Brooklyn Heights

Apartment tower headed to site of eyesore 153 Remsen St.

Eye On Real Estate

March 5, 2014 By Lore Croghan Brooklyn Daily Eagle
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Brooklyn Heights’ next new apartment tower will be 185 feet tall – the equivalent of 18 stories.

That’s Quinlan Development Group’s current thinking for what will replace derelict 153 Remsen St. and two neighboring buildings it bought last year, Eye on Real Estate has heard.

The Upper West Side-based developer can build a tower this tall as of right on the site, which is  outside the  Heights’ landmark district.

Say So Long to sad-sack 153 Remsen – empty for eons, with smashed-up windows, graffiti tags and a torn-up awning, an anomaly in upscale Brooklyn Heights – and perfectly nice properties 155 and 157 Remsen St. The city Buildings Department recently approved demolition plans for all three.

As a prelude to the tear-down, rat traps were recently placed outside 153 and 155 Remsen and a sign was posted on a window warning “Poison – Keep Out.”

Awnings from departed tenants Saigon Garden and Wi-Pie were removed from the buildings. On Monday, National Grid workers dug up the street – to turn off the gas lines, which is also a prelude to demolition, one of them explained.

A tenant remains in the storefront of 157 Remsen, the chiropractic service Physio Logic. The developer and this tenant are in negotiations to try to get Physio Logic to move out, we heard.

Clinic director Dr. Rudy Gerhman didn’t return our call asking for details. Quinlan’s office didn’t respond to a query about the project by deadline.

Recent Buildings Department documents yielded another bit of info: A member of Lonicera Partners, which is a real estate development firm based on nearby Atlantic Avenue, is listed as a managing agent in several of them.

Possibly this means Lonicera is a development partner in the Remsen Street venture – as it is at 267 Pacific St. in Boerum Hill, where Quinlan is building an apartment house.

The prior owner of 153 Remsen, the late Fred Musser, let 153 Remsen get run down while he cooked up a plan (which never came to fruition) to add floors to the two-story commercial building and convert it to a hotel, Eye on Real Estate previously reported.

 

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