Purchase Building Gone
From the Brooklyn Papers
Bridge “Park” Can Find No Purchase by Mike McLaughlin
Demolition teams have made short work of the iconic Purchase Building beneath the Brooklyn Bridge to clear space for a piazza that will be part of the controversial Brooklyn Bridge Park project.
The $300-plus-million parkland and condo project along the DUMBO and Brooklyn Heights waterfront has long included destruction of the two-story Modernist relic built as part of FDR’s New Deal in the 1930s – and that’s a good thing, say project boosters, who are excited by the current plan for a piazza-like open space under the Brooklyn Bridge where the Purchase Building stood.
The brick-and-concrete building could not even be torn down had it not, in 2006, lost the protection it enjoyed as part of the Fulton Ferry Historic District. At that time, city officials lobbied the Landmarks Preservation Commission to cut the building out of the district because the historic building would obstruct views from the new park.
The building had many lives during its years in city service, earning its name after being christened as a warehouse for the city’s “Department of Purchase.” It remained a warehouse for other city agencies for decades, and, for a time after the 9-11 terrorist attacks, became the home of the Office of Emergency Management.
©2008 The Brooklyn Paper