sign in sign up
<<
Home , Bay Parkway (Brooklyn), Coney Island Cyclone, DeKalb Avenue, Kings Highway (Brooklyn), Rubin Schron

225 AVENUE M DEVELOPMENT

COMPS & NEIGHBORHOOD Transaction Overview

The 225 Avenue M development project possesses a strong location in the midst of the largest religious communities in City. Expensive houses stand shoulder to shoulder, each with manicured lawn and hedges, luxury cars parked out front and designs like Mission-style archways, porches with columns and terra-cotta roof tiles. The massive homes are owned by the large and still-growing Sephardic community from Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere in the Middle East. A few minutes away, in , resides the largest Russian community.

Demographics and Economics

Brooklyn has been rapidly changing and growing over the past several years as new businesses and residents have flocked to the borough, largely from . As of May 2014, the number of businesses in had grown 21 percent over 2003. Job growth has outpaced that of , at 19.8 percent. Nearly half the jobs in Brooklyn are within the health care and retail industries. Professional and business services are experiencing rapid growth, manufacturing is recovering, and there is an increasing presence from technology and creative firms.

Private sector wages in Brooklyn totaled $18.7 billion in 2012, which is the highest amount on record, and represents a 42 percent increase over 2003. The average private sector salary for jobs in Brooklyn was $38,550 in 2012, which is the lowest out of all the boroughs. This can be attributed to the fact that Brooklyn has a high concentration of lower paying industries. Brooklyn’s median household income in 2012 was $45,230, while the citywide median was $50,900. Household income in Brooklyn is improving, though, having experienced 5.8 percent in 2012, which is twice as fast at the citywide growth rate.

Brooklyn experienced a faster growth rate for private sector employment than any other borough between 2003 and 2012, during which time it increased by 19.8 percent, while the rest of the city increased by an average 10.6 percent. Brooklyn had a total of 484,560 private sector jobs in 2012, and in the third quarter of 2013 the rate of job growth increased more dramatically resulting in the number of private sector jobs exceeding 500,000. The graph below depicts the percent change in private sector employment in Brooklyn and the other four boroughs between 2003 and 2013.

A significant sector of employment in Brooklyn is the health care and social assistance sector, with 160,410 jobs in 2012. A recent agreement with the Federal Government will enable New York State to reinvest projected Medicaid savings to help Brooklyn hospitals that have fallen on tough times reorganize and remain open. This will help preserve hundreds of jobs that would otherwise be lost. With 64,890 jobs in 2012, retail is the second largest employment sector in Brooklyn, accounting for 13.4 percent of all private sector employment. The retail sector faced obstacles during the recession, but has since recovered, adding 8,120 jobs, 40 percent of which were in food and beverage stores. The fastest rate of growth out of any sector in Brooklyn was experienced by the leisure and hospitality sector, which expanded by 36 percent between 2008 and 2012. It is important to highlight that the rest of the city grew at twice the rate between 2008 and 2012. During that four year span, Brooklyn’s leisure and hospitality sector added 9,820 jobs, 85 percent of which can be attributed to restaurants, bars and food services.

Focusing on the more immediate area that surrounds the site, Southern Brooklyn provides nearly 9 percent of all jobs in the borough. Health care accounts for approximately half of the area’s jobs, with 10 out of the 11 large employers with over 500 employees in the area being in the healthcare industry. The greater Borough Park area, which is adjacent to the subject area, is responsible for 8 percent of all jobs in Brooklyn.

Sunset Park, which is an area northwest of the subject, accounts for approximately 8 percent of all jobs in Brooklyn. This area is a major manufacturing center, with three key clusters of activity. Industry City is New York’s largest privately held shipping and manufacturing center with 6 million square feet in 16 various buildings on 30 acres. The property is working on attracting manufacturers of food, clothing and technology. A 50,000 square foot factory was added to the property in 2013 by MakerBot, a manufacturer of 3-D printers. The 97 acre, city-owned Brooklyn Army Terminal has been converted from a military depot to commercial and manufacturing uses. The city is seeking to invest $100 million in the facility to create new commercial space. Adjacent to the Bay Ridge Channel is the third facility, South Brooklyn Marine. New York City Economic Development Corporation completed a $115 million renovation of the 88 acre site in 2012 to help spur maritime freight services. In 2013, the city’s first large recycling facility was completed at the facility.

Demand Generators

In the subject’s area of Brooklyn, Healthcare is a major industry. Companies and offices in the surrounding area include Pharmaceutical and Healthcare related businesses such as Dealmed Medical Supplies, Adwe Laboratories Inc., Universal Marine Medical, Park Surgical, Jaman Drug Co., Gaetano Disanto Pharmaceutical, Geri-Care Pharmaceuticals, R & J Pharmaceutical Inc., Metromed, Medical and PhentermineNY.com.

There are a number of leading hospitals and medical centers within proximate distance of the subject area. Within a two mile radius of the proposed site are Mount Sinai Beth Israel Medical Center, Hospital, and the New York Community Hospital of Brooklyn. In July 2013, The Mount Sinai Medical Center and Continuum Health partners combined the two entities, creating the Mouth Sinai Health System. The facility encompasses 1,784 full and part-time physicians, 3,783 voluntary physicians and 12 freestanding ambulatory surgery centers. Coney Island Hospital has enhanced their facilities with the recent renovation of the Emergency Department. In 2013, the hospital reported 310 staffed beds, 11,471 discharges, 268,075 outpatient visits and 57,269 ER visits. New York Community Hospital of Brooklyn was founded in 1929, and today serves as a 134- bed acute care hospital within the community. Other medical institutions within the nearby area include Brookdale Hospital Medical Center, College Hospital, New York Methodist Hospital, and Maimonides Medical Center.

In the Fall of 2013, Touro College’s School of Health Sciences’ Department of Nursing moved into two floors of a new, modern building located at 902 Quentin Road across the street from the subject. Touro College has a significant presence in the south central region of Brooklyn.

Educational facilities affiliated with Touro College that are located in Brooklyn include the Graduate School of Education, Graduate School of Social Work, Lander College of Arts and Sciences, Machon L’Parnasa/Institute for Professional Studies, New York School of Career and Applied Studies, School for Lifelong Education, School of Health Sciences- Nursing Program and Graduate School of Speech and Language Pathology.

Brooklyn College and Kingsborough Community College are academic establishments located within the subject area as well. In Spring 2014, Brooklyn College had a student body of 13,276 undergraduate students and 3,187 graduate students. Brooklyn College is comprised of 13 buildings on 35 acres. Kingsborough Community College offers over 40 degree and certificate programs and has been recognized as one of the top community colleges in the United States by The New York Times.

Other major educational institutions that are located outside of the immediate Midwood area include Medgar Evers College, NYU Polytechnic School of Engineering, Long Island University, SUNY Downstate Medical Center, Brooklyn Law School, Career Institute of Health and Technology.

The subject area has a large immigrant and foreign born population. Many visitors come to the area to visit local residents and/or to experience their culture’s ethnic community. The subject area features an abundance of facilities reflecting cultural and ethnic ideologies and traditions, such as educational facilities, religious facilities and specialized food establishments. There is significant presence from foreign travelers from the Middle East and Asia in particular.

Other demand generators within the area that appeal to leisure travelers include the famous Coney Island Cyclone, an historic wooden that first opened in 1927. There are currently plans in place to invest a total of $5.5 million on improvements such as adding 950 feet of track and repaving the tracks over the next several years. Coney Island offers several amusement parks, with the two newest parks being Luna Park, which opened in 2010, and Scream Zone, which opened in 2011. The Coney Island Boardwalk extends 2.5 miles off of the Coney Island border from West 37th Street to Brighton Beach. Along the boardwalk, additional attractions such as the beach and the can be accessed. The New York Aquarium was severely damaged by Superstorm Sandy, with estimated damages totaling nearly $65 million. Plans have been proposed for a $157 million shark exhibit, which is projected to open by 2016. Another attraction in the area is The minor-league baseball team, which utilize MCU Park as their home field.

The Neighborhood Neighborhood Developments 1601-1607 Distance: 0.4 miles to the west Source: Sheepshwadbites.com

A real estate management company linked to the owner of one of the city’s leading necktie manufacturers and wholesalers has taken over a swath of Kings Highway real estate, with plans to redevelop the property into a five-story retail and office development.

The building is being designed by the architectural firm of Murdock Solon. Renderings show an ultra-modern design, featuring large bulked-out windows, a patterned facade and setbacks with rooftop gardens to be viewed by the office workers on the upper levels.

With escalators drawn into the middle of the retail space, it appears the developer was aiming to attract a large retail tenant to occupy the bulk of the space, and indeed rumor has it that Century 21 has signed the lease. The new building will stand 79 feet tall, and have 67,355 square-feet of space.

Neighborhood Developments Target Store - 1715 East 13th Street Distance: 0.4 miles to the west Source: commercialobserver.com

Big-box retailer Target announced on June 23rd 2016 that it is headed to Midwood, where it signed a lease for 38,000 square feet at a development site owned by Midtown-based Infinity Real Estate and Nightingale Properties.

The Minneapolis-based company inked the deal for 38,081 square feet at 1715 East 13th Street, according to property records filed with the city Thursday. The lease spans 10 years with options for two five-year extensions.

The site is currently a 300-car parking garage owned by Infinity Real Estate and Nightingale Properties, according to The Real Deal, which first reported news of the deal. The owners have yet to file plans to redevelop the site, TRD noted. The buyers picked up the property in August 2014 for $7.7 million, property records indicate.

Neighborhood Developments 902 Quentin Road Distance: 0.8 miles to the west

Located on East 9th Street between Kings Highway and Quentin Road, 902 Quentin Road is a newly constructed 8-story Class A medical office building consisting of 71,516 rentable square feet and reaches 113 feet into the sky. Just off of Kings Highway, commercial space is the only thing allowed at 902 Quentin Road. Its restrictive C8-2 zoning spills off from , a mixed-use district that planners zoned purely for commercial use in 1961. Among the tenants is Touro College’s Nursing Department along with some doctors’ offices. Neighborhood Developments 815 Kings Highway 1702, 1712 East 9th St Distance: 0.8 miles to the west Source: therealdeal.com

This Kings Highway Development Project is a unique 203,360 square foot mixed-use project planned by Z&K Realty Developers, LLC, to be completed in 2018 in the Midwood Section of Brooklyn, NY. The project, of which Phase I will consist of a 147- room Hyatt Place Hotel, a banquet and function facility, a 203-space state-of-the-art parking facility and 20,000 square feet of retail space, will serve as an anchor to an extremely prosperous yet vastly underserved Brooklyn submarket. The development will cater to the local market as well as be a destination for visitors, both local and international.

The Kings Highway development project possesses a strong location in the midst of the largest Jewish communities in New York City. Expensive houses stand shoulder to shoulder, each with manicured lawn and hedges, luxury cars parked out front and designs like Mission-style archways, porches with columns and terra-cotta roof tiles. The massive homes are owned by the large and still-growing community of Sephardic Jews from Syria, Lebanon and elsewhere in the Middle East. A few minutes away, in Brighton Beach, resides the largest Russian community.

Neighborhood Developments 1536 Sheepshead Bay Road Distance: 1.5 miles south

With a bold contemporary design that reaches thirty stories high atop extensive landscaped grounds, 1 Brooklyn Bay presents a new vision for Brooklyn living. Rising up amid the historic waterfront community of Sheepshead Bay, the one- to four-bedroom condominiums emphasize exceptional views of the Atlantic Ocean, New York Harbor, Manhattan skyline and beyond. Amenities include an outdoor swimming pool and multiple recreation areas, offering residents a standard of comfort and convenience unmatched in Brooklyn.

Neighborhood Developments The Venetian, 447 Avenue P Distance: 1.2 miles to the northwest

The Venetian’s dramatic and distinctive exterior is designed in the classical style, reminiscent of Renaissance era Italian architecture. Residents are greeted by a round- the-clock concierge in a secure lobby adorned with tapestries and fresh floral arrangements. The exquisite lobby finishes include stone floors, walls and an original floor tile mosaic. You’ll find the timeless interior design of the wide variety of homes to be formal and elegant yet functional and livable.

"I suspect there's more wealth on Ocean than there is in Beverly Hills," says Steve Solarz, the area's former congressman.

The Venetian’s draw its inspiration from the Italian Renaissance era, in particular from such buildings as Andrea Palladio’s Palazzo Iseppo Porto, 1552 and Villa Barbaro, 1560, and Vincenzo Scamozzi’s Villa Rotonda, 1550

Neighborhood Developments 400 Condominiums Distance: 1.5 miles to the southwest

Built in 2009, 400 Avenue U Condominiums is a 6-story luxury residential condo building situated on almost half an acre. The property consists of 29 apartments and a commercial retail condo unit at the ground floor, with IDB (Israeli Discount Bank)’s private client group is the tenant. Unit sales at the property have reached as high as $1,350 / SF.

The Edmond J. Safra Synagogue Expansion Distance: 1.4 miles to the southwest

The Edmond J. Safra Synagogue will be constructing a new Brooklyn location, designed by Building Studio Architects at 2085 . Building Studio Architects has created a traditional plan for the three-story building, which will have a total construction floor area of 39,811 square feet, entirely dedicated to the new synagogue.

The design for 2085 Ocean Parkway is described to evoke “Brooklyn’s civic structures from the 1930′s and 1940′s,” and the architects elaborate as follows:

The meticulously detailed building employs age-old techniques – carved limestone, cast statuary bronze, leaded glass, and a broad program of interior building arts. A broad landscaped plaza leads to a monumental rusticated limestone entrance.

Throughout the building Classical design elements are counterbalanced with patterning derived from Sephardic communities of the Middle East, in homage to the rich culture of origin for this Syrian-American Jewish community. The limestone-clad sanctuary takes a dynamic ovoid shape that offers the best interior sight lines with the spiritual import of community conveyed by the unique shape.

Area Developments 1501 Voorhies Avenue (Muss) Distance: 1.7 miles to the southwest

Architect Perkins Eastman has filed for a new building permit at 1501 Voorhies Avenue in September 2014 to be developed my Muss Development. The tower will reach a whopping 333 feet into the sky, hitting 30 stories at its peak. The project – situated on an oddly shaped parcel adjacent to the Brighton Line elevated structure, overlooking the Sheepshead Bay express stop – will be 280,000 square feet in total, mostly residential but with a 15,000-square foot commercial space.

Muss Development already proved the market for luxury condos marketed towards immigrants from the former Soviet Union in Brighton Beach with their Oceana complex. While condos elsewhere in Sheepshead Bay and Brighton Beach tend to sell in the $400s per square foot, units in Muss’s Oceana towers have been fetching $600 a foot or more since the market rebound. Similar pricing can be expected for the condos at 1501 Voorhies, which will make up for the lack of Oceana’s beachfront setting with height that rivals anything else south of .

The architecture should also be a big step up from the normal Sheepshead Bay and Brighton Beach fare. Perkins Eastman will likely be designing a much more modern structure than the pastel and stucco buildings normally developed for Russians in the U.S., whether in Brighton Beach or Sunny Isles.

Area Developments 532 Neptune Avenue (Schron) Distance: 3.2 miles to the southwest

Rubin Schron’s Cammeby’s International filed plans with the city in January 2015 for a 40- story, 430-foot tall, 544-unit mixed-use building on Coney Island. The building, located at 532 Neptune Avenue (also known as 2851 West 6th Street), will span 691,405 square feet, including 513,850 square feet of residential space and another 162,220 square feet of commercial space. Ground floor retail will face West 6th Street and Neptune Avenue to West 5th Street. Amenities for the new building include a fitness center, spa, game room, as well as additional recreation space on the 40th floor. SLCE is the architect of record. Cammeby’s purchased the property for $25 million in 2013. The developer owns roughly 15,000 units across the city. President Rubin Schron made a $2 billion offer to buy the Empire State Building in 2013.

The project would be located in what is today the Shopping Center. It would sit just south of the Neptune Avenue F station right next to the elevated tracks, in the West Brighton section of Coney Island.

The low-rise strip retail center would be demolished to make way for the 40-story tower, as rumored, which would amass air rights from across the massive 212,000-square foot site in order to build the tower, clocking in at a bit more than 690,000 square feet in size.

The project would bring 544 new housing units to the neighborhood. Spread across 514,000 square feet of space with 16 apartments on the fifth through 24th floors, and 14 each on the 25th through 39th, with mechanicals and a residential amenity space on the 40th. The apartment could go either rental or condo, or a combination of both, as with the Sheepshead Bay tower.

According to the permits, the garage, on the first through third floors, would contain space for 500 cars and 272 bicycles.

A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

Introduction

One of Brooklyn's premier shopping districts, the Kings Highway BID serves 225 businesses on 25 blocks between and Ocean Parkway, including part of Quentin Road, from Coney Island Avenue to East 13th Street. This stretch of Kings Highway is unique; a "regional commercial center" in a sea of dense residential development, it also forms the boundary between Brooklyn Community Districts 14 and 15. Historically, this commercial corridor was considered part of Flatbush. Over time, consensus has shifted its location to Midwood, though Homecrest and Madison lie immediately adjacent. A major consequence of the district's proximity to these neighborhoods is that its own vibrant narrative has been lost in their histories, particularly that of Flatbush, one of Brooklyn's original Dutch settlements. Yet many of the communities that sprang up around the shopping district prior to World War II would not have been possible without it. Builders and realtors followed merchants, who were drawn to Kings Highway by transportation developments that pushed a 300-year old road into the 20th century.

The Kings Highway

Kings Highway is an irregular road that runs northeast from 78th Street and in Bensonhurst to East 98th Street in Brownsville. A former Canarsee Indian trail, Kings Highway connected five of the original Dutch towns of Brooklyn: Brooklyn, Flatbush, Flatlands, Gravesend and New Utrecht. When the English conquered New Netherland in 1664, Brooklyn was rechristened Kings County, in honor of King Charles II. Kings Highway was laid out in 1704, along two lines of the old Ferry Road, one running east to Jamaica and one running south to Flatbush and Flatlands. Kings Highway was a name commonly given to major colonial roads in the 18th century. With many smaller lanes that branched off east and west, Kings Highway united disparate parts of Brooklyn that were mostly farmland at the time. Though Kings Highway now terminates inland, the original route was anchored by ferries; the Brooklyn Ferry, later the Fulton Ferry, at the north end and Denyse's Ferry, begun in 1740, at . A segment of Ferry Road survives as Old in DUMBO, a desiccated northern portion of Kings Highway, named after the engineer Robert Fulton. Only a loop confined largely to South Brooklyn remains of this great road that once traveled the borough in four directions and is believed to be the first highway in the United States.

Much of Kings Highway's historical significance derives from its strategic role in the Battle of Brooklyn, fought throughout the city in August of 1776. The British army marched along Kings Highway into Central Brooklyn, moving tens of thousands of troops and artillery supplies from Flatlands to Bedford- Stuyvesant. The Colonial army, led by steered clear of the road, setting up a stronghold in Brooklyn Heights. An early 20th century New York historian remarked that "it was in name and in fact Kings Highway, for British troops and not American traversed it almost exclusively in the period of revolution.“

In the 19th century, Brooklyn grew from a village to a city, consolidating independent settlements and multiplying its population. The municipality sought to control these physical and demographic changes by reordering 18th century land use patterns. By 1850, the Brooklyn street grid crisscrossed Kings County's sprawling farms and meandering roadways, with brick and brownstone tenements replacing wood houses. Industrialization, immigration, and shipping dramatically altered the landscape and character of Brooklyn's oldest neighborhoods. By the end of the 19th century, middle-class families were fleeing poverty and overcrowding on the waterfront in search of cheaper, undeveloped land in Flatbush and Bay Ridge.

1899

1960 A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

An oasis of sleepy Dutch farmhouses, largely rural in character, awaited them along Kings Highway. Yet this was not to last; transformative changes were coming to Kings Highway, propelled by the BMT Brighton Line and the advent of the automobile. By the 1920s, the road and the neighborhoods along its path had been altered irrevocably, giving rise to a dense suburban community and a commercial district to rival Broadway.

The Brighton Line

The shopping district's rapid development was catalyzed by elevated service and the widening of Kings Highway at Ocean Avenue. Today's B and Q train was originally a "surface steam railroad" that operated between and Brighton Beach, a burgeoning summer resort. The Brighton Line commenced service in 1878, delivering passengers to the Brighton Beach Hotel, also owned by the railway. The line changed hands multiple times due to fierce competition among private rail companies, but each acquisition solidified the route with expanded service and infrastructure improvements.

The 1890s saw massive consolidation of government and transit operations in New York City. In 1898, the five boroughs, formerly autonomous municipalities, were merged into the City of New York. Shortly thereafter, the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company, formed in 1896, acquired nearly all the major rapid transit operations in Brooklyn and , including the Sea Beach Railway (today's N train), the Prospect Park and Coney Island Railway (today's F train) and the Brighton Line, owned by the Kings County Elevated Company.

Between 1905 and 1908, BRT constructed the Brighton Line's present right of way, which runs in a trench from Prospect Park to Newkirk Avenue, emerging overhead at Kings Highway with a rushing roar. BRT also built the Kings Highway steel overpass, which opened in 1907. Newly electrified and lifted above the street, the modern Brighton Line posed a stark contrast to the scene on Kings Highway, where shoppers still arrived to the district by stagecoach.

Remaking an Old Road

Whereas the district's central core was built up with three-story brick houses with ground-floor retail stores, at the turn of the century, Kings Highway east of Ocean Avenue remained undeveloped. While food and dress merchants populated brick and terra cotta storefronts in the district, barns and farmhouses still lined the road in East Midwood. As commercial development spurred real estate values along Kings Highway, developers purchased and cleared most of the large parcels in Flatbush. Within a decade, the 18th century farmhouses whose property lines marked the road's irregular twists and turns had given way to one and two-family houses. A 1910 article in the New York Times hailed the new construction with the headline "suburban homes with city comforts have transformed Flatbush farms".

The onslaught of residential development boosted property sales in the shopping district. Another breathless New York Times piece detailed a parcel on East 15th Street, where two three-story buildings were nearing completion: "These two buildings occupy seven lots for which a few months ago $45,000 was paid. Two years ago the lots could be had for $1,500 each and fifteen years ago, they were sold for $100 per lot.“

A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

As Kings Highway struggled to accommodate the dizzying growth of housing, automobile traffic and commercial development had already begun to strain its narrow width. The widening of Kings Highway was first proposed in 1912. At the time, the road was no wider than 60 feet at any point along its length. The plan, put forth by the City Planning Commission proposed expanding its width to 100 feet along a two-mile stretch between Ocean Parkway and .

The proposal generated considerable discussion among merchants and residents, who agreed the public works project was necessary but balked at the cost [estimated at one to three million dollars]. The City architect declared the expansion of Kings Highway "one of the most important features of the 'Brooklyn beautiful' movement." The initiative was part of the City's greater ambition to widen Kings Highway along its entire length, an undertaking deemed too expensive to be accomplished at once.

Tabled for unknown reasons after 1913, the plan resurfaced ten years later, revived by Brooklyn Borough President Edward Riegelmann. In the early 1920s, the City planned to demap Kings Highway to normalize the Brooklyn street grid. Riegelmann argued that widening Kings Highway from Bay Parkway to would provide a new highway across Brooklyn. His efforts to save Kings Highway resulted in a proposal for "the City's improvement of Kings Highway into a cross-city parkway boulevard 140 feet wide." The road was widened from two lanes to eight, with a triangular park acquired by the City as part of condemnation proceedings marking the intersection of Kings Highway, Ocean Avenue and Avenue P.

The Roaring Twenties

By the 1920s, Flatbush had become a haven for middle-class families. A rosy 1913 editorial characterized the neighborhood as "not a district with many residents of unusually large means but one where persons of average financial resources may live in a comfortable manner." Many of these residents were second or third-generation Ashkenazi Jews. Sold on "the new Brooklyn" by eager realtors, they relocated from Williamsburg and Brownsville to experience modern living in the urban suburbs. A sizeable Jewish community took root in Flatbush erecting multiple synagogues in the area, beginning with the Flatbush Jewish Center in 1921.

The shopping district entered a decade-long boom marked by flamboyant architecture and a heady nightlife. In 1920 a new tunnel under Flatbush Avenue joined the Brighton Line at Prospect Park to the 4th Avenue Subway (the D, N, and R lines) at DeKalb Avenue, connecting the Brighton Line to the Manhattan Bridge. With access to the City, Kings Highway became a bedroom community for commuters who worked in Manhattan. As residential development continued apace, Kings Highway grew into a major destination for entertainment, shopping, and dining. The district gained two majestic theaters, multiple dance halls and a grand reception hall, in addition to varied retail stores. Real estate brochures dubbed Kings Highway from Coney Island to Ocean Avenue "the New White Way of Flatbush.“

Apart from these establishments, Kings Highway's biggest strength lay in its retail mix. Realtors expressed confidence in the district, noting that "Kings Highway has had its greatest growth influenced by the concentration of chain stores and specialty shops on its frontages." As the district developed into a major commercial thoroughfare, rents along Kings Highway skyrocketed to $500 per front foot and $650 per front foot for corner locations. Long before the age of main street management, Kings Highway had hit upon a successful formula, drawing chains that could afford to locate in the district, while retaining businesses that made it unique.

A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

The Great Depression

Though commercial development had initially spurred real estate speculation in Flatbush, the area's growing population and ceaseless residential construction now fueled inflated property values in the shopping district. Like much of the country, Kings Highway was riding the prosperity bubble of the Roaring Twenties. When the Great Depression struck, newspapers stopped reporting brisk real estate sales on Kings Highway, and began detailing bankruptcy proceedings among business owners.

Despite the economic downturn, the 1930s brought developments that strengthened regional shopping districts in the boroughs. In 1932, New York City awarded contracts to private bus operators, with several lines serving Kings Highway and Flatbush replacing former trolley routes. Already a force in major retail corridors, chains took advantage of low rents to secure choice locations on Kings Highway, Avenue J and Avenue U. In 1936, heavy demand and limited space pushed ground-floor rents to an unbelievable $1,000 per front foot. Commercial leases helped prop up sagging property values in overdeveloped residential neighborhoods.

Widespread unemployment ignited tensions between local unions. On a Saturday night in August 1938, a dispute between the Motion Pictures Operators Union and the Empire State Motion Pictures Operators Union resulted in gas bombings on twelve Brooklyn theaters. The bombings were a calculated assault on the Century Circuit chain, which owned all the affected theaters including the Avalon and Kingsway theaters in the Kings Highway shopping district. Nineteen people were injured by the explosions. Theater bombings had already swept Manhattan, Queens and , ceasing only when the City stepped in to negotiate agreements between the warring unions.

Investors began buying up apartment buildings in Flatbush, as taller multi-unit dwellings surpassed one and two-family houses as the dominant mode of urban living. As demand for housing held steady, developers like erected dense apartment complexes in undeveloped sections, creating new residential communities. Most of these buildings were intended for low and middle-income families. Sales were spurred by improved transportation to Kings Highway via the Eighteenth Avenue bus line and the IRT Flatbush Avenue subway at Newkirk Avenue.

The Golden Age

In the postwar period, Kings Highway entered a golden age, rendered in color by Brooklyn photographer John D. Morrell. These images record a bygone era of Kings Highway and Brooklyn's main street. Local merchants recall Kings Highway in the fifties and sixties, as a shopping district "known for its men's stores and shoe stores" that drew "a good, high-end clientele." Kings Highway's reputation as a shoe-shopping mecca dates back to this time, when dozens of fine footwear and fancy dress stores lined the busy thoroughfare. On Thursday nights, shops in the district stayed open until 9 pm so that its customers could purchase party clothes for the weekend.

An attractive, well-kept shopping district with a rich array of commercial uses, Kings Highway boasted classic signage, high density, and quality retail. These elements distinguished the district as a major destination, anchored by famous retailers like Field Brothers, Ripley's, Neil's and Jimmy's. Most of the shops that populated Kings Highway in the sixties have long departed from the district, but are still remembered by locals. Some of the businesses whose names graced Kings Highway's storefronts in the central core were Morrell's on the southwest corner of East 12th Street, Ira Bruce on the northeast corner of East 13th Street,

A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

Dorsey Mens Wear Ltd. on the southeast corner of East 14th Street, Flagg Brothers on the southeast corner of East 13th Street, and Julius Grossman Shoes on the northeast corner of East 14th Street. Another of Kings Highway's many icons was Perelson's Department Store, housed in a 1920s terra cotta building on the southeast corner of East 17th Street.

Jimmy's was the last of the signature stores to leave Kings Highway. It opened in 1948 as Jimmy's 2-Cent Plain and Fancy at 1226 Kings Highway, hawking high-end men's clothing. In the 1960s, Jimmy's became a unisex boutique stocking thousand dollar designer suits and gowns, which were sometimes sold on the sidewalk outside the store. In the nineties, owners Jimmy and Gloria Jacobs set their sights on Manhattan, opening a second Jimmy's on 72nd Street off Madison Avenue. Until a few years ago, the Brooklyn landmark maintained its location on Kings Highway, catering to newly affluent Russian Jews.

Kings Highway was served by a number of well-known diners, such as Chat N Chew Luncheonette on the northeast corner of East 15th Street and the legendary Dubrow's Cafeteria on the northeast corner of East 16th Street. Dubrow's Cafeteria was a chain of restaurants established in 1929 by Belarusian immigrant Benjamin Dubrow, in the Eastern Parkway section of Brooklyn. Dubrow's other locations in New York included Kings Highway and the Garment District. The Kings Highway Dubrow's, opened in 1939, was famous for drawing celebrities and campaigning politicians. Jewish baseball player Sandy Koufax announced his decision to sign with the Brooklyn Dodgers in front of Dubrow's in 1954. President John F. Kennedy campaigned at Dubrow's while running for office in 1960. Before it closed in the eighties, Dubrow's was the setting for the 1979 film Boardwalk starring Lee Strasberg and Ruth Gordon as restaurant owners fighting a protection racket on Coney Island.

As today, food purveyors clustered in the eastern portion of the district toward Ocean Avenue. These consisted mostly of markets like Food Mart and Key Food on the south side of Kings Highway between Ocean Avenue and 19th Street. A number of establishments in the district catered to observant Jews including the King Terrace Kosher Restaurant located above Litt Chinitz at 1122 Kings Highway. Confectioners like Barton's Bonbonierre at 1712 Kings Highway and the Barricini Candy Shop at 1912 Kings Highway beckoned customers with a sweet tooth. Numerous pharmacies also made their home east of the subway station including Kings, Avalon, and B&W. Finally, the district housed multiple banks, including the Kings Highway Savings Bank and 1st National City Bank that had begun moving to Flatbush in the 1920s.

Despite a staggering variety of stores, the district presented a uniform image of sophistication and class. Its tasteful look and feel derived from the merchants' commitment to cleanliness, luxury and preservation. Sidewalks were kept free of greenery or debris; signage conformed to unspoken standards of scale and quality, and many of the buildings which have since been drastically altered still retained their historic charm. Chains like Thom McAnn, Florsheim Shoes and Town and Country augmented the district, nestling gracefully alongside specialty shops.

Though many customers arrived on Kings Highway by automobile, the BMT station remained the focal point of the shopping district. The areas around and under the overpass were well-maintained and reserved for eateries and drug stores. Dubrow's, DeBarry, London & Fishberg Station Market, Cut Rate Drugs, and a second diner all huddled under the elevated tracks between East 15th and East 16th Streets, flanking the station entrance on either side.

A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

71| A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

Changes and Challenges

The golden age of Kings Highway proved to be its twilight. As New York City accelerated its descent into financial ruin, demographic changes came to Flatbush that unsettled many locals unaccustomed to change. Slowly but steadily, longtime residents who had patronized the upscale shopping district left the neighborhood for the suburbs. Those who stayed were mostly elderly Jewish immigrants in rent- controlled apartments, and black and Hispanic families who had begun moving into the area. The nature of shopping too was changing. The classic downtown no longer offered an exciting experience; instead, customers were drawn to a new development that had begun popping up all over the country, the mall.

In 1970, the Kings Plaza Shopping Center opened in the Mill Basin section of Brooklyn at the intersection of Flatbush Avenue and Avenue U. The design was a windowless brown and beige box, anchored by two enormous department stores, Macy's and Alexander's. It was the first and largest regional mall in New York City, with 1.3 million square feet of retail. Kings Plaza boasted 110 stores, a double-screen movie theater [most theaters built in the 1920s were still singleplex], and a 3,700 parking garage where shoppers could park free of charge. Together, the mall's department stores comprised 656,000 square feet and created 2,700 jobs. To assuage customer anxieties about their massive scale, Macy's and Alexander's worked to replicate the "intimate feeling of small shops…through a partial or substantial enclosure of small sections."

While the mall adapted Main Street, Main Street could not emulate the mall. As soon as Kings Plaza opened, it began drawing customers away from Kings Highway and Avenue U. For the next two decades, the shopping district entered a period of decline, whereby many merchants who had upheld Kings Highway left the corridor, and those who remained fought to preserve its reputation. Vacant storefronts were filled by newer chains and discount stores; offices, previously confined to second and third stories of buildings, opened on ground-floors; outdoor grocery stores opened closer to the central core. Shoppers now flocked to Kings Highway for basic goods and apparel, with a select number still frequenting Jimmy's.

The hallmarks of the district also began to disappear, as changes in its retail mix began to manifest in its appearance. Kings Highway's uniformity was disrupted by irregular signage, alteration of individual buildings and the sudden appearance of stucco, which degraded its polished image. Meanwhile, the district's most storied establishments continued to close. Dubrow's Cafeteria ceased operation before 1985; the Avalon Theater was shuttered in 1982. In a parallel and troubling development, Kings Highway's major intersections had become unsafe. Flatbush residents cited street sales of drugs and related crime at Flatbush Avenue; loitering and disorderly youths around Ocean Avenue, and public drinking and double-parked cars on Quentin Road as major obstacles to quality of life.

Resilience and Renewal

The nineties brought a new resolve to Kings Highway and transformed the demographics of its trade area. A Business Improvement District formed in 1990 to improve all aspects of the district, and specifically address parking and sanitation issues. In 1994, the New York City Department of Transportation selected Kings Highway as a preliminary testing ground for European-style multispace parking meters, installing 11 such Muni Meters along its length. After complaints from confused drivers, [then] City Council Member Anthony D. Weiner persuaded DOT to remove the meters, citing his district's "heavy concentration of people from Russia and Eastern Europe" as the source of failure.

A History of Kings Highway Shopping District

The ethnic makeup of the area was shifting. The collapse of the Soviet Union sent an influx of Russian immigrants, most of them Jews, to New York City. Many settled along the Q train from Brighton Beach to Kings Highway, where Russian Jewish communities had already taken root. The Orthodox Jewish population in Midwood grew exponentially, giving business to Kings Highway and Avenue J. Local leaders mused at the juxtaposition of "1996 stores and people out of 19th century Poland." Chinese immigrants opened businesses on Sheepshead Bay and Avenue U, revitalizing long-dormant commercial corridors.

By the mid-nineties the Kings Plaza Shopping Center was a crossroads. The mall lost one of its two anchor tenants when Alexander's department store closed in 1991; with the development of Fulton Mall and Atlantic Center in the early nineties, it was no longer the only mall in Brooklyn. Kings Plaza also faced competition from an unexpected source: the resurgent Main Street. Plans to revitalize the Flatbush Avenue and Church Avenue corridors threatened to lure away Kings Plaza's customers in North and Central Brooklyn. Repelled by its dated seventies décor and poor security, shoppers grew wary of Kings Plaza, which hurt the mall's merchants. Store owners complained about the mall's dark interior, the absence of a food court and incidents of violence, robberies and shoplifting. The problems that beset Kings Highway in the eighties had migrated indoors, threatening Kings Plaza's viability. Altogether, these developments set the stage for a Kings Highway renaissance in the 21st century.

The Road Ahead

The district has made a comeback, adapting to change by forging a new identity. Though it has lost many of the fine stores that built its reputation, Kings Highway now caters to an ethnically and economically diverse clientele. The district is a mix of shoe stores, cell phone retailers and other chains but retains its winning formula of glamor and convenience. Though arguably less cohesive than in its golden years, the core nonetheless stakes out its niche as a major destination for high-end shoes, clothes, and jewelry shopping. Kings Highway weathered the 2008 economic downturn with a record low number of vacancies. New businesses and sought-after chains like TJ Maxx are staking out territory in the shopping district, capitalizing on its central location and strong customer base. The BID recently celebrated its 20th anniversary with a major victory; a concession from DOT to extend parking time to two-hours in the district, allowing customers to browse its shops at their leisure.

In planning the future of the shopping district, the Kings Highway BID will look to its vibrant past for new directions while capitalizing on its present strengths and valuable potential. Its biggest challenge in the next ten years will involve balancing change with stability: drawing a new generation of shoppers while preserving what makes the district truly special.

Source: Inna Guzenfeld, Kings Highway BID