For years, the CitiStorage building on Kent Avenue has been a blight on Williamsburg’s waterfront, a husk collecting dust as shiny new high-rise buildings pop up left and right.
It’s finally coming down.
We announced the news back in March, when the NYC Parks Department finally broke ground on an additional parcel of Bushwick Inlet Park, but we’re happy to confirm that it is, in fact, currently in the works. Greenpointers was recently invited to check out the progress being made on the site, so we can tell you for a fact: it’s coming down! We witnessed with our own two eyes an excavator digging up debris!
“We’re so excited to take this next step in the transformation of the North Brooklyn waterfront here at Bushwick Inlet Park. Instead of an abandoned warehouse, New Yorkers will be able to enjoy a beautiful, accessible greenspace where they can take in the city skyline, connect with the diverse nature that surrounds us, and build community with their neighbors,” said Mary Salig, Director of North Brooklyn Parks, NYC Parks Department. “We look forward to working with our partners in the community and throughout government on this ambitious project that will benefit generations of New Yorkers to come.”
Now, what we can’t tell you is when the fully completed Bushwick Inlet Park will be up and running. Building demolition is expected to wrap up at the end of this year and in true Greenpoint/Williamsburg fashion, the site necessitates environmental remediation (thank you, ExxonMobil!). Once the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation gives the go-ahead, that parcel of land can start its transformation into a park space.
As part of the Bloomberg administration’s 2005 Greenpoint/Williamsburg rezoning, locals were entitled to several new parks, one being Bushwick Inlet Park. The park is made up of several different parcels of land, one of which is almost entirely encompassed by the building. The massive CitiStorage building fire in 2015 jeopardized the park’s future, with the land nearly sold to developers before the city stepped in to acquire it in 2016. And in 2021, the city allocated $75 million to complete work on the parcel.
Thank you for this story. In it, I learned that it was Mayor Bloomberg who was responsible for providing for “affordable housing” in the neighborhood, via his plan back in 2005. It wasn’t Lincoln Restler, who’s been quoted in news lately bragging about his district providing “the most affordable housing anywhere in the city!” (similar words, I’m paraphrasing). Number 1 – you have no responsibility for this (on paper, at least) – your district is benefiting from Mr. Bloomberg’s work nearly a decade ago. Number 2 – it’s hardly “affordable housing” – a small percentage of the high rises on the water offer a few units via lottery (and of course they’re impossible to access, even for this neighborhood’s long time residents) and that’s about it. It’s impossible to find anything in Greenpoint b/w complete trash and a $5200/month, amenities NOT included white box (ie studio, or what they call a “small” one bedroom) in one of the high rises – that sums up housing availability in this neighborhood. So you don’t get bragging rights for “affordable housing” … when it comes time to vote for community board members, those of us who live here and deal with this will remember that.
Bragging rights? I see tou’re not a fam of Couciman rrestler, but, he figure aren’t wrong. It’s the unrealistic DEFINITION of affordable hosing that’s the problem, and the State is heavily involved in determining that. As for blame, it was Bloomberg’s rezoning plan which opened the floodgates for greedy real estate developers to stampede Into Greenpoint — causing rents skyrocket for everyone else living in the neighborhood. Of course the same real estate developers will say that is unaffordable for THEM to create truly affordable housing. It’s all about power & money, and ordinary people without money or power are disposable pawns who get screwed in the process. What else is new?