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Here is a portrait of Tribeca from the Census Bureau. Fun facts to be gleaned from the table below: 1. Tribeca is already as dense or even denser than it needs to be. In fact, it may be optimally dense. Tribeca South is denser than Paris (which many, including myself, consider an optimal density). Chinatown […]
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Recap of what happened (see pictures further down) Last year a developer sought to put a glass building on the two tiny triangle lots at 100 Franklin, right in Tribeca East Historic District. The neighborhood really came out in force against it. There was a petition with 1500 signatures and massive turnouts at the various […]
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02 Feb '15
How is the Integrity of Historic Districts Maintained? Historic Districts are cultural assets. Their integrity is a real problem. “Architectural integrity is defined as “those qualities in a building and its site that give it meaning and value” (Morton and Hume, cited in Murtagh, 2005). It is very clear that from both preservation law […]
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27 Jan '15
This is a great idea. Alessandra Galletti of the Tribeca Trust board has been pitching parklets for a while. Everyone at Tribeca Trust has been enthusiastic, although parklets are a bit of a headscratcher in terms of getting set up. We wanted to do one for Finn Square but Con-Ed got grumpy. So last summer, […]
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27 Jan '15
A place unlike any other The country of Yemen has many non-architectural tragedies to deal with. It is a failed state. There is more or less anarchy going on, civil war, declining oil prices, a failed popular movement for more democracy and clean government, the operations of a terrorist network and U.S. drone strikes. Yet […]
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I was asked some questions about historic districts recently. So I decided to work up good answers. Here is the short of it. What is a historic district? A historic district is a neighborhood knitted together by some visual commonality and historical experience. The National Register of Historic Places defines it as “a geographically definable […]
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We really need zoning reform. The problem is simple: Big Real Estate has been allowed to run amok in NYC for too long. They toss up over-scaled high-rises right next to fine old neighborhoods. They attack the concept of zoning and the actual existence of historic districts. They tear down buildings that should be landmarks. […]
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A Whole Block Destroyed by Related Companies and Ponte Equities The Landmarks Preservation Commission has turned a deaf ear to our pleas for this block and instead listened to Big Real Estate – notably that powerful long-term enemy of historic Tribeca, Related Companies, whose tower at 105 Duane sparked the original preservation movement in Tribeca. And […]
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Here we have what used to stand at 50 and 52 Murray Street (south side). Fantastic, no? It was owned by Charles Ahrenfeldt and Son, the New York office of an importer of fine Limoges china. Ahrenfeldt operated out of here from the 1860’s until 1913, when other tenants took over these two matching buildings. […]
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Behold the beautiful Lawrence Building which once stood where Square Diner now sits. Magnificent, is it not? It was written up in “The American Architect and Building News” of Oct 4, 1884 on page 162. The review gushed over the “light-buff brick from Perth Amboy,” “the cornices, string-courses and spandrils” and the “window dressings of terra-cotta, […]
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