Some More Sunnyside Press
From the Queens Ledger
Dateline : Thursday, March 15, 2007
Two (Sunny)Sides To Every Story
By Nik Kovac
“Have you been there?” asked Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) chairman Robert Tierney, as he worked his way down a City Hall stairwell. “It’s a great area. Fifty years off, if that’s allowed to go away, we should be very embarrassed.”
He was speaking about Sunnyside Gardens, a 77-acre, 600-building, 1,200-unit housing development built in the 1920s just south of the eastern end of the big railyards. Last Tuesday his commission voted to calendar the neighborhood for historic district status, a move that usually means eventual designation as a New York City Landmark.
This news is being welcomed by hundreds of the residents and by an even larger community of city and worldwide preservation advocates, but is being furiously resisted by an emerging coalition of residents.
“We’ve got a petition with 400 signatures,” claimed Sunnyside Gardens resident Warren Lehrer, as he protested with about 30 of his neighbors at the St. Patrick’s Day For All parade on Skillman Avenue, just two days before LPC voted unanimously to calendar their neighborhood. “On their petition they’ve got thousands of names, but some of those people are from places like Australia, or Manhattan.”
Lehrer said he believed the number of actual Sunnyside Gardens residents to have signed the pro-landmarking petition to be less than 300, but his neighbor, landmark advocate Jeffrey Kroessler, insisted the number was 381 homeowners, not even counting spouses or other co-habitators.
“My wife and I count as one in that number,” he told the Ledger/Star last weekend during the annual conference of the Historic Districts Council (HDC).
In the end, however, the only vote tally that will really matter is that of the 51 City Council members, who almost always approve what the LPC decides, unless the local member is staunchly opposed, as David Yassky was last year to the 184 Kent building’s designation on the Williamsburg waterfront.
So far Sunnyside’s representative, Eric Gioia, is publicly on the fence, although most close observers believe he will ultimately be in favor of Landmarking.
From the Daily News
‘Garden’ nabe’s reputation
Sunnyside in landmark debate
By NICHOLAS HIRSHON
Posted Wednesday, March 14th 2007, 7:09 PM
The push for a Sunnyside Gardens historic district came a step closer to fruition last week when a city commission unanimously agreed to a public hearing.
The hearing is set to take place within the next two months, but a final decision on the proposed district will not be made until a later date, said Lisi de Bourbon, a spokes-woman for the Landmarks Preservation Commission.
One of the most significant planned residential communities in the country, Sunnyside Gardens was developed between 1924 and 1928 to house low- and middle-income work-ers.
Its rows of townhouses and nine small apartment buildings were the first American adaptations of the “garden city” approach popularized by British urban planner Ebenezer Howard.
During the mid-20th century, the neighborhood was also home to many star entertainers, including Perry Como, Ethel Merman and Bix Beiderbecke.
In a statement, Commission Chairman Robert Tierney called Sunnyside Gardens “an extraordinary place that deserves to be protected for generations of New Yorkers to come.”
“Its rich history, the spirit in which it was built, verdant setting and low scale make it eminently worthy of designation,” Tierney said.
Queens preservationists often criticize the commission for heavily favoring Manhattan sites, a reputation Tierney is clearly trying to shake.
The hearing on Sunnyside Gardens “underscores the commission’s commitment to preserving the historic treasures of all five boroughs,” Tierney said.
If approved by the commission, Sunnyside Gardens would become the largest historic district in Queens.
From the New York Post
TIFF CLOUDS SUNNYSIDE
By TOM TOPOUSIS
March 12, 2007
Along the tree-lined streets of Sunnyside Gardens, battle lines have been drawn over a proposal to designate the community as the city’s newest historic district.
The city Landmarks Preservation Commission has agreed to hear arguments on granting landmark status to nearly 16 blocks of the Queens neighborhood, built in the 1920s as an idealistic haven for the working class.
“It’s not the individual houses so much as the collective look of the place and the collective feel of the place,” said Irma Rodriguez, an early landmark proponent.
But Rodriguez said the drive to landmark 610 buildings, mostly one- and two-family homes, has created a backlash among some residents, who say rules that would block additions to the tiny homes are anti-immigrant.
“It’s become personally offensive. Because I’m a supporter of landmarking, I’ve been characterized as being anti-immigrant or elitist,” Rodriguez said. “Opponents have become vocal and nasty.”
And finally, a letter to the Western Queens Gazette
To The Editor:
The rush to landmark Sunnyside Gardens is partly being driven by fear of overdevelopment. Many people are under the misperception that one of the purposes of landmarking is to prevent overdevelopment. If one reads the Landmarks Commission’s enabling legislation, it becomes clear that stopping overdevelopment isn’t their job.