Coney Island

The Municipal Art Society has launched its Web site devoted to Coney Island, part of the civic group's initiative to bring in new ideas for designing a reimagined amusement zone. Check it out here, and feed them suggestions.

On Friday, we wrote about how the Municipal Art Society is putting together a design forum to come up with ideas for the redevelopment of Coney Island, kicking off the initiative today.

But this weekend, a Department of City Planning spokeswoman sent over a statement from planning director Amanda Burden that effectively fired a shot over the Municipal Art Society's bow, saying that the city welcomes new ideas—but not any that would change or interfere with its own rezoning plan for the area.

"It is imperative that the rezoning process and timeline not be jeopardized by any reconsideration of our proposed rezoning boundaries or urban design parameters," Ms. Burden said in the statement.  read more »

In the works for years now, the city's planned redevelopment of Coney Island has never been short on input. A sampling of what we've seen in the last year: A self-proclaimed "bombshell" press conference by a dissatisfied state Senator, an environmental "scoping" hearing with a stream of freaks, musicians, a hunger striker and the Reverend Billy; an info session that attracted busloads of protesters, many of whom were apparently unfamiliar with the issue.

Now, the Municipal Art Society  is stepping deep into the muck, with plans on Monday to kick off its own charrette—a pow-wow of designers and amusement experts—as part of its larger recent focus on the Coney issue.  read more »

The Bloomberg administration announced today it has agreed to pay $11 million for a piece of Coney Island boardwalk property, putting into city hands the land under much of Wonder Wheel park owned for decades by the Ward family.

The property was once sought, and nearly acquired, by Thor Equities, the largest landowner in the area which has been sparring with the Bloomberg administration for nearly two years over a vision for the amusement district. Just a few months ago, city officials referred to the site as land controlled by Thor, assuming they would need to purchase it from the developer along with most of the rest of the land along the boardwalk.  read more »

Michael Immerso, author of Coney Island: The People's Playground, wrote in the Wall Street Journal this weekend a conditional endorsement of the Bloomberg administration's Coney Island plans:

New York's goal of making Coney a year-round tourist destination is worthy of support -- but not in a way that leaves insufficient space for seasonal attractions and amusements that have become synonymous with Coney Island. The city hasn't yet struck a proper balance. Under the current plan, too little land is allotted for the outdoor amusements, arcades and game stands that have long been Coney Island summer staples. The redevelopment zone comprises some 47 acres, and with the right zoning there can be ample space for year-round attractions without confining classic Coney Island amusements to a fraction of that area.

Then there's this beautiful historical context:  read more »

With two straight days of rain ahead of us, we can't think of many things that would be better than spending the weekend watching movies. Films even (hey, it is fall). And lucky us, there happens to be this massive film festival going on. Actually, there are two! If you're interested in some cinematic fare that's perhaps a bit more under the radar, the 8th Annunal Coney Island Film Festival, which kicks off tonight, might be worth checking out. This year's centerpiece is Save Coney Island, a film that documents the past year's worth of efforts to preserve the historic Brooklyn amusement site.  read more »

Back in the late spring, the city added a few new slides to its Coney Island redevelopment plan PowerPoint, presumably to assuage critics, that showed successively how the core amusement area has shrunk decade after decade to become just a pitiful shadow of what it once was. With the city's planned rezoning, the pitch went, Coney could come closer to its heyday and be large and lively by historic standards.

Now with Astroland apparently headed to amusement park heaven, the city added a new slide.

"Coney Island: 2009?" the slide read, showing an overhead view with active amusements highlighted in orange, and a big swath missing where Astroland is today.  read more »

"Good riddance! Throngs of confused people meandering knee-deep in trash blown from unattended-to garbage cans. Nice! Really, really nice! There are many other cleaner, safer, better beaches and boardwalk attractions so close in Jersey... Coney Island doesn't even have a shell store or decent restaurant associated with its beach area." ["Advantage Sitt! Astroland Closing for Good"]

Here's a statement from Astroland co-owner Carol Hill Albert on the Coney Island amusement park's impending closure for good this Sunday. It was sent to the Save Coney Island listserv.

I am making this statement today to set the record straight. I have not "given up on Coney Island" as Thor Equities has stated. I have given up on trying to get Thor to negotiate which I have attempted to do every month since June, and numerous times in August. Each time their response was, "We have no answer." The safety of our customers and our commitment to employees means our time has run out. Ride parts must be ordered a minimum of eight to 10 months in advance. My employees cannot live in a state of limbo any longer. It takes six months to pack up a three-acre amusement park that has been in operation for 46 years, so a January 31st deadline means start packing yesterday. We are out of time.  read more »

Coney Island's Astroland will have its last day this Sunday. Then it's over for the iconic amusement park, according to reports out this afternoon. A deal couldn't be reached by 1 p.m. today between Astroland's operator and its landlord Joseph Sitt, who has big plans for the area (if the city doesn't get its way first).

Here's the Post's take. Here's an emailed statement from Lynn Kelly, president of the Bloomberg administration's Coney Island Development Corporation:

Today’s announcement that Astroland will close after 46 years should be a serious wake-up call to those who have stood back and watched as the fate of Coney Island has been left in limbo without any safeguards for its future.

 read more »

It's only July and already the so-called "Summer of Hope" is winding down on Coney Island.

Gowanus Lounge is reporting that the various rides and attractions touted by controversial developer Joe Sitt back in April are currently being dismantled, apparently headed to some other carnival site in Tennessee.

This Coney Island music video has been around for a few months now, but we only stumbled upon it today (via a Brooklyn Paper article). The tune was performed (i.e., delivered in public comment form) at the uncharacteristically not-boring planning meeting Tuesday evening on the city's proposed Coney Island rezoning.

We thought we’d post a few renderings from the city’s slideshow at its rowdy Coney Island scoping meeting Tuesday evening.

All goes without saying that renderings are a crucial tool in the battle to win public support for development projects in the city. The last batch made by the city, now somewhat obsolete given that the plan has since been modified, emphasized rides and roller coasters, whereas this time the city seems to be trying to stress the street-level vitality that could come as a result of the plan.

Renderings from the Department of City Planning:

Leading up to tonight’s scoping meeting of the Coney Island revamp, various advocacy groups and others are staking out positions on the city’s plan, a few of which have ended up in our inbox. The comments are on the latest iteration of the plan, which was altered after it met opposition from Councilman Domenic Recchia, who sided with landowners including major property owner Joseph Sitt.

The hearing, which starts at six in Coney Island, has attracted a large bit of attention given that it's ostensibly intended for comments on what should or should not be included in a draft environmental impact statement.  read more »

Coney Island merchant Dianna Carlin continues her quest to reopen her Lola Staar Dreamland Roller Rink in the abandoned Childs Restaurant building with the first of two fund-raisers tonight.

Ms. Carlin is trying to raise the necessary funds for an assembly permit to cover the whole 60,000-square-foot building -- the cost of which is considerable.  read more »

Gowanus Lounge has the text of Dick Zigun's resignation letter from the Coney Island Development Corporation. The Mayor of Coney Island is rather peeved at the Bloomberg administration's current plan for the amusement mecca. As he told my colleague Eliot Brown in May, "The new plan sucks."

Mr. Zigun elaborates in his letter:  read more »

Proprietors of venerable Coney Island institution Ruby's Bar & Grill hope to reopen Friday afternoon, following vigorous repairs to replace a collapsed floor in the men's room that sent one patron to the hospital over the weekend.

Much maligned developer Joseph Sitt of Thor Equities, who owns the building, is chipping in on the cost of repairs, which were completed yesterday, according to a source at the bar.  read more »

The Health Department has shuttered venerable Ruby's Bar & Grill on the Coney Island boardwalk following a bizarre incident on Saturday, which I reported in this week's Observer.

A cop on the scene summed it up thusly: “One guy was taking a leak, the floor partially collapsed, and he fell 10 feet.”

Police closed down the bar soon after the accident on Saturday. It reopened Sunday. Then the health inspector closed it down again yesterday, according to a well-placed source on the boardwalk.

The jukebox at Ruby’s Bar & Grill was cranking out its usual eclectic mix of beachy classics—Frank Sinatra’s “Strangers In the Night,” Milli Vanilli’s “Blame It on the Rain”—this past Saturday when proprietor Michael Sarrel abruptly pulled the plug.

“Finish your drinks!” he told patrons of the venerable Coney Island venue at 5:22 p.m.  read more »

"How about making some noise for opening the beach?" Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe said from the podium, as brightly dressed protesters standing behind a police line chanted, "Thor no more! Thor no more!"

So began another politically charged season at Coney Island under appropriately gloomy skies on Thursday morning.  read more »

Mermaids, hula-hooping transvestites, scantily-dressed burlesque dancers, tattooed carnies, and a host of other Coney Island characters took their act over the bridge last night to raise money for Coney Island U.S.A., a 29-year-old, nonprofit arts program that supports the amusement park’s mainstream underbelly.

If Memorial Day was not approaching, the good-naturedly lascivious scene inside the Angel Orensanz Foundation’s headquarters—ironically a former Lower East Side synagogue—could have easily been mistaken for a Halloween party.

Busty, bikini-clad, not-quite-spring-chicken, burlesque dancers and mermaids mingled as costumed swing dancers twirled their way across the dance floor to the music of Lady Luck and the Suicide Kings.  read more »

For those of you who have always wanted to go see the Coney Island Circus Side Show or the Mermaid Parade but are too lazy to trek out to Brooklyn, tonight is your night.

The amusment park's motley crew of underbelly performance artists is coming to the Lower East Side from 7 to 11 p.m. for Coney Island USA’s annual Spring Gala at the Angel Orensanz Foundation. Lady Luck and the Suicide Kings are performing, and the Brooklyn Bombshells will kick off the night with swing dance lessons.  read more »

Pat Singer, the founder of the Brighton Beach Neighbors Association, has lived in the Brooklyn neighborhood for 44 years.

But she is not, as she estimates roughly 80 percent of her neighbors are, a Russian immigrant, and does not speak the language.

So she had a hard time one evening around Thanksgiving of last year explaining to the 20 or so elderly Russian Brighton Beachers what they were doing at her organization’s offices at Brighton Beach Avenue and 14th Street on a Monday evening.  read more »

Even on dreary days like today, we can smell the old-hot-dog-and-rotting-garbage-breeze blowing in festival season this summer. At Coney Island, the Village Voice's 8th Annual Siren Music Festival on July 19 is one main events, with a decent line-up this year. Pitchfork alerts us that Indie rock god Stephen Malkmus (Pavement reunion, please!) and the Jicks, Canadian noise rockers Broken Social Scene and CMJ Music Festival darlings Parts & Labor and Dragons of Zynth will be playing, along with Beach House, Times New Viking, the Dodos, Annuals, the Helio Sequence, These Are Powers, Film School, and Jaguar Love.

Joe Sitt, the developer who owns much of the amusement district at Coney Island, today announced a new set of rides and other amusements to fill his vacant lots for the summer. On the list for the new “Dreamland”: bumper cars, a “Giant Gondola” and a petting zoo, among others.

Mr. Sitt's efforts come as amusement enthusiasts are pushing back against the city’s new plan for Coney Island, a proposal they claim is far too generous to the landowner. The city’s prior proposal would have effectively forced Mr. Sitt to sell or swap the bulk of his land, as the city wanted to create a 15-acre city-owned amusement zone. That plan ran into opposition from local Councilman Domenic Recchia, who sided with Mr. Sitt, and thus the city was forced to compromise, given the power of local elected officials in major land-use changes.

Now the city and Mr. Sitt are negotiating over the revised plan, which Mr. Sitt has thus far resisted supporting.  read more »

The Bloomberg administration is getting squeezed from all sides with its Coney Island plan, as its most recent proposal is taking fire from both advocates of the historic amusement hub and the area’s major landholder, Joseph Sitt.

Key advocates who once rallied behind the Bloomberg administration are now coming out strongly against the city’s proposal, expressing dismay that it would further shrink down the amusement district, putting retail and some hotels where city-owned land for amusements was once planned.

“The new plan sucks,” said Dick Zigun, the director of the nonprofit Coney Island USA who is often called the unofficial mayor of Coney Island. “They initially came together and came up with a plan that everybody got on board for … This is so watered down it is unacceptable.”  read more »

Mayor Bloomberg and Joseph Sitt just can’t seem to get along.

Mr. Sitt, the major landowner in Coney Island, has been resisting the city’s quest to remake the Brooklyn enclave. He opposed the city’s earlier plan and now has reservations about a compromise that would allow him to develop much of his land just north of a nine-acre amusement zone.  read more »

The debate over the future of Coney Island has become enmeshed in politics; standing at center stage is Councilman Domenic Recchia.

“I tell you one thing, we’re going to get a new boardwalk,” the Brooklyn Democrat said, stomping his foot last week on the decaying wooden planks of Coney Island’s signature walkway.  read more »

Coney Island merchants sent out a terse press release Friday afternoon in response to "an ominous fence which is obstructing the entrances to an entire block of businesses on the boardwalk."

The Parks Department, which erected the fence a day earlier, issued the following explanation via email to The Observer:

The Parks Department is currently doing maintenance work along the boardwalk including the area between West 12th Street and Stillwell Avenue to reinforce its support structures and repair decking material. The affected areas will be repaired or replaced, and fencing will be removed, prior to the start of the busy beach season. While we regret any inconvenience this may present to adjacent business owners, safer structures will be a benefit in the long run and, in the meantime, we are preserving access wherever possible.

Seaside merchants have long complained about the sorry state of Coney Island's rickety boardwalk.

And some say the city's latest attempt to address the situation isn't really helping:

"Instead of fixing the boardwalk in front of the businesses that go from Stillwell [Avenue] to 12th Street, the Parks Department decided to build this enormous barricade in front of all our stores," said Dianna Carlin, owner of the Lola Starr Souvenir Boutique. "So now all of our businesses are completely blocked in by this wall, which they say will be there all summer."

Charlie Bendit stood atop Coney Island’s ancient Childs Restaurant building, peering out to sea.

“Can you imagine being up on the roof and having a wedding overlooking the ocean? What a wonderful experience,” he said. “In the summertime, you can have part of it outdoors, part of it indoors. You can have an outdoor dancing area, which is what the roof used to be used for.”  read more »

"It was a great night and it was definitely a huge success by all accounts," gushed Coney Island T-shirt maven Dianna Carlin following last Saturday night's splashy grand opening party at her Lola Staar Dreamland Roller Rink in the abandoned landmark Childs Restaurant building on the boardwalk.

Sponsored by Glamour magazine and fashion designer Tommy Hilfiger (promoting a new perfume called "Dreaming"), the event featured appearances by sparkly dressed pop singer Ashanti and pig-tailed actress Marisa Tomei (sporting her own kitschy T-shirt: "I'M PULLIN' FOR PEE-WEE").

"We had 1,000 people RSVP," Ms. Carlin said. "Luckily, not all of them showed up. ... For a while, we ran out of roller skates."

Yet no one has done any skating at the makeshift rink since Saturday's party.

   read more »

Curbed and Gowanus Lounge have photos (and video!) from Saturday evening's opening party for the Lola Staar Dreamland Roller Rink in Coney Island. The rink is the brainchild of Dianna Carlin, whom my colleague Chris Shott profiled in last week's Observer.

Ms.  read more »

My colleague Chris Shott profiled unlikely Coney Island activist Dianna Carlin in Wednesday's Observer, including her efforts to open a roller rink in the Brooklyn neighborhood. (The New York Post has a story on Ms. Carlin in today's paper. It's, um, labeled EXCLUSIVE.)

Ms. Carlin emailed us on Wednesday about the opening-day party for the Lola Staar Dreamland Roller Rink. It's tomorrow at 6 p.m.  read more »

The Bloomberg administration’s plans to revitalize and reinvent Coney Island have been through a noticeable evolution. A year ago, the city wanted to partner with the private landowners in the amusement district at Coney to give the historic hub a makeover, establishing the neighborhood as a regional destination.

Then the city determined that the private landowners—one in particular, Joe Sitt of Thor Equities—were not the perfect partners they had imagined. In November, the mayor announced a plan that would put the city in the captain’s seat by taking control of the entire amusement zone, buying out or trading property with the owners.

Then last night, at a forum at the Museum of the City of New York, a city official acknowledged there were talks going on to reach some sort of agreement where the city would realize a remade amusement district in conjunction with the private landowners, which would represent a reverse from the November announcement. The official, Coney Island Development Corporation president Lynn Kelly, said she could not expand much beyond that, but did say of the plan that “the different landowners could partake in all of this.”

Why the shift since November?

As often with development fights, local politics reign supreme.  read more »

When Coney Island stalwart Dianna Carlin talks about her “wild roller-coaster ride,” she isn’t referring to the rickety old Cyclone.

Last March, the gingery 34-year-old T-shirt designer from Detroit was facing eviction from her small souvenir shop on the boardwalk.  read more »

Tonight the Coney Island rezoning plan moves one step further toward completion with a public scope meeting where residents are invited to comment on the scope of the environmental impact.

Since the Economic Development Corporation has not even started conducting the environmental impact assessment, the controversial rezoning remains a world away—its projected enactment date is 2019, 10 years after ground is broken.

Alas, one of the rezoning scheme’s most vocal opponents, Senator Carl Kruger, will not be speaking at the hearing because he failed to get a flu shot this year, but will be submitting testimony, his representative said.  read more »

“I think it’s very bad-ass,” said Brooklyn burlesque queen Angie Pontani. “It’s a really bold move and I’m proud of the city for coming up with it.”

She was referring to Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s controversial plan to redevelop Coney Island.

“In the face of Coney Island becoming a high-rise luxury condominium development, I think this is definitely a really good scenario,” Ms. Pontani told The Observer. “I think anything that preserves the amusement district is a good idea.”  read more »

Back in November, state Senator Carl Kruger bussed in a reported 500 people to a city-run information session on the redevelopment of Coney Island, disrupting and ultimately shutting down the meeting in a show of opposition to the plan.

Well, now the expenditure report for Mr. Kruger’s campaign committee has gone online, and the final tally is in: it seems the senator paid $2,475 to bus company Dimino Express for the event, only a small portion of the $1.63 million he lists as having in his campaign account.  read more »

Perhaps legislators all received new gavels for the holidays, as there seems to be a whole bunch of hearings in the next few days relevant to economic development.

A list for those that like sitting in the uncomfortable chairs of City Hall and elsewhere:  read more »

The Bloomberg administration seems to have met a foe in its plans to redevelop Coney Island. And no, we’re not talking about Joe Sitt, the owner of the bulk of the prime amusement-area land that the city wants to take (the city has offered a land swap).

Rather, the biggest resistance so far, at least in public and in the media, has come from State Senator Carl Kruger, a feisty Democratic lawmaker who loves the spotlight, and seems to have put opposition to Coney Island at the top of his agenda.  read more »

The mayor did a good job last week of making his Coney Island plan look like a done deal, but it is far from over. The local City Council member, for one, is casting doubt on the idea of acquiring the land in the core amusement area and turning it into city-owned parkland the way the Bloomberg administration is proposing.

“I believe there should be hotels. I believe there should be an amusement district,” Domenic M. Recchia, Jr. told The Observer. “But in my view, the result should be different than the one [Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff] proposes. I believe that we should recreate an amusement district and work with the present landowners and not map it parkland. You still have other landowners besides Thor Equities that were there for 50 years when nobody else was, and they won’t be able to capitalize on the plan if you map it parkland.”

Thor Equities, founded by developer Joe Sitt, has bought up about 80 percent of the area in the past few years and has proposed turning it into a modern amusement park with hotels, time shares and condominiums. He is not a particularly popular player to root for, but there are a few other landowners who would be affected as well.  read more »