Former Brooklyn Heights Resident Thinks Hoboken is Better

By on July 2, 2010 1:53 pm in Brooklyn Heights

Kathy Zucker, a former Heights resident, came with her family to visit her old neighborhood recently, and wrote about it on the blog Hoboken Patch. Here’s how she concludes her piece:

I expected to be overcome with nostalgia and longing to live in Brooklyn Heights again. And it is certainly an incredibly picturesque, walkable, convenient area. It is also old, something that never occurred to me while we were living there. Almost every building has steps in front of it, a nightmare when you are hauling a heavy double stroller. Parking garages are scarce and on the outskirts of town, window air conditioning units are the norm, and the sidewalks were bumpy with ancient tree roots.

Some parts of Hoboken remind me of Brooklyn Heights, but there is much more new construction, especially on the west side of town. My family has an urban lifestyle 15 minutes from Manhattan with many of the benefits of the suburbs (expansive rooms, deeded garage parking and central air conditioning plus big box grocery stores with parking). I knew all this when I bought my condos, but re-experiencing my past brought those choices back vividly.

I am really glad we chose to live in Hoboken.

Stoops! Tree roots! No big box stores! Oh, the horror…

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  • my2cents

    Good for her. But she still lives in Hoboken.

  • the3rdman

    I lived in Hoboken when I first moved to the area, then UES of Manhattan. Brooklyn Heights/DUMBO is by far my favorite place to live – especially if Montague street ever gets real retail and/or better bars. Hoboken is all right and the waterfront is beautiful (although it doesnt beat ours) but between the PATH and being very limited (Hoboken is totally boxed in) it isnt even close.

  • GHB

    I like Hoboken…to visit! All those electrical poles and wires, parking sucks there too, too many bars (and the drunks to go with them!) No, thanks. I’ll stick to the Heights.

  • WillowtownCop

    Don’t let the screen door hit you in the ass on the way to Jersey.

  • nabeguy

    Hoboken…famous for once having the highest bar-to-resident ratio of any city in America. I’m sure some BH residents would be envious of that statistic.

  • Teddy

    Something tells me she’ll be moving east someday, maybe not to the Heights, but somewhere in the city.

  • EHinBH

    We can WALK to Manhattan — or grab a cab. I’ve tried getting a cab to Hoboken. It’s an ordeal. Apples and oranges in every way…

  • TAP

    To each his/her own. Hoboken is also a great little town. Though, if I could live in a neighborhood that eliminated cars altogether, that’d be my preference. Dangerous, polluting, outfacing means of defining one’s status as it compares to their neighbor, etc.

    Not sure why a search for ‘nostalgia’ is coupled with a dislike for those characteristics of BH that are reminiscent of simpler/friendlier times: steps in front of brownstones, ancient trees, etc…

  • JM

    Well I’m happy he found what she wanted in a lifestyle (box stores, central air, new construction and a deeded parking space) OUTSIDE of BKLYN, rather than these throngs of newbies trying to transform our city into their suburb by advocating for box stores and the like here.
    I and many like me, moved to the city to LIVE in a CITY. If you like the burbs, god bless.
    PS. “old” as a derogatory term to describe heights architecture. WTF?

  • Ben

    Port Washington, we left Heights in 2006 because there was NO middle school. Someday we hope to return to our home on Montague Terrace. Until then I enjoy my 2 car garage drive n the kitchen is there no dragging groceries down Montague Street, and central air conditioning, and my own swimming pool, in the winter months Hofstra U Swim Center. I am told the public schools here are excellent time will tell. Here in the suburbs life is easier with 2 children no doubt. But we miss the Heights, the Heights Casino, Lassen & Hennings, The Promenade. I have never been to Hoboken.

  • adam

    I lived in “the Heights” and moved to Jersey City a year ago and never looked back. Maybe if the residents weren’t so pompous and took the sticks out from behind I’d have stayed, but I can’t disagree with the Hobokenite.

    Also, I love it when residents of Brooklyn Heights, who mostly did NOT grow up in Brooklyn or NYC for that matter, insult people living in NJ. You grew up in suburbia or rural towns far away from here!!!

  • adam

    Also, “JM,”

    what box stores are in Hoboken? I frequent the waterfront often and have never seen a big box store. Again, I love the pompousness that residents of the Heights have, as if they are actually lifelong New Yorkers. Ha!

  • nabeguy

    adam, I grew up in the Heights and happen to love Hoboken, although I preferred it in the pre-gentrification era of the early 80’s. Good luck over there, and next time your at Maxwell’s, order a Brooklyn Lager for old times sakes.

  • JM

    Hey Adam, did you bother to read the article these comments are based on? Quote:” My family has an urban lifestyle 15 minutes from Manhattan with many of the benefits of the suburbs (expansive rooms, deeded garage parking and central air conditioning plus big box grocery stores with parking).” That’s the Hobokeners quote no mine.
    Also, seems like you have a problem following writings in general, as I said I MOVED here (from a suburban area) to live in a CITY. I never pretended to be a life long New Yorker. THATS the point!
    Whatever…..

  • nabeguy

    JM, don’t let it bother you. Clearly, adam has decided that Hoboken is a town he can be pompous about. We all like what we like and NOBODY can tell us otherwise, so enjoy what you have. Besides, Jersey is too far away to have a pissing contest over, unless, of course, you drank a case of Brooklyn Lager.

  • bhsliver

    I’ve spent most of my middle-aged life in the heights, but I’m off to hoboken, largely because our politicians keep on raising taxes while NJ’s are lowering them.

  • http://selfabsorbedboomer.blogspot.com Claude Scales

    To me, not needing to own, register, insure, maintain, fuel and garage a car more than makes up for any tax difference.

  • T.K. Small

    Claude raises a good point. Making a very quick and dirty calculation, I come up with approximately $5400 per year to operate a vehicle, which covers: fuel, financing, insurance, maintenance, tickets, etc..

  • HobokenRocks

    The 2 best things about Hoboken,

    1) You dont have to drive through the city to get out and experience the rest of the country
    2) 50% of the 60+ restaurants within a square mile are BYOB

  • http://selfabsorbedboomer.blogspot.com Claude Scales

    Not the best thing about Brooklyn Heights, but high on the list:

    You don’t have to drive.

  • mike

    HobokenRocks – one of the two best things about Hoboken is that you can escape it easier? One day you should try living in a neighborhood that you dont want to escape from.

    The second “best thing” is reflective of another large negative (to some people) of hoboken: it is infested with recent college graduates and drunks.

    While I dont mind visiting Hoboken and its many restaurants, I will stay in Brooklyn, thanks.