I should have said, "making" rather than "asking" new businesses to use existing facades.

Well, Andrew, I have to admit, the idea of asking new businesses to use existing facades is an excellent one. I'm sure that's happening in other parts of the city, and that might have made for a much more palatable Ikea here.

If all of NY still looked like it did a century and half ago, I doubt many people would regard that as an improvement.

[11] Posted by: okay. | May 9, 2006 07:47 AM

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Not suggesting that at all. But the waterfront structure being torn down to accommodate Ikea is singular, as is Red Hook. It's like killing the last of a species.

You're right -- it would be stupid to say we can't tear anything down. But it's just as stupid to tear everything down.

Which is what is happening in this city.

Architecture and history are part of a city and become increasingly a part of it as it gets older. Preservation is as important as growth in a great city.

Yes, cities change. And there is no guarantee that the New York of tomorrow will be a desirable place. It's our job to keep it that way. (That's assuming, of course, that you think it's desirable to begin with.)

Now, the Ikea project is flawed for reasons other than preservation issues. For one thing, it's just a bad location -- not designed to accommodate that kind of traffic.

But, ignoring that, would it have been an unfair condition for the city to have placed upon this project if they required Ikea to keep the facade of the existing historic structure?

Would that have been too much to ask?

Because we asked for nothing.

Unfortunately, NY is a city more than it is a historical site. It's a place where people live and work and sometimes buy furniture. And, thankfully, a city that lives and breathes and changes and gets older. It's a city. It has to. If all of NY still looked like it did a century and half ago, I doubt many people would regard that as an improvement.

Stop making bad panoramas! Instead, use autostitch. You'll thank me later.

>>>It's not much to look at now-- but some day soon, you'll be buying all your affordable Swedish furniture on this very spot.

Not with an $89 delivery fee, I'm not.

www.forgotten-ny.com

Thanks for your response Andrew I should have added that I lived close to Red Hook all my life. Im glad that people are starting to move in there and bring the stores, etc. with them. I agree 100% about the transit issue but won't this Ikea be good for the neighborhood. Im not trying to pick a fight - I really do love that area and want it to become a vibrant residential and commerical area but I still cannot see why Ikea is a bad thing. Most people who live in Red Hook projects are living in poverty and many are unemployed - won't this bring much needed jobs?

[6] Posted by: Stacey | May 8, 2006 04:42 PM

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A lot of this has been reported on, Stacey.

The actual number of unemployed in Red Hook seems to be lower than insinuated. However, yes -- jobs would be nice -- but none have been promised

The only "guarantee" made to the people of Red Hook is that residents of Red Hook's zip code can apply for the (mostly low-wage, part-time) positions two weeks before anyone else. There is no guarantee that any Red Hook resident will get a job. In fact, even if they gave all the jobs to people in that zip code, there would still be no guarantee a resident of Red Hook would get one because the zip code encompasses more than the Red Hook area.

Anyway (without addressing the seemingly obvious fact that most people don't work in the neighborhood where they live), there have always been jobs in Red Hook. American Stevedoring -- which is being denied the multi-year lease renewal they seek for their currently-operational Red Hook facility -- offers better jobs than Ikea. And the dry dock Ikea will replace was a source of jobs. There are many other examples.

Enhancing Red Hook's inherent appeal and developing a strong, local economy based on its unique strengths is what would help "the community". A giant, car-oriented store will help Red Hook about as much as casinos helped Atlantic City.

Not at all.

You wanna help the poor people in Red Hook -- create a neighborhood where they have something to do, somewhere to go, something nice to look at.

This Ikea will bring traffic, pollution, accidents and no tangible improvement to anybody except Joe Birkin of Mill Basin who needs a couch.

And meanwhile, no one will be able to stand in front of Lillie's bar and see what was seen a century and a half ago. That continuity and understanding can't be replaced. A stately piece of New York's waterfront history will be lost.

And for what?

the traffic is going to be terrible, i don't think anyone disagrees about that.

certain big box retailers get more shit than others (wal-mart, obviously, and ikea in this particular case, versus say whole foods), probably due more to class and publicity issues than anything to do with the location. wal-mart could propose a location out in the middle of space and people would be against it, whereas whole foods could have a store built on top of an african slave burial ground with minimal fanfare.

image, after all, is everything. whole foods is the 2nd largest non-union grocer chain in the united states (behind whole foods) but they cater to a vastly different consumer base than wal-mart does. john mackey has repeatedly come out publically against unions for being retrograde and damaging to companies, etc.

though in a few years, when the local foods/raw foods (i.e the more hardcore than thou in the "organic" arena) gain some more steam, we might see some similar actions against whole foods.

personally, i don't shop at either but i do find the way corporate identity plays into things like site scouting, market penetration and the like.

Thanks for your response Andrew I should have added that I lived close to Red Hook all my life. Im glad that people are starting to move in there and bring the stores, etc. with them. I agree 100% about the transit issue but won't this Ikea be good for the neighborhood. Im not trying to pick a fight - I really do love that area and want it to become a vibrant residential and commerical area but I still cannot see why Ikea is a bad thing. Most people who live in Red Hook projects are living in poverty and many are unemployed - won't this bring much needed jobs?

Stacey -

There is a vibrant and burgeoning artistic community in Red Hook, in addition to yuppie "pioneers", had-it-with-Williamsburg hipsters and the good people of Red Hook's projects. (Also 6 Italians who forgot to move out in 1963.)

Good bars. Increasing numbers of restaurants, some quite good.

Have you somehow missed all the (somewhat overstated) "Red Hook is Hot" articles in recent years?

The neighborhood's growth has been hampered by insufficient transit access and other factors but it's not exactly been "languishing". (As a matter of fact, the dry dock being supplanted by Ikea was operational until it changed hands.)

When you say you've lived in Brooklyn all your life, what does that mean? Brooklyn is pretty big and simply being a native gives you no special knowledge of Red Hook. Do you know the area in any more than a drive-by sense?

I mean no offense by this. I was born and raised in Brooklyn but didn't know Red Hook until a few years ago. Many/most Brooklynites don't.

But the way to remedy this is not to undo the charm and life that's already there, rather to enhance it.

Countless additional people will go to Red Hook once the Ikea is built but, basically, none of them will know the area any better than they do now. It'll be in/(traffic delays)/out.

This is development for the benefit of outsiders, not the community itself. "Let's put that big store -- over there -- so, we can go to it and get what we want. It may help you but it won't help Red Hook.

I have lived in Brooklyn all my life and that area has always looked the same. I never heard of anyone else showing interest there. It seems to me (and please enlighten me if I am wrong) that as soon as Ikea decided they wanted to build there all of sudden it can be used for much better purposes. Why wans't it done before. This area languished for as long as I can remember.

Kevin -

From a purely practical perspective -- bad location.

Ikeas are designed to be off highways. The traffic will be miserable.

Also, the building being replaced did/does not look gritty and industrial. It had/has that proud quality that certain old structures have, with "New York Dock Company" or some similar impressively encompassing generic name etched into the facade. (Is the front still there? If it is, you should go see it.)

Re your European vs. American corporations point (which is irrelevant to my argument in favor of Red Hook's preservation), my complaint is not with corporations. (At least, not in this context).

Ikea wants a store in New York -- I get that. In fact, I was in favor of this project until I came to know Red Hook over the last few years.

But I learned that the character and history in Red Hook is unique in modern New York and should not be allowed to be destroyed. Unfortunately, we have no leaders, in politics or business, with the sensitivity and character to realize this and take action.

Hell, even a conservative think tank (I think it was the Manhattan Institute), which could be expected to favor business interests, was against this for the reasons I've just laid out -- that Red Hook offers more if we exploit its unique potential than if we destroy it.

They were in favor of the "Inner Harbor" proposal to emphasize the maritime village that is Red Hook, developing it using the existing architectural stock.

You know, there were all these articles a couple of weeks ago bemoaning the fact that passengers debarking the Queen Mary in Red Hook had no incentive to spend time or money there.

I doubt the ability to buy cheap, modern Swedish furniture will provide such inducement.

i do not share so dim a view of ikea - i highly appreciate good swedish design! i think it will allow brooklyn residents to discard their yellow and brown and pick up some green and pink! it would have been neat to see it look like a gritty industrial warehouse, but then again, they are not only selling furniture, but a brand as well.

ikea, like other european design corporations (think swatch) made their way to the top by being good at what they do, not by exploiting people like american corporations do. at this point, if you need cheap furniture, the only ikeas are in new jersey or long island. i welcome this ikea!

The demolition of that mid-19th century dry dock to make way for Ikea makes me want to weep.

I never hated Ikea, but now I do, as it seems they bribed leaders of the Red Hook projects' community to support them.

To think that only one City Council member -- Charles Barron -- voted against this deal, while they're all frothing at the mouth about Wal-Mart in Queens.

What would Wal-Mart be supplanting? Certainly not a historic part of the only more or less untouched waterfront community in the city.

These guys don't know from Red Hook. They just didnt want anyone to be able to say they were against jobs for poor people in Red Hook (which were not part of the deal, anyway). Bloomberg's the kind of a guy who would visit Baltimore and come away singing the praises of the Inner Harbor, never once realizing he had the opportunity to have something like that here at home.

What does this rich-man from Mass. know about NYC? He knows a little more than before he was mayor, but New York to him is the Upper East Sider's New York -- with a self-satisfaction about that way of life that would never let him imagine that homogenizing the city to its standards and styles would not be everybody's idea of paradise.

Why does everything in the city have to be the same? Why couldn't Ikea use the facade of the existing structure?

Arrogance. Limited imagination. They just don't care.

The pace of this change is dizzying. "Development" proponents claim it's New York's spirit to build.

But building is too easy now. Once upon a time, a major construction project was a big deal. People built monuments to themselves and their ambitions that were often things of beauty.

Now, materials are cheap, technology lets us build tall on every block and the structures have more sameness than a McDonald's.

That kind of building is NOT in the spirit of New York. New York is found not only in luxury high rises but in tenements, warehouses, shipyards and people.

When all that is gone we will merely be a generic city -- an Indianapolis on the Hudson.