NIMBY ism volume 17 issue 1.5 Trisha Logan & all our contributors, THANK YOU. urban magazine summer 2014 NIMBY ism 2 urban magazine summer 2014 volume 17 issue 1.5 2 3 acronym NIMBY meaning NOT IN MY BACK YARD implication NOT IN MY BACK YARD urban magazine summer 2014 NIMBY ism 4 FROM THE EDITORS The phrase “Not In My Backyard” and it’s colloquial acronym “NIMBY” are commonplace in the vocabulary of urban planners, both in academia and in the professional practice of the discipline. The phrase is used to describe the attitudes of residents that understand the requirement for a public good, but do not personally want to sacrifice their neighbourhoods to allow said good to be carried through. The implication of NIMBY-ism is of people who value their own neighborhood above the overall welfare of the city, and as such, is naturally a point of contention for planners who treat this attitude as an obstacle to their processes. Treating NIMBY-ism in this way undermines the pride residents take in their neighborhoods. This sense of attachment to one’s neighborhood as perhaps the ultimate goal of practitioners working to shape the built environment becomes secondary to development - specifically developments that are planned to benefit the public at large. How do we rationalize and quantify the residents’ understanding of a neighborhood when it competes with our understanding, as practitioners, of the same neighborhood? The brief for this issue’s articles was to profile a New York City neighborhood with the goal of portraying what differentiates the neighborhood from others in the city and allows it to be defined as a discrete part of the city. If this was to be discerned, our hope was that a cursory understanding of the root of the deep neighbourhood pride demonstrated by New Yorkers can be gleaned. Love, URBAN Magazine urban magazine summer 2014 volume 17 issue 1.5 4 5 neigh·bor·hood noun (plural neighborhoods) british english I neigh·bour·hood a district, especially one forming a community within a town or city the area surrounding a particular place, person, or object the set of points whose distance from a given point is less than (or less than or equal to) some value synonyms vicinity, environs, purlieus, precincts, vicinage, district, area, locality, locale, quarter, community, neighborly feeling & conduct origin from the old english nèahgebùr, from nèah ‘nigh, near’ + gebùr ‘inhabitant, peasant, farmer’ urban magazine summer 2014 NIMBY ism 6 Jordanna LACOSTE Upcoming Planning Efforts & Their Effects Ariana BRANCHINI Micro-Neighborhoods Daniel HEWES An Ever-Evolving Neighborhood Sharon MOSKOVITS Preserving Maritime & Industrial Manufacturing Becca BOOK Placemaking & Assimilation The INTERNET Names Peter ERWIN Imagining When it Thrived urban magazine summer 2014 volume 17 issue 1.5 6 7 Jordanna Lacoste In 2008, the New York City Department of City Planning (NYC DCP) proposed a rezoning plan for the neighborhood of Gowanus in Brook- lyn. The neighborhood – which surrounds the notorious Gowanus Canal, now designated a Superfund site by the Environmental Protec- tion Agency (EPA) – has long been character- ized by its industrial nature and low-density, diverse makeup. The original proposal by the DCP included rezoning 25 blocks along the ca- nal to allow for more mixed use and residen- tial development. While it called for preserving the industrial nature of the neighborhood, the introduction of additional residential develop- ments would no doubt have threatened many industrial and light manufacturing businesses. GOWANUS In 2009, after the EPA placed the Gowanus Ca- nal on the Superfund National Priorities List, the DCP shelved the proposal. Now, with the canal cleanup projected to begin in 2015 and a host of developers looking to capitalize on the BROOKLYN neighborhood’s trendy appeal, the City is look- ing to reopen the planning and rezoning effort in Gowanus. Like much of the Southwest Brooklyn water- UPCOMING front sites, the Gowanus neighborhood is heav- ily industrial. Today, much of this has been rel- egated to light industrial and manufacturing businesses, such as artisan food production facilities, small wood shops, artist workspaces, PLANNING and entertainment businesses. These small, in- dependently owned light industrial businesses are thriving in the neighborhood. However, with rapid changes occurring in the neighbor- ing areas of Carroll Gardens, Red Hook, and EFFORTS & Park Slope, and the recent real estate boom in Brooklyn, developers are now looking to build new residential developments in the neighbor- hood. A rise in new ‘hot spot’ businesses, res- taurants, and bars in the area – including a THEIR new Whole Foods, the Bell House concert hall, and the Royal Palms Shuffleboard Club – are attracting new crowds to the neighborhood and sparking interest from developers looking AFFECTS — to capitalize on these growing trends. Some of urban magazine summer 2014 NIMBY ism 8 urban magazine summer 2014 volume 17 issue 1.5 9 the major upcoming developments include the trial businesses in areas that have a large in- Lightstone Group’s 700-unit rental complex dustrial presence by providing tax credits and at 363 and 365 Bond Street, and the Hudson incentives that help these businesses remain Company’s 790,000-square-foot mixed-use competitive against real estate pressures. In- development at Smith and Fifth streets, slated dustrial businesses can provide valuable high- to open in 2017. wage, low-skill jobs for many New Yorkers, and the current landscape in Gowanus has allowed The new Gowanus planning effort – spear- for independent entrepreneurs to open up new headed by City officials and organized by the businesses and thrive. New planning efforts Pratt Center for Community Development, will likely undermine the industrial presence who are serving as the planning consultants in the neighborhood, pushing out local busi- for the project – is once again looking to make nesses due to sky-high rents spurred by new the neighborhood friendlier to mixed-use de- development interests. velopment. This effort would no doubt strain the flourishing industrial businesses in the The zoning of the Gowanus neighborhood, neighborhood. After several invitation-only which is designated M1 and includes light in- planning meetings, the Pratt Center for Com- dustrial uses, storage facilities, and wholesale munity Development organized several public services, has helped keep the neighborhood hearings regarding this new planning effort, primarily industrial. However, should the area termed the ‘Bridging Gowanus’ series. At the be rezoned, much of the current landscape in third meeting, the most recent of the ‘Bridging the area will likely change. Upscale residen- Gowanus’ series, there was a clear sense that tial developments are already underway and residents were concerned with the future of the industrial businesses are not the only victims neighborhood if no limits are set for new de- of these upcoming changes. The very nature of velopment projects. Residents also feared that the neighborhood – a diverse community with affordable housing might be used as a tool by primarily low-density development – is also at developers to push through new development risk. Residents fear an increase in rents and in the neighborhood. Throughout the meeting, overwhelming traffic will forever change their residents demanded more transparency for up- neighborhood. Hopefully, the concerns of resi- coming high-rise development projects. dents are considered throughout this process, and Gowanus will keep a semblance of its cur- The meetings and the new planning efforts in rent and unique nature in the future. Gowanus bring up some issues and debates that have been occurring around other his- torically industrial areas of Brooklyn. With the Brooklyn real estate boom and development interests in East Brooklyn skyrocketing, the industrial nature of many Brooklyn neighbor- hoods is being threatened. Some incentives are being provided to keep Gowanus primar- ily industrial. The neighborhood is part of the JORDANNA LACOSTE is a 2015 Master’s of Urban Southwest Brooklyn Industrial Business Zone Planning Candidate at Columbia University. She (IBZ), which was created under the Bloomberg has been working on a plan for preserving New administration in order to incentivize indus- York City’s maritime industries during her trial business creation within the allocated IBZ summer internship at the Pratt Center for areas. The purpose of IBZs is to foster indus- Community Development. urban magazine summer 2014 NIMBY ism 10 Ariana Branchini Novelty and diversity are key elements that keep New York City a vibrant center of inno- vation. These qualities are encapsulated in the city’s many neighborhoods, villages and ethnic enclaves. And now – due to limited land and sky-high real estate prices – smaller and more specialized micro neighborhoods put these qualities on full display. Throughout the city’s five boroughs, small districts typically limited to a one to three block area are being carved out of larger neighborhoods. Micro neighbor- hoods are the boutique to the neighborhood’s department store or the food truck to the lo- cal 50-seat restaurant. Often, these sections of the city crop up as the result of newcomers changing or revitalizing an area. But how long can New York sustain this spatial rebirth, and who will want it? Micro neighborhoods are an expression of the city’s ingenuity and they ap- peal to a fad-centric culture. They are a space to innovate, but they may also be a symptom of the larger gentrifying forces sweeping the city. New York City has long been known as a fast paced, exciting, and ever-evolving city famous for its patchwork of neighborhoods. In the five MANHATTAN boroughs, the city’s neighborhoods range from ethnic enclaves to business districts and spe- cialty zones. Spatial boundaries in New York exist in some cases as strictly drawn, formal borders that lend their names to an acronym- NEW YORK defined neighborhood.