Vanishing New York Backup

The McDonald's on 6th Avenue and 28th Street is getting a gut renovation. This would not be newsworthy, except for the fact that this McDonald's was once a Child's restaurant , a chain of long ago, beloved by urban historians, and this renovation has so far included the destruction of the antique terra-cotta decoration around the top of the 1930 building. The motif includes intertwined seahorses, Child's signature style , with some creatures that look like bears. A large portion has been scraped off so far. In Coney Island, the Child's was landmarked. This one won't be worthy of preservation once all the seahorses are destroyed. Is this an intentional scalp job?

The new Astor Place is at it again. Now that our public space has been semi-privatized by the Bloomberg administration and the Village Alliance BID, now that it's a prime example of zombie urbanism , it continues to push the interactive corporate advertainment installations. First, there was the Design Pavilion . Now it's a "tiny food" pop-up cafe to "celebrate the new Zagat app!" Yes, tiny food. Look at it. So tiny. So cute. As Jim Windolf once said in Vanity Fair , "Big business is not blind to the power of cute... cuteness tricks you into forgetting that it represents something that’s not cute in the slightest." Zagat is owned by Google, who basically owns everything about you. And there's that whole thing about public spaces being privatized. But don't think about that! Just get excited about tiny food! Tiny tacos. Tiny burgers. Tiny pizza. Tiny cookies. All "versions" of food items from trendy eateries around t

I went to the Carnegie Deli recently to experience it before it shutters forever this New Year's Eve after 79 years in business. It's closing not because of the rent, but because the owner is tired of it all. Someone wants to buy the place and keep it going, but the owner is not interested . It's closing. Period. So I went. If you've tried to get into the Carnegie you know it's almost impossible, thanks to the hordes of tourists mobbing at the door day and night. Tourists have always dined at the Carnegie--I did when I was a teenage tourist--but today the city suffers under mass tourism and there are many places--parks, museums--that are no longer enjoyable because of them. So I got there at 8:00 in the morning, the moment it opened. Only a few diners were inside. It was quiet, the speakers playing light music from the 70s and 80s. Kenny Rogers, Barry Manilow, Neil Diamond. Their images hang on the walls, in the famous sea of autographed head shots. What wi

VANISHED Last week, I shared the news that Bleecker Street Records would be closing . This past weekend, they shuttered. from Bleecker St. Records Facebook page As noted earlier, the shop left Bleecker Street in 2013 after over 20 years in business when the landlord hiked the rent to $27,000 . They relocated to West 4th. Sadly, many relocations don't work out, and stable, long-term small businesses often fold after being forced to move. The shop's old spot on Bleecker was turned into a Starbucks . In more depressing news, the record store's famous cat, Creeper, died two weeks ago. Their Facebook page reported: "She's up in rock & roll kitty heaven with her brother, Scuzzball, and probably sitting on David Bowie's lap on a sparkling cloud floating somewhere above Manhattan." from Bleecker St. Records Facebook page

The Museum of the City of New York is currently showing " Gay Gotham: Art and Underground Culture in New York ," a multi-media exhibit that "brings to life the queer creative networks that sprang up in the city across the 20th century." It's a show worth seeing. I was most intrigued by a collection of small photographs taken on the streets of New York by an anonymous photographer in the 1960s. They show men walking, cruising, and meeting other men, mostly around 42nd Street. The wall text references a 1960 New York Times article decrying the "decay of 42nd Street," thanks in part to homosexuals, at a time when the city wanted to attract tourists for the upcoming World's Fair. In the article, reporter Milton Bracker hits the street to see the decay for himself. "In two weeks of studying the area, virtually at all hours," he wrote, "this reporter encountered several of the most extreme types. One was a Negro who wore fluff

VANISHING New York Bakery is not a bakery. It's a hidden little gem on West 29th Street where the owner, Harrison, and his wife serve a quietly celebrated mix of Mexican and Korean food. It's been there for 12 years, up a narrow set of rusty stairs in the Wholesale District. It won't be there much longer, as tipster Jared wrote in. I went by for lunch. Harrison told me that developers are working on permits to tear down the building and put up something bigger. He figures he's got another month or two before he has to go. When he first opened shop, the Korean immigrant sold Korean food. But no one was buying. He noticed that many of the workers in the neighborhood were Hispanic. A Mexican woman started cooking for him and business got better. Gothamist recently called the tacos "glorious." Now, with its ethnic mash-up, New York Bakery attracts devoted fans from all over the city. Harrison told me, "My customers will be crying" when

VANISHING Back in 2013, I shared the news that Bleecker Street Records, after over 20 years in business, would be leaving Bleecker Street --and relocating to West 4th--when the landlord hiked the rent to $27,000. Now we hear they are vanishing completely. Jason at Generation Records wrote in: "As of Halloween 2016, we will be making some significant changes at Generation Records. After much deliberation, we have decided to close our sister store, Bleecker Street Records. A number of factors have contributed to this decision, most notably the proximity of our two stores and the realistic necessity of having them both in a neighborhood that has seen a drastic rent hike in recent years . We realize that the loss of yet another record store in Manhattan seems discouraging, but our hope is to secure the future of Generation Records as a Village staple." He reports they'll be consolidating all the stock from Bleecker Street Records to Generation on Thompson Stree

Astor Place has long been a site of public protest and free expression. Today, after an upscale redesign, it is being controlled. This is what happens in a neoliberalized city. Public space becomes quasi-privatized. And as urban scholar Sharon Zukin notes in Naked City , "Privatized public space...tends to reinforce social inequality." New signs asserting the rules have gone up over Astor Place. Prohibited activities include the "unreasonable obstruction" of sitting areas and pedestrians, along with camping, storing personal belongings, and lying down. This language clearly refers to the presence of homeless people and presumably will be used to harass them out of the new plaza. They can also be used to stop political protests and spontaneous, unregulated art performances. Skateboarding is also not allowed, though it's been an unofficial Astor Place tradition for decades. In addition to this sign, there are several other day-glo signs placed on the g

If you walk past Ellen's Stardust Diner at Broadway and 51st, you'll find their singing waiters making music -- on the street. They're singing in protest of several firings that came after they unionized this summer in response to a change in management they say led to sexual harassment, bullying, and other abuses . Ellen's Stardust Diner has been in business since 1995. The workers' union is called Stardust Family United , a branch of the international labor union Industrial Workers of the World. You can visit their site to support them, and see more on their Facebook page. Playbill has many more details on the story.

Park Slope has a new Starbucks. A gigantic Starbucks. It recently opened on the corner of 7th Avenue and 9th Street in a part of the neighborhood with very few, if any, national chain stores. This large corner spot was previously home to Brooklyn Flipster's, a burger place. Their lease was not renewed . Too bad the city won't stand up to corporations. Too bad they won't zone to stop the spread of chain stores. Too bad they won't pass the Small Business Jobs Survival Act or give us back commercial rent regulation, like we had decades ago. Too bad Mayor de Blasio, in his own home neighborhood, won't do anything to stop the homogenization of the city and the total destruction of the small business streetscape. Too bad no one in power will stand up and #SaveNYC .

Back in June, Three Lives & Co. Books announced that their building was up for sale . On a month-to-month lease, they hoped the future new owner would let them stay. I just found out, thanks to a tipster, that the sale of the building went through last week . And it does not look good for Three Lives. Papers filed with the New York City Department of Finance reveal the buyer is Oliver's Company. They paid $14 million -- that's $4 million more than the asking price . On their website , Oliver's Realty Group is described as "the independent investment, development and brokerage arm of Oliver's Company, LLC, formed in 1995 to specialize in luxury residential real estate ." Oliver's developments all look the same, from the High Line-hugging Caledonia to Tribeca Park. The company is run by David J. Wine, a real estate professional "with unparalleled knowledge and insight into the luxury rental and condominium markets in Manhattan."