Reactions to story from The Real Estate | The New York Observer

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  Manhattanville, Columbiaville: City Agency Approves Massive Columbia Plan

  http://cb9m.blogspot.com/2007/11/manhattanville-columbiavill...
  167 days ago in CB9M Chairman's Blog · Authority: 46

  Date: Tue, 27 Nov 2007 13:37:45 -0500 Subject: [Gothamist] Recommendation: Manhattanville, Columbiaville: City Agency Approves Massive Columbia Plan To: whitmananne@yahoo.com From: whitmananne@yahoo.com November 26, 2007 Manhattanville, Columbiaville: City Agency Approves Massive Columbia Plan The old saw is that one can't fight City Hall, and we can apparently add the ivory tower to the bulwarks of imperviousness. Despite fierce community opposition, Columbia University will be expanding its upper-Manhattan campus to surrounding blocks. The plan to expand the university's property by 17 acres and several blocks in each direction was approved this afternoon by the New York City Planning Commission. CityRoom reports the neighborhood meeting wasn't exactly neighborly: A majority of people who crammed into the commission’s meeting room in Lower Manhattan did not appear to agree. Many booed or hissed throughout the meeting. Critics have asserted that the scale, density and design of the project would overwhelm the neighborhood in Harlem, an area that has already been subject to rapid gentrification and rising real estate values.Columbia's proposal will probably undergo some revision before passing before the City Council. You can see Columbia's Manhattanville plan here. Community Board 9 voted against Columbia's expansion plan in August, which the university took as an opportunity to negotiate with the community but the community board felt the university was too arrogant. And one of the demands of Columbia students on hunger strike were concessions about the Manhattanville plan. The properties that Columbia wants to acquire includes residences, gas stations, and storage facilities. Thus far, the school has declined from using eminent domain legal procedures against any residences. One critic feels that's a bit a fair-weather hedging, hoping that the state will come in and do eminent domain seizing for the school from afar, without alienating city or neighborhood residents too directly. And Columbia President Lee Bollinger said, "We believe that thriving universities are essential to preserving New York City’s historic role as a place that provides good, moderate-income jobs and a global leader that continues to attract great minds to consider the central intellectual, scientific, artistic and cultural challenges of our time. We look forward to continuing to work with our neighbors, City Council members and other local elected representatives to ensure that the people who live and work in West Harlem and all of New York continue to benefit as the home of a world center of academic excellence.” Photograph of Manhattanville by Mira (on the wall) on Flickr By Dave Hogarty in News Link Comments (2) Recommend this! (4) [+] Tags: City Council, Columbia University, Community Board 9, development, Manhattanville,
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  All The Harlem News That's Fit To Click

  http://www.harlemfur.com/2007/07/all_the_harlem_news_thats_f...
  304 days ago in Harlem Fur · Authority: 10

  Given that UPTOWNflavor is on vacation running the Missoula, MT Marathon this Sunday, July 15th (Go UPTOWNflavor!), Cimbi and I thought we would fill in with links to the morning's news. We've only found one article this morning, but damn if Columbia University's announcement that it will not use eminent domain to evict residents of 132 apartments isn't a big one. [Times] More on the annoucement in The Real Estate. And what Cimbi missed from yesterday... Conversion of a long vacant school into condos is causing some to look down their glasses with a disapproving glare while tapping a ruler on the open palm of their free hand. [Sun] The Daily News had an article on the entrepreneurial undertakings of Broadway stars Lisa Rinna and Brenda Braxton. Brenda started BBraxton, the upscale men's grooming salon in 116th St and 5th Ave. I can't find the article on the Daily News site, so here it is after the jump. FROM SHOP TO STAGE. Two new stars of Broadway's 'Chicago' have heads for business - and bods for sin By CHRIS ROVZAR In the musical "Chicago," Lisa Rinna and Brenda Braxton play women who make a business out of killing. In real life, the two are making a killing with their businesses. Both are entrepreneurs who found success starting their own small companies. Rinna owns an expanding chain of clothing stores called Belle Gray (named after her daughters, Delilah Belle and Amelia Gray), and Braxton last year began an upscale men's grooming salon in Harlem called BBraxton. And since the two have been facing off in front of the curtains, they've begun trading tips and advice behind them. "My oldest daughter was having a hard time because we [Rinna and husband Harry Hamlin, who also stars in "Chicago"] usually put them to bed at night, and now we can't. All of a sudden, she started to freak out. Brenda came in and said, 'Why don't you have them come to the show every night, so they can be with you and then they can go to bed?'" explains Rinna. "I thought, 'That's a great idea,' so we did it. Not only did they completely connect with Brenda right off the bat, but it worked. They let our nanny put them to bed and it's all good now!" On the business front, Rinna is better equipped to dole out advice. In 2006, she left her job on the television show "Soap Talk" to open a store. "I love fashion and I love to shop. My husband studied architecture in college," she says. "We started to investigate how to do it and, five months later, we had a store. We did it all ourselves, we didn't hire anybody. I went downtown, bought all the clothes myself!" Rinna now owns two Belle Gray locations in California, and expects to open another in Las Vegas in 2008. Braxton also came up with the idea for her own business with the help of her husband, power fitness trainer Anthony Van Putten. "My husband said there's no place really where guys can go, other than sitting in nail salons with women, where they can get manicures and pedicures," Braxton explains. "The novelty of it is that a lot of women know what they like in men. Just like how a lot of male designers know how they want women to look. That's a good idea! "This isn't really something that's new," Braxton adds. "Back in the '30s and '40s, especially in Harlem, that's what they did. The dapper gentleman." Now that her business has taken off, Braxton said she, too, is thinking of expanding to Vegas in the fall - so she and Rinna can have a second act together. Visit the "Chicago" stars' shops at www.bellegray.com and BBraxton, 1400 Fifth Ave., at W. 116th St., or www.bbraxton.com
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  Masters of Their Domain

  http://renewyork.blogspot.com/2007/07/masters-of-their-domai...
  301 days ago in renewyork · No authority yet

  In the same week that a committee of Community Board 9 voted unanimously on a zoning and development plan in sharp contrast with the Columbia's Manhattanville project, university officials issued a statement pledging not to ask the state to use eminent domain in order to evict residents currently in the 17-acre expansion area. Coincidence? While some community officials celebrated this mini-victory in the New York Observer, the Columbia Spectator noted the university had already agreed not to use eminent domain against residents -- and was merely repeating itself. Meanwhile, Renzo (Centre Pompidou) Piano told BusinessWeek that West Harlemites have got to change with the times. "You can't embalm a city," he said. Eric Washington, a historian of the area, appeared to choke when he heard that Piano will preserve less than a half-dozen turn-of-the-century brick buildings as part of his plan. "How can only three or four buildings preserve the character of a neighborhood,” Washington asked. “That’s a lot of responsibility for four buildings." New York Observer: Columbia Renounces (Some) Eminent Domain New York Times: Columbia Rules Out Evictions in Expansion Plan Columbia Spectator: Committee Approves 197-A Plan Columbia Spectator: CU Pledges No Eminent Domain For Residents--Again Business Week (from 6/07): Controversy in West Harlem
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  EMINENT DOMAINIA

  http://www.nolandgrab.org/archives/2007/07/eminent_domaini_3...
  304 days ago in No Land Grab · Authority: 104

  Capitol Confidential, Sides Of Chuck The political blog of The Albany Times Union mentions Senator Charles Schumer's cognitive dissonance on eminent domain. NoLandGrab: Schumer likes eminent domain for Atlantic Yards, wants to use more of it for New York City in general, and is against it for the New York State Regional Interconnect powerline project. Loge 13, Squaring Off In The Iron Triangle Meanwhile in the Willets Point land grab: At the end of June, it was leaked that The New York City Economic Development Corporation published a formal request for "on-call" condemnation attorneys to aid with the development of Willets Point. This means the EDC is asking lawyers to research property valuation and eminent domain litigation in advance of claiming eminent domain on the 250 businesses in the Iron Triangle. The Real Estate Observer, Columbia Renounces (Some) Eminent Domain Columbia University announced today that it will not seek to take over people’s homes through eminent domain, a huge step in addressing one of the most controversial aspects of its expansion into West Harlem. This protects tenants and homeowners and splits the coalition against the business owners, who are still under threat of condemnation. Duffield St. Underground, Your EDC at Work: Destroying Parking to Build Apartments, Destroying Homes to Build Parking The EDC’s Downtown Redevelopment plan was supposed to encourage commercial construction, and instead we are ending up with new apartments. Many of these apartments were built on the several parking on Schermerhorn. Streetblog covers this quite well in “T.O.D. in Brooklyn: Turning Parking Lots into Housing.” The Brooklyn Paper also report on the new construction in “Schermerhorn rising” (June 23, 2007). Yet while the EDC’s plan encouraged the destruction of parking lots to build homes on Schermerhorn, just two blocks to the north, it is advocating the destruction on homes to build parking lots. Asbury Park Press, Belmar bakery not "blighted" New Jersey is way ahead of NY State on eminent domain reform: Last summer, Superior Court Judge Lawrence M. Lawson, assignment judge in Monmouth County, dismissed two lawsuits against Belmar filed by business owners who disagree with the borough that their commercial properties are blighted and in need of redevelopment. ... But the higher court reversed Lawson's decision with respect to Freedman's. The Belmar Mall case is being heard by another appellate court. "Freedman's Bakery is not a blighted area even if its design is not optimal for its commercial purposes," the court ruled in a 10-page unanimous decision issued by Appellate Judges Ariel Rodriguez, Donald G. Collester Jr. and Thomas N. Lyons.
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  Thursday PM Linkage

  http://www.curbed.com/archives/2007/07/12/thursday_pm_linkag...
  305 days ago in Curbed : The New York City Neighborhoods and Real Estate Blog · Authority: 929

  · Absolut 2nd Ave. Subway campaign, advertecture-style (above) [UES Community] · What's behind the bargain rates at the Hotel Chelsea? [LWL] · Columbia says it won't exercise eminent domain over residential prop [TRE] · 'User's Guide to Williamsburg', because we can't help ourselves [Gawker] · Wild wheelchair drivers are a menace on our safe streets [EVill Idiot] · Magnolia Bakery reopens with shiny new sink [Eater]
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  Columbia's Smoke and Mirrors

  http://momandpopnyc.blogspot.com/2007/07/columbias-smoke-and...
  304 days ago in The Neighborhood Retail Alliance · Authority: 33

  Let's get one thing straight about Columbia and its expansion plan: the university has no desire to really negotiate an agreement with the community-no matter how it is configured. That was made clear by the unanimous vote that was given the other night to the CB's 197-a plan. If a developer with Columbia's resources put any effort into wooing a community board it would have been able to garner at least some support. To us, the unanimous vote against Columbia-and that's what support for the 197-a plan indicates, signifies the fact that the university isn't even bothering to generate local support. Instead, it is relying on its institutional muscle-and public relations gimmicks. This was witnessed by the university's seeming about face with its announcement that it would refrain from using eminent domain to evict the tenants in the low income housing on the west side of Broadway. As we pointed out to the Observer, however, this is merely an example of divide and conquer tactics-ones that seeks to divide the opposition by race and class in refusing to consider, and be proactive with, the other property owners. What is clear here is the fact that Columbia can easily modify its plan if the will is present to do so. There is nothing written in stone and as we pointed out, "It demonstrates what we have said all along...and that is Columbia's plan can be modified and there is room for compromise." That does depend to some extent on the willingness of the elected officials to act as honest brokers. In the body of the Columbia press release there is a quote from Councilman Jackson praising the university for its magnanimity. He goes on to say that he looks "forward to continuing to work with the University and the community to address the myriad other challenges associated with Columbia's proposed expansion." This is a good statement but it means that Jackson must start to exhibit leadership-and initiative-to insure that these "myriad" issues are properly addressed and resolved. There is no reason why Jackson can't insist that Columbia hold face-to-face meetings with the property owners to determine whether there are ways to allow the university to expand, while simultaneously preserving property rights. Efforts in this area would mean that his office would take the lead- and not allow the WHLDC to meander along while precious time is being lost.
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  Thursday PM Linkage

  http://www.floatingpodium.com/20070712/thursday-pm-linkage/
  304 days ago in The Latest Architectural News and Blogs Floating in the Blogosphere | Floating Podium · Authority: 15

  · Absolut 2nd Ave. Subway campaign, advertecture-style (above) [UES Community] · What’s behind the bargain rates at the Hotel Chelsea? [LWL] · Columbia says it won’t exercise eminent domain over residential prop [TRE] · ‘User’s Guide to Williamsburg’, because we can’t help ourselves [Gawker] · Wild wheelchair drivers are a menace on our safe streets [EVill Idiot] · Magnolia Bakery reopens with shiny new sink [Eater]… · Absolut 2nd Ave. Subway campaign, advertecture-style (above) [UES Community] · What’s behind the bargain rates at the Hotel Chelsea? [LWL] · Columbia says it won’t exercise eminent domain over residential prop [TRE] · ‘User’s Guide to Williamsburg‘, because we can’t help ourselves [Gawker] · Wild wheelchair drivers are a menace on our safe streets [EVill Idiot] · Magnolia Bakery reopens with shiny new sink [Eater] Published by Original source : http://xfruits.com/floatingpodium/?id=26186&clic=1…

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