Open Thread Wednesday

It’s a long Byzantine story involving the Revolutionary war fort, a not public park from 1865, the pocket parks created by Robert Moses in 1935, and the BHA trying to preserve river views by adding more land to the park. it would be fun for Jeremy to chime in why this “park” is a fenced of derelict wilderness.

I once met tourists at Fulton Ferry reading the George Washington plaque who asked me if there were any Revolutionary War locations up in the heights. All I could think of was Fort Sterling but I told them not to bother because I didn’t want them to be disappointed.

Got to love that sign. "The Law"

Does anyone else find it unfortunate how irrelevant Vine, McKenney, and Doughty Streets seem relative to the rest of Brooklyn Heights' Streets?

Is is DOH-tee like “dough” or DOW-tee like “ouch”?

Vertical aerial photo of the area in 1924 (and see reply for same area after they bulldozed a path for the BQE, and Cadman Plaza):
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/e7ec553ddb9ea8b28eb35358b3b00350282439d7a4a51f5e174be680ab2f16ac.jpg

I've always pronounced it "dawty." But I could be wrong.

Has anyone experienced a panhandler on Montague St. usually between Clinton St. and Hicks St. – he's an older/bald man who aggressively asks for money and often curses at the person if they decline? Is this a new trend? Panhandling is nothing new in NY ofc but have not witnessed this level of aggression in some time.

“ Only a few Steps from the promenade Is 111 Columbia Heights, a dignified, stately, townhouse with a high stoop and black iron work that separates the building from the street. It America. Wolfe occupied there and is now the home of the Italian Historical Society of third‐floor apartment, and it was in that apartment that one of the ugliest quarrels between the novelist and his considerably older love, Mine Bernstein, took place.”

The assailant was a different person. A photo was posted of the assailant and he was younger and taller.

The fellow who curses you has become more frail in the last 6 month. He has a cane now and is slower and more bent over he’s rude but I suspect he’s harmless.

Thanks for the information. I'm new to the area so was surprised to see that behavior happening consistently. Why do you assume he's harmless? Aggressively cursing at people strikes me as highly agitated behavior.

I suppose I base my assessment of “harmless” on experience. I’ve walked past him at least 2x daily, sometimes 6x daily, for… 4 years? So I’ve passed him about 5,000 times without violence.

And I’m just one person. Hundreds of people pass him every day. For years. And he’s never done anything violent.

Will he one day turn violent? It’s possible. But the odds of you being affected are literally less than one in a million. Not to mention he’s become so frail I don’t think he’d be able to really harm anyone.

so, should the city remove him and… what? Jail him? Forever? For being rude? Because there’s a 1 in a million chance he might assault someone?

I think it’s a shame there are mentally unwell people like him that don’t have a place to live but I think we’re all focused on the wrong “danger”. You know what’s much, much more likely to harm you this year? A reckless driver.

I’ve lived in the neighborhood for 20 years. In that time I’ve heard of one panhandler assaulting someone (the aforementioned case linked to on Reddit). In that same time I know of 3 people killed by cars and I personally know 4 different people who were hit and seriously injured by cars. One of them has walked with a cane for the decade since (the driver thought he could “beat her to the intersection”). One was a mother pushing a stroller (the driver said “he didn’t see her”).

I don’t recall the details of all the deaths, but when it comes to the injuries every single case was a turning car. Why do I mention this?

We should all be standing in the street, blocking traffic, demanding the city install Daylighting at every single intersection.

For those that don’t know what Daylighting is, from Streetsblog:

”State law requires this, banning parking within 20 feet of intersections, but the City of New York overrides this law — allowing, in many cases, parking right up to the crosswalk. This limits visibility for everyone on our streets, especially drivers, preventing them from seeing people in the crosswalk.”

A real world example? Go to the southern side of Henry, where it crosses Joralemon. See how the sidewalk bulges outward, taking up the parking space on either side of Henry? This means 1) pedestrians are more visible as they step off the curb – they’re not hidden by a giant SUV and 2) they have a much shorter span of pavement to cross.

Why does the city override it the state law? Because people demand the right to park their private vehicles on public space. To them, that’s more important than the lives of those that live here. We’re literally trading lives for convenience.

I don’t like rude beggars either. I too worry that one of them will some day become violent. But I’m much more worried about someone in my family getting hit by a car.

Email Lincoln Restler.

Demand daylighting.

Thank you for the education on daylighting.

We had no idea of this law and how the law is ignored in NYC.

We agree that it is dangerous in Brooklyn Heights we see that pedestrians get hit by cars.

We drive a large SUV; it is difficult to see pedestrians seated higher-up.

We are extra cautious when driving our car in Brooklyn Heights.

We encourage all drivers to be extra careful when driving in Brooklyn Heights.

The next time a pedestrian looking at their phone or crossing mid-block causes a driver to die, perhaps that will be the message.

Thanks for the perspective. I do not disagree with any of the points you're making. My question and I suppose confusion stems from being new to the area and surprised that an individual who seems to at least verbally harass people regularly is both well known and tolerated.

There are tough questions lurking behind what sounds like a (for now) "smallish" problem and glib comments about it.

To wit – what the Supreme Court just OK'd in terms of cities trying to arrest the growth of the unhoused population by – at the option of those cities – making those individuals "criminal."

I happen to be liberal, so I'd very much like to see more affordable housing built – almost "by any means necessary" – and some meaningful investments in "support" systems for the least among us, but I draw the line (and I'm sure many other liberals do, too) at individuals with poor mental health and/or addictions making the city or our neighborhood somewhere between less lovely and awful. (That obviously depends on the specifics of a situation and the thickness of one's skin.)

But the individual being discussed here is a fair illustration – to say "He's human" doesn't belie the reality that he's quite a bit beyond "rude."

Somebody railed against public urination in this column a month or 2 back. That there's a clearer "ordinance" on that one strikes me as less important than the reality that "public nuisance" is applicable to both, and we should learn something from SF and Portland. For better or worse, one CAN overdo "compassion."