Brooklyn Today November 26: Brooklyn Heights Association Presents Alternative BQE Plan

The Lede

Happy Monday! We take a stroll down Marcy Avenue, Carlos Menchaca hosts a town hall on the public charge rule, and packages go missing in Ditmas Park. Plus, we go behind the numbers on how Andrew Gounardes beat Marty Golden, a Texas-themed food hall comes to Downtown Brooklyn, and Green-Wood’s visitor’s center progresses. Finally, we recommend the best restaurants and bars in Bed-StuyLinda Sarsour comes under fire, and the Brooklyn Heights Association presents an alternative BQE plan.

Imprint

Actress Claire Foy graces the November cover of Time Out London.

The Rundown

BHA PRESENTS ALTERNATIVE BQE PLAN, CHALLENGES DOT TO THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX:

The Brooklyn Heights Association met with top DOT honchos last week and pushed them to consider alternatives to the city’s plan to replace the Promenade with a six-lane highway during the reconstruction of the BQE. As one viable alternative, BHA presented a plan conceived by Marc Wouters Studios. The Wouters design would move traffic to a temporary two-level structure west of the existing triple cantilever, as opposed to DOT’s six-lane highway on the Promenade. While the alternative design would impact Brooklyn Bridge Park’s noise-attenuating berms, it would not affect the park’s usable space. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

TAKE A STROLL ON MARCY AVENUE, PART ONE:

Montrose Morris mansion and a NYCHA project where Jay-Z grew up. You can find both on Marcy Avenue. This historic road leads through the heart of Bed-Stuy and into Williamsburg. It’s an excellent avenue for an autumn walk. You’ll want to take snapshots of landmarks like Romanesque Revival-style Boys’ High School at 832 Marcy Ave. and Queen Anne-style 232 Hancock St., which was designed by the beloved architect Montrose Morris. We’ve split our stroll into two parts since we can’t fit everything we want to show you into a single story. This is Part One(via Brooklyn Eagle)

BEHIND THE NUMBERS: HOW GOUNARDES BEAT GOLDEN:

As Democratic state Senator-elect Andrew Gounardes prepares to take office in January representing Brooklyn’s 22nd Senate District, a deep dive into the election results offers hints into just how he managed to pull off a victory over eight-term incumbent Republican state Sen. Marty Golden in the Nov. 6 race. According to data compiled by the New York City Board of Elections and analyzed by CUNY, Gounardes’ key to success appeared in certain neighborhoods, where he overwhelmed Golden in the sprawling Senate district in terms of the vote total. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

MENCHACA TO HOST TOWN HALL IN SUNSET PARK REGARDING PUBLIC CHARGE RULE:

With fear and uncertainty about their legal status haunting many Sunset Park residents in the era of Trump, one local pol will be hosting a series of town halls whose goal is to simplify a very complex subject, the revised public charge rule currently under review. Councilmember Carlos Menchaca will host the event tomorrow at Our Lady of Perpetual Help at 6:30 p.m. The forum will focus on a new rule proposed by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for how the government assesses who counts as a “public charge” when issuing green cards and certain visa applications. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

SARSOUR STANDS FIRM AMID CALLS TO STEP DOWN FROM WOMEN’S MARCH:

Women’s March Co-Chairperson Linda Sarsour is resisting mounting pressure to step down from her post as a leader of the massive female empowerment movement. Sarsour, along with co-chairs Bob BlandTamika Mallory and Carmen Perez, fired back after Women’s March Founder Teresa Shook wrote a scathing Facebook post suggesting that the four leaders have led the movement astray and should resign. Charging that Shook “weighed in, irresponsibly,” Sarsour, Bland, Mallory and Perez wrote their own post defending themselves against accusations that they are too willing to tolerate anti-Semitism and anti-gay biases. (via Brooklyn Eagle)

CONVERSION OF HISTORIC WEIR GREENHOUSE TO GREEN-WOOD’S VISITOR’S CENTER UNDER WAY:

The historic Weir Greenhouse across from Green-Wood Cemetery at 25th Street and Fifth Avenue is being restored to its former glory in preparation for use as a visitor’s center for the cemetery. The cemetery purchased the former greenhouse, which had rotting wood and broken glass, in 2012. There’s no date for the completion of the project yet, but the former greenhouse has a gleaming new copper dome, as the Brooklyn Eagle reported last year. (via Brownstoner and Brooklyn Eagle)

HILL COUNTRY TO REOPEN AS FOOD HALL IN DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN:

Hill Country, a Texas-style bar and restaurant in Downtown Brooklyn that has been closed for about a year, is reopening as a food hall today, but will still maintain its Southwestern vibe. Hill Country Food Park will include vendors such as Austino’s, which offers square pizza Texas-style; Bluebonnets, serving vegetable-based sandwiches and salads; Nickie’s Tex-Mex specialties; and Hank’s Saloon, which is being forced to move out of its longtime home on Atlantic Avenue. (NYT via Brooklyn Eagle)

MASS THEFT OF AMAZON PACKAGES REPORTED IN DITMAS PARK, KENSINGTON:

Amazon packages have been reported missing from Ditmas Park and Kensington for months. In more than half a year, 100-plus packages – Amazon and others – have been reported missing from one building near Cortelyou Road and Stratford Road alone. The area is served by the Kensington Post Office. Local resident Eddie Shiomi organized residents and started a tracking chart, showing a concentration of thefts in August. The packages are being stolen from both apartment houses and private homes.(Bklyner via Brooklyn Eagle)

Staff Picks

LONG READ

“The Predatory Lending Machine: How an obscure legal document turned New York’s court system into a debt-collection machine that’s chewing up small businesses across America.” (via Bloomberg)

ANOTHER LONG READ

With stronger hurricanes, devastating wildfires and rising sea levels, the planet is shrinking at an alarming rate. (via The New Yorker)

EAT

From Mexican to Mediterranean, Cuban to Italian, here are the 20 best restaurants and bars in Bed-Stuy.

POLITICS

As of Tuesday, a turkey had spent more time in front of reporters this month than White House press secretary Sarah Sanders(via Quartz)

NATIONAL BULLETIN

In 2017, 37,133 people lost their lives in motor vehicle crashes in America…A New Jersey teacher is wearing the same dressfor 100 days…And an NYPD officer may have framed a teenager in Staten Island by planting drugs(via NHTSA, USA Today and NYT)

FOREIGN FLASH

Saudi women are protesting clothing laws by wearing their apparel inside out…A sperm whale in Indonesia dies from eating roughly 13 pounds of plastic…And a cluster of 200 million termite mounds is discovered in Brazil. (via Global News, BBC and NYT) 

ROYAL WATCH

Here’s a list of the 15 most popular royal family members. (via INSIDER)

EAGLE SPORTS

Spencer Dinwiddie is wearing art on his feet this season. The Brooklyn guard is planning to have a different set of sneakers in every game this year, paying tribute to either various people or causes on that particular night. Last week in Miami, his shoes were an homage to Heat guard Dwyane Wade. And they were truly one-of-a-kind: The words “One Last Dance” were across the tongues of the shoes, a nod to what Wade is calling his final NBA season. There were images of palm trees, a Miami signature, as well as the No. 3 that Wade has worn on his jersey for the entirety of his time with the Heat. (AP via Brooklyn Eagle)

MILESTONES

Happy birthday to Garcelle Beauvais-Nilon, Shelley Moore Capito, Shannon Dunn, Dale Jarrett, Rich Little, Jack Markell, Tina Turner and Kara Walker!