Construction Gone Wild – UES edition

When they finally finished the Second Avenue subway in 2017, we figured that after ten very long and noisy years - construction in the neighborhood would finally end.

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2012/06/second-avenue-subway-part-1.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2012/06/2nd-avenue-subway-part-2.html

We were wrong.

I guess we should not have been surprised that the real estate developers would take note of our new found convenience.

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2017/01/72nd-second-subway-station.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2017/01/72-second-subway-station-2.html

https://pj-studio.blogspot.com/2017/02/72nd-second-subway-station-3.html

Or maybe we should just blame Leslie Jones for pointing out what a great hood this is…

https://www.google.com/search?q=leslie+jones+ues&rlz=1C1ONGR_enUS1022US1022&oq=leslie+jones+ues&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyCQgAEEUYORiABDINCAEQABiGAxiABBiKBdIBCDUzOTNqMGo3qAIAsAIA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#fpstate=ive&vld=cid:35a1eda9,vid:A-4E9tZNrVw,st:0

A few buildings went up immediately so I didn’t take much note of them.  But by the fall I couldn’t help but notice that buildings were popping up like mushrooms. 

So, I decided to take a closer look.  Here’s a map.  X marks our apartment on 74^th & 1^st, and I spotted 11 works in progress within a 12 block radius…

For some reason I cannot fathom, the person delivering this honking big crane to York and 74^th, chose to do so by backing down 74^th street at 3 am on a Sunday morning.  I can sleep through lots of traffic noise.  But the beeping when a truck backs up sounds just like an alarm clock.  I am sure that I am not the only one on the block that they woke up.

Some of the sites are still in the pre-sprouting stage.  The one on 1^st & 86^th streets has been fighting with a rent-controlled holdout for years.  I heard the developer was trying to use eminent domain.  I don’t think that will work since they aren’t a government entity and New Yorkers know how to fight city hall.

I suspect the site on 72 & Second Avenue (also in the nascent stage) may be trying to buy out the other places on the block – including our old apartment on 71^st street, (which is visible on the left.)   Meanwhile though I get to enjoy the advertising ghost on the wall of the old tenement building.

The biggest amount of activity is on 3^rd between 74^th and 76^th.  It makes perfect sense since they are between the Second Avenue and Lexington Avenue subway lines.  Talk about convenience.

The buildings in the 80’s – which are directly across the street from each other - are wrapping up and signs say that they will be finished by Fall 2024.

It would be nice if after these 11 buildings were finished the construction in the hood would stop.  But when I took my walk, I could see several blocks where the tenement buildings were being emptied, so there is even more construction on the horizon.

Cheers!

PJ

 

© 2024 PJ Lehrer