It’s not easy being weird but I’ve spent the course of some five years researching and drafting what has so far resulted in an 8,000 word essay I wound up calling Revolt Club, Long Island City: Uncovering a Lost History of Queens Political Clubs. I started out by wanting to make the slightest point.
Continue reading “The True Story of the Paretti Club”
It has been one and a half years since the last post on this blog. And for some reason, according to stats, people still visit this blog. Now would be a good time to make note of some new and potentially new things in the Queensbridge-Ravenswood area.
Continue reading “Some new things in the Queensbridge-Ravenswood area”
In a 2017 piece titled, “Discovering the Lost Coast of Queens,” the New York Times profiled several of the developing residential building projects along the Astoria-area East River waterfront. The southern-most of those projects, Alma Realty’s 34-46 Vernon Boulevard, was just getting the “finishing touches,” the Times reported then. The double-headed, 17-story, 404-unit development squeezed between a Ravenswood power plant sub-generator and the film and TV warehouse by Rainey Park, was expected to be leasing, the Times had reported, by the fall of 2017. More than two years and a pandemic since that projected date, the yet-to-open set of towers sits behind a wall of deteriorated construction signs and has become a neighborhood enigma.
Demonstrations in response to the murder of George Floyd by a white cop in Minneapolis as well as other police killings of black Americans such as Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Tony McDade in Tallahassee, Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia and others have been reported across Queens in neighborhoods including Astoria, Queensbridge, Sunnyside, Jackson Heights, Flushing, Jamaica, Hollis, Whitestone, Bayside, Fresh Meadows and Far Rockaway. Continue reading “#BlackLivesMatter protests across Queens”
Death is all around us, and everyone is jogging.
On every temperate day during this pandemic, Vernon Boulevard, the waterfront strip with its parks and protected bikeway, is a continuous stream of joggers and bicyclists, most of them now wearing masks, as ambulances frequently go blaring by. Here on the western edge of Western Queens, we are so close to the epicenter of the epicenter, but not quite of it. Continue reading “On the edge of the epicenter”
I don’t usually like to make the protesters – the ones that haunt the Sunnyside Yards and BQX streetcar planning meetings – the whole story. But last night they didn’t just create a scene, they really disrupted, true to the word, the city’s BQX outreach meeting in Long Island City.
The drama was similar to that which happened at the Sunnyside Yards master plan meeting six months ago, when Queens protesters stood on a table, and created a people’s mic-style forum of sorts, in the middle of the gallery space where info-boards were set-up on easels. At that time, Queens Neighborhoods United dubbed the action a “#SSYshutdown.” But at that meeting, the city planners were still able to hold a separate community meeting in a room down the hall. When the protesters finally tried to get into the meeting, the door was blocked, leaving them to chant in the hall. But not this time. Continue reading “Protesters turn BQX meeting in LIC upside down”
A RentHop study breaks down donation numbers for presidential candidates per zip code. Doesn’t seem like much has changed in recent months, citywide or in LIC-Astoria.
Last year, the new study shows, the 1106 zip code had 53 donors for Bernie Sanders, with 25 for Elizabeth Warren. That’s a nearly parallel rise from 20 for Bernie and 16 for Warren as of last October, but with Bernie doing better. The Queensbridge-Ravenswood area zip code also had 19 Pete Buttigieg donors and 16 Trump donors.
In 11101 (lower LIC), the ratio is similar: Bernie had 53 donors, whereas Warren had 35. Lower LIC also had 30-something donors for Yang (dropped out) and Buttigieg.
In 11102 (Central and waterfront Astoria), there were 41 Bernie donors, 25 Warren Donors, and 13 Buttigieg donors. In that zip, there were also 10 Yang donors and eight Trump donors.
Bernie also scored 58 donors in 11105 (Ditmars) and 42 in 11103 (Steinway).
H/T amNY
The city will be holding public meetings on the Brooklyn-Queens Connector (BQX) through the first half of this year. The Economic Development Corporation’s new BQX website lists workshops in “February/March 2020” and public hearings in “May/June 2020.” The EDC released a conceptual design report in summer 2018.
Coverage: Crain’s, Queens Courier, Gothamist, Brooklyn Eagle
Two years ago today, a man was killed on 36th Avenue near 14th Street.
Today, Judge Kenneth Holder sentenced Javyn McNish, now 21, from the Ravenswood Houses, to 25 years to life, for slaying Jerell Lewis, 20, from Queensbridge, at 4:10PM on December 2, 2017.
On that day, McNish’s friend told him that he’d been in a fight with Lewis, accounts found. McNish then, is said to have chased Lewis into the street near the Ravenswood Houses. He then shot at Lewis three times, say reports, hitting him in the chest, torso and the arm or hand. A bullet to the spinal chord is said to have paralyzed Lewis. McNish is said to have then pistol-whipped Lewis, knocking out two of his teeth. Lewis died later at Mount Sinai Hospital.
McNish, seen on surveillance video, was later found in an apartment with a 9mm semi-automatic pistol. He was charged two days after the death with murder and criminal possession of a weapon. Continue reading “25 to Life For 36th Ave Murder”
The Justice For All Coalition and other activist groups held a weekday noontime press conference at the Sunnyside Yards today, calling for a moratorium on all mega-projects and large-scale rezonings. The protesters also called on the Economic Development Corporation and the Department of City Planning to:
“allocate the tens of billions of dollars intended to develop the yards instead to restore public housing, repair and expand our crumbling infrastructure, save small businesses, and restore habitability for all, not just the wealthy.”
According to a tweet from community organizer Ivan Contreras, more than 100 people participated in the rally. A flyer shows endorsements from 46 organizations, such as obvious ones including Woodside on the Move and Queens Neighborhoods United. There are also endorsements from a few non-local groups such as Coalition to Protect Chinatown & LES and Brooklyn Anti-gentrification Network. Access Queens is not listed.
The EDC is holding a “digital town hall” on December 4. I’m not sure how protesters will be able to crash it. You can sign up here.
