Take Back Gowanus

Brad Lander’s Bridging Gowanus series of meetings has spurred some local Gowanus activists to hold their own meetings. “Take Back Gowanus” will be held Wednesday evening at 7 pm at the Green Building, normally home for weddings and other celebrations. It is at the corner of Bond and Union Streets. The Green Building is itself a symbol of the change in Gowanus. It used to be a brass foundry, and was renovated to become an elegant catering hall some years ago. Now, it faces extinction as the whole block is on the market for future real estate development, which these days generally takes the form of luxury condo apartments.Take Back Gowanus

The meeting will begin at 7 pm. The people behind it include a local Gowanus historian and a group called FROGG. These are groups who are somewhat resistent to wholesale neighborhood change, and in favor of neighborhood preservation.

These days it is tough to preserve neighborhoods in the face of the gobs of money that can be made by neighborhood transformation. Gowanus is only the latest Brooklyn neighborhood to face this situation. Come to this meeting and see how local activists can come to criticize even ‘progressive’ politicians.

The photos below are from a recent canoe trip on the Gowanus Canal. While some real estate interests were against the current Superfund program, a 10 year program they probably thought would delay Gowanus gentrification, a trip on the canal shows in close-up detail that the cleanup is sorely needed. IMG_4957 IMG_4958 IMG_4960 IMG_4962 IMG_4964

Share:

Facebook
Twitter
LinkedIn

2 Comments

  1. story correction

    Don;t know where you got the idea that the Superfund Cleanup “introduced a time delay to cleanup the canal”. Prior to Superfund, there was NO PLAN TO CLEANUP THE CANAL.
    Substituting an actual cleanup plan for no plan, is not a delay by any measure.

    However, the city of New York, who wants to rezone the canal, is adding delay to the Superfund work, needlessly stretching out the cleanup process. Yet their whole basis for the claim to rezone is because of the resulting cleanup.

  2. gbrook@pipeline.com

    You are correct – I wrote too quickly. I changed it to more precisely reflect what I meant to say… thanks!

On Key

Related Posts

An ode to the bar at the edge of the world, theater review by Oscar Fock

It smells like harbor, I thought as I walked out to the end of the pier to which the barge now known as the Waterfront Museum was docked. Unmistakable were they, even for someone like me maybe particularly for someone like me, who’s always lived far enough from the ocean to never get used to its sensory impressions, but always

Millennial Life Hacking Late Stage Capitalism, by Giovanni M. Ravalli

Back in 2019, before COVID, there was this looming feeling of something impending. Not knowing exactly what it was, only that it was going to impact the economy for better or worse. Erring on the side of caution, I planned for the worst and hoped for the best. My mom had just lost her battle with a rare cancer (metastasized

Brooklyn Bridge Rotary Club returns to it’s roots, by Brian Abate

The first Brooklyn Rotary Club was founded in 1905 and met in Brooklyn Heights. Their successor club, the Brooklyn Bridge Rotary Club, is once again meeting in the Heights in a historic building at 21 Clark Street that first opened in 1928 as the exclusive Leverich Hotel. Rotary is an international organization that brings together persons dedicated to giving back