NEWS: A Triple-Feature of Articles about the proposed Bayside Historic Districts
Three Historic Districts Proposed For Bayside
From the Queens Chronicle
To help prevent tear downs and inappropriate alterations, Bayside residents are looking into creating three landmark districts in their neighborhoods. The idea was the brainchild of Paul DiBenedetto, 41, an audio engineer who lives in the Bellcourt section. “Even with rezoning, the areas are all in jeopardy,” he said. “Rezoning only slows it down.”
Bayside eyes historic district status
By John Tozzi
01/18/2007
From the Times Ledger
Bayside preservationists who want to make some neighborhoods into historic districts asked residents to consider beginning the long-haul fight to get their communities designated.
“The strongest thing that people are feeling is that we want to maintain the look of the community, and if this is what it takes, this is what it takes,” said Paul DiBenedetto, a board member of the Bayside Historical Society.
He is part of a movement, spurred by a 10-year building boom, that wants to keep Bayside’s housing stock dating back to the early 1900s from being torn down and replaced with new, larger homes.
Some 60 people met at the historical society’s Fort Totten headquarters last Thursday for a presentation on six potential historic districts in Bayside.
“I want to jar you back into why we’re here tonight,” said Paul Graziano, the urban planner who has been one of the loudest voices for preservation in northeast Queens.
A slideshow that Graziano presented showed dozens of historic homes in Bayside, some written over with bold red text: “Demolished.” The next shot would show the structure that replaced it, eliciting gasps from some in the audience. Much of the recent style of construction would no longer be permitted in a historic district. Homeowners in such districts need approval from the city’s Landmarks Preservation Commission to do any exterior work beyond normal repairs. Most interior changes do not require approval unless the changes affect the outside of the building. Those kinds of restrictions did not interest many homeowners in Queens for decades, but the development boom has made some look for more powerful limits on building than the zoning code provides, preservationists said.
When Downzoning Just Doesn’t Cut It
By Shane Miller
From the Queens Ledger
January 18, 2007
Is the historic district the new downzoning?
Probably not, but about 60 curious Bayside residents concerned about the loss of their neighborhood character attended a presentation last Thursday on that very subject at the headquarters of the Bayside Historical Society inside Fort Totten.
“We know that we need to be more visible in the community,” said Carol Marian, president of the Bayside Historical Society, of her organization. “We are losing our history every day.”
The presentation was given by business partners Paul Graziano and Phil Esser, whose firm specializes in historic preservation. But Graziano is a ubiquitous figure in Queens planning circles. Besides growing up in nearby Flushing, he has been studying Bayside since 2003, working on the massive downzoning which passed a few years back. In that time, he has identified an estimated two dozen potential historic districts, about ten of which he and Esser outlined Thursday night.