demolished in the hopes of cashing in on a real estate bonanza.

But in the build-up to World War II, the economy quickly contracted in fear, and the hopeful wager that had been placed on the Hippodrome property failed to yield the anticipated winnings. Gambling on a dazzling short-term payoff quickly gave way to the humble reality that razing a theater once described by Streetscapes author Christopher Gray as “one of the most unusual theatrical venues ever built,” produced nothing more than a tedious parade of blueprints, drawings, plans and ideas about what to do with the idle property.

Like a nagging reminder of the mercurial nature of real estate development and the economy to which it is lashed, the site that had boasted a most spectacular structure, featuring an enormous sculptural relief of an elephant’s head along with a pair of turret-like temples on either end of its roof, was reduced to the quotidian chore of serving as a parking lot… more>

From http://savethelowereastside.blogspot.com/:

This Monday evening, the Chinatown Working Group, a group open to all stakeholders in Chinatown, will hold a town hall on its plans for the future of Chinatown. The Group has not decided on the boundaries of Chinatown, so their plans may include and affect areas far beyond narrow, antiquated notions of Chinatown of the last century, and may be relevant to your own neighborhood.

The question for the Working Group is: how can Chinatown both preserve itself and thrive. The latter usually implies gentrification, adverse, typically, to the former. So there’s a challenge to face.

There are many threats to Chinatown: hotel development, exorbitant commercial and residential rents, loss of industry; congestion of traffic, parking, parks; need for improved education, arts and cultural spaces, among others. These have all been treated by the Working Group in their Preliminary Action Plans. The documents in English, Spanish and Chinese are available at www.chinatownworkinggroup.org.

Town Hall
Monday, February 1, 7pm
PS 130, 143 Baxter Street
translation will be available in English, in Chinese and in Spanish 

We are fighting to save PS186 in West Harlem.

Even if you are not in this neighborhood we need all the help we can get and are asking you to please support us by signing our petition:

SIGN PETITION

For additional Info go to:

Harlem Bespoke

Columbia Spectator

Walter South is trying to save a historic building, but a complex bureaucracy is stopping him at every turn.

South, chair of Community Board 9’s Landmarks & Preservation Committee, mobilized local residents this month to call for the preservation of P.S. 186, a public schoolhouse on 145th Street between Amsterdam and Broadway that has been vacant since it closed in 1975.

But his coalition seeking to preserve the decaying building hit a major roadblock at Thursday’s CB9 full board meeting in Harlem.

He wrote an internal committee resolution urging the building’s preservation, which passed unanimously in the Landmarks Preservation Committee several weeks ago. But his ambitions were stalled last week when CB9’s Executive Committee, composed of the CB9 officers and the chairs of the standing committees, voted down the resolution by a narrow vote of 8 to 7. This prevented it from appearing on the agenda for a vote at Thursday’s general board meeting.

Had it passed the general board meeting, the resolution to preserve the historic site would have been adopted—and the board would have moved forward with an effort to stop the demolition.

South felt that the executive board was precluding the general board from considering the issue, so he took legal action.

“The whole point of taking legal action in the first place was to resolve the fact that the executive board is not a gatekeeper for the [general] board,” South said.

From David Freeland:

Wednesday, February 10, 2010, 6:30 PM

“The Vanishing City: Losing the Fun,” Dixon Place Theater lounge, 161A Chrystie St.

This is going to be a panel discussion related to issues of preservation and the city’s disappearing entertainment architecture, featuring myself (David Freeland) and three others: Andrew Dolkart of Columbia University (many of you are no doubt familiar with his work, but he also has a new book titled The Row House Reborn), performer and writer Trav S.D. (whose book about vaudeville, No Applause – Just Throw Money, is a delightful read), and Cindy VandenBosch, who runs Urban Oyster, a tour company devoted to exploring off-the-beaten path spots around the city (for example, the 19th century breweries of Brooklyn). All of these folks bring different perspectives to the issue of New York architecture and preservation, so it should be a fun evening with lots of time for discussion!

International Conference on Urbanism and Public Space Brought together Stakeholders and Officials from Hong Kong, Shanghai, and New York

HONG KONG, Jan. 25 /PRNewswire-Asia/ — A major conference entitled “Vertical Density, the Public Dimension: A Dialogue between Hong Kong – Shanghai – New York” was successfully held last Thursday and Friday in Hong Kong. City officials, planners, architects, and developers from Hong Kong, Shanghai, and New York convened over one and a half days to discuss the balance between urbanism in global cities and how public space and urban planning can be further enhanced.

Organized by The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government and the Shanghai World Expo 2010 Executive Committee and presented by the Hong Kong – New York Urban Planning Exchange, AIA Hong Kong, and The Skyscraper Museum, the conference served as a platform to exchange dialogue on vertical density in three major cities and how they can learn from each of their experiences. In addition to the overall conference dialogue, the January 21 opening session marked the 100-day countdown to the upcoming Shanghai World Expo 2010, a major event in China that celebrates the theme of “Better City, Better Life”.

The full day conference on January 21 brought together a large audience of 330 delegates while the half-day on January 22 attracted 190 attendees. Delegates from New York introduced several themes to the dialogue which included the creation and enhancement of public urban space, waterfront access and uses, and the design and management of urban parks, particularly in the context of the utilization of public-private partnerships. Featured speakers from New York included among others, Alexandros Washburn, Chief Urban Designer, New York City Department of City Planning, Ann Buttenwieser, President, The Neptune Foundation and Hilary Ballon, Deputy Vice Chancellor, New York University Abu Dhabi.

On January 21, Alexandros Washburn’s presentation demonstrated New York’s effort in promoting high standards of urban planning and design through the use of regulatory mechanisms. Examples of public space creation and ongoing maintenance and management from a New York City perspective were presented by Vishaan Chakrabarti, Marc Holliday Professor of Real Estate Development and Director, Real Estate Development Program, Columbia University, Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, Preservation (GSAPP). While Carl Weisbrod, President, Trinity Real Estate demonstrated the role that local business can play in bringing about district based improvements including the use of sustainable energy sources on New York streets to create a distinctive neighborhood identity.

On January 22, the conference continued its dialogue with presentations on preserving and promoting a city’s character and culture through public space access and landmarks protection. Robert Tierney, Chairman, New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission presented an overview of New York City’s landmarks and historic districts and explained the Commission’s role in protecting not only the cultural characteristics of a city inherent in its buildings but also the city’s historic and aesthetic heritage, including the revitalization of old industrial areas and the creation of public space with the help of a publicly empowered authority. James Cavanaugh, President, The Battery Park City Authority, described the corporate structure and evolution of Battery Park City where a series of shipping piers has been transformed into a successful mix of residential and commercial projects, all set in a district with a high percentage of public open space. Charles Maikish, Managing Director of Global Corporate Services and Real Estate, Blackrock and Blackrock/Barclays; Former CEO of World Trade Centre, New York, spoke about the importance of water borne transit and land/water interface in a vertical high rise city.

The New York speakers’ presentations on both days were followed by a series of Hong Kong responses. As the New York speakers reiterated throughout the conference their emphasis on streetscapes and a “pedestrians-first” point of view, several of the Hong Kong respondents explained that the fundamental mechanisms of urban planning would need to be rethought in order to realize similar objectives in Hong Kong. Respondent Rocco S.K. Yim, Founder and Executive Director, Rocco Design Architects Limited, encouraged the provision of more public space but explained that there are limitations in Hong Kong. “We need to understand our constraints (in Hong Kong) and we also need to balance our priorities” Mr. Yim said. Hong Kong respondent Keith Kerr, Former Managing Director, Swire Properties Limited; Chairman, Executive Committee, Real Estate Developers’ Association, said: “We need to look at the mechanisms in Hong Kong and the financial model that runs it”. There was also agreement that public space in privately managed locations was a valuable addition to a city’s urban environment but that there should be agreed guidelines on how this might best be achieved.

The conference was jointly chaired by Nicholas Brooke, Chairman, Professional Property Services Group; Chairman, Hong Kong Science and Technology Parks Corporation, Paul Katz, President, Kohn Pedersen Fox Associates and Carol Willis, Founder and Director, The Skyscraper Museum, New York.

Mr. Brooke commented “The interactive nature of the event afforded the ideal opportunity for the exchange of views and experience and will be very helpful as Hong Kong addresses issues of land use planning and the creation and management of public open space, both of which are the subject of much current public debate.”

In the words of Paul Katz, “This second Dialogue afforded an excellent opportunity for New York delegates to better understand the vertical density challenges faced in Hong Kong and Shanghai and to explain how New York has managed to address some of these, given that it is the most mature of the three high rise cities.”

Carol Willis, Founder and Director, The Skyscraper Museum, New York, who conceived and organized the first “Vertical Density” two-city dialogue in New York in 2008, observed, “This second dialogue took the facts of Hong Kong and Manhattan’s vertical density to the next logical point of discussion, the necessity of a great and gracious public realm.

Margaret Brooke, of the Hong Kong – New York Urban Planning Exchange and lead organizer of the conference summed up by saying “We would like this event to be part of an ongoing dialogue between Hong Kong and New York and other vertical density cities given that much can be learned from the sharing of experiences and an understanding of how challenges can be addressed in differing ways.”

Striking a balance amidst the development of a city with the consideration of the public dimension and private interests is an ongoing task that is essential to any successful city. With the success of this conference and the previous one held in New York in 2008, the ongoing exchange on the urban environment of successful cities will surely continue.

Mercifully, a July 2009 federal court ruling spared the 76-year-old version of Holden Caulfield the experience of padding about the New York City streets that were such an indelible part of his adolescent universe. In finding that the new novel, 60 Years Later: Coming Through The Rye — in which Swedish author Fredrik Colting, writing under the taunting nom de plume J.D. California, imagines one of the most famous teenagers in American literary history as a man who’s been collecting Social Security for more than a decade — is sufficiently derivative of J.D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye to constitute copyright infringement, Judge Deborah A. Batts issued a preliminary injunction prohibiting its distribution in the U.S.

But the Brits published the Swede’s novel. And this has me worried about poor Holden coming unglued all over again. For the Salinger-California case, which has yet to go trial, provided a haunting observation about New York City’s track record on protecting historic structures and the sense of place they evoke.

As Clyde Haberman remarked in the New York Times, many of the places visited by Holden in the original novel no longer exist. Sure, Central Park has a carousel, but not the one he envisions his sister, Phoebe, riding in his mind’s eye. The Biltmore Hotel, where young Holden waits for his date, is long gone. So is the Paramount movie theater. And, of course, the Pennsylvania Station that Holden knew was tragically demolished in 1963.

So my concern for Holden goes way beyond Salinger’s legal right to protect his intellectual property. I believe that if California’s senior version of Holden were to ever actually set foot in New York City, the brevity of his visit would be epic. As Kent Barwick, president emeritus of the Municipal Arts Society (MAS), explained in a phone call while reflecting upon the imperative to reconstruct Warsaw after World War II, it’s a “basic need of human beings to be oriented.” When you take away physical reference points, the effect can be quite traumatic…

keep reading at http://www.clydefitchreport.com/?p=5586