This Tuesday, June 12, we are having our next Neighborhood Safety meeting at Brooklyn Borough Hall, 209 Joralemon St at 6:00pm. Come by and join the discussion going on in and around the community, ask questions, or just listen to what others are talking about. Refreshments will be served.

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J. Crew Latest Retailer to Move In

A cluster of post-Civil-War coffee warehouses stars in gazillions of selfies snapped in Brooklyn Bridge Park. When visitors take photos from the DUMBO park’s pebble-strewn beach, the Empire Stores complex is often part of the backdrop along with the iconic Brooklyn Bridge. The coffee-warehouse complex is also an imposing sight from other vantage points in Brooklyn Bridge Park like the walkway outside Jane’s Carousel. The eye-catching cluster of landmarked brick warehouses was constructed between 1869 and 1885.  It’s now a thriving office, retail and restaurant complex thanks to a makeover by a joint venture headed by Midtown Equities. In 2013, the Brooklyn Bridge Park Board of Directors gave the joint venture the go-head to ground-lease Empire Stores for a 96-year term. Read full story here

As summer approaches, Brooklyn Bridge Park visitors will notice 15-year-old girls dressed up for quinceanera birthday celebrations and brides posing in front of recently spiffed-up Empire Stores.

Armando’s Restaurant and Bar, Brooklyn Heights’ classic Italian restaurant, has closed its doors after almost 82 years of business. City finance records show that Peter Byros, the restaurant’s owner since 1981, sold the building located at 143 Montague St. to Uri Koptiev for $7,418,000 on Feb. 14. Koptiev is a real estate agent. The roughly 2,000 square foot (plus basement) restaurant space is listed for rent by Eastern Consolidated for $165 per square foot. Once a hangout for locals like Marilyn Monroe, Arthur Miller and Norman Mailer along with Brooklyn’s many politicians and lawyers, Armando’s has been a fixture since 1936, with the exception of a brief hiatus from mid-2008 to late 2009, when the space was rented to the Spicy Pickle eatery. Read full story here

Residents of DUMBO and Fulton Ferry Landing say the last undeveloped site in Brooklyn Bridge Park should be named to honor Emily Roebling. The Brooklyn Bridge couldn’t have been built without her. Workshop attendees tour Brooklyn Bridge Park’s undeveloped site beneath the Brooklyn Bridge. Eagle photo by Lore Croghan She supervised its construction after her husband Washington Roebling, who was the mighty span’s chief engineer, was crippled by caisson disease and confined to their house at 110 Columbia Heights. While her husband watched bridge workers through a telescope from the window of their Brooklyn Heights home, Emily Roebling served as his liaison to master mechanic Frank Farrington, dealt with business issues and calmed ornery politicians.   Wednesday night, at a community engagement workshop to generate design ideas for a vacant Brooklyn Bridge Park site beneath the famous bridge, neighborhood residents recommended various ways to honor Emily Roebling. Read the full story here!

High over Fulton Street in Downtown Brooklyn, foot-long microphones are being installed, which will pick up and analyze the neighborhood’s potent mix of sounds, allowing the city to move towards the automatic identification of noise polluters. Roberto Gautier, whose apartment at 140 Cadman Plaza West overlooks the Brooklyn Bridge, suffered through years of noisy bridge repairs. The major work wrapped up in 2016, but Gautier said the nightly drilling of jackhammers and annoying backup beeps of construction vehicles affected the health of many of the building’s residents — and even their pets. Gautier, a member of the Department of Transportation’s Working Group, says residents of the building experienced “almost continuous sleep deprivation” for roughly three years. “Noise pollution in the ‘city that never sleeps’ involves having one’s sleep interrupted, which affects one’s ability to function healthily and happily,” he told the Brooklyn Eagle on Saturday.

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FYI: Artist loses rent-stabilized Tribeca loft, fined $185K for putting it on Airbnb

A Manhattan judge has ordered an artist booted from her $1,500-a-month Tribeca loft and is making her pay a record-setting $185,000 fine for illegally renting it out on Airbnb. Eileen Hickey, 72 — whose artwork has appeared in “Eat Pray Love” and other films — was first sued by the owner of 460 Greenwich St. in 2014 over illegal sublets in her rent-stabilized home of 43 years. Landlord Robert Moskowitz claimed Hickey, whose apartment spans the entire fourth floor, had raked in some $4,500 a month via her Airbnb guests from Spain, California and New Orleans.

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Brooklyn Community Board 6 – Thurday May 17, 6:30PM, 6 MetroTech, 1st Floor. MakerSpace Event Space

Joint meeting with Brooklyn Community Board 2 for an informational presentation from the NYC Department of Transportation outlining their proposal to replace the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (I-278, AKA the BQE) from Atlantic Avenue to Sands Street for the purpose of bringing the roadway up to safety standards; address structural conditions; fix flooding, drainage and lighting issues; and improve traffic flow and pedestrian connectivity. For more information about this project, visit the project website: BQE-I278.com

The park will hold kayaking, outdoor film screenings, concerts, a floating glassmaking workshop and more this summer, organizers announced.

DUMBO, NY — The Brooklyn Bridge Park will host outdoor movies, kayaking, an Americana music festival and a floating glassmaking workshop as part of their spring and summer series of events, organizers announced. The Brooklyn Bridge Park Conservancy on Monday released their schedule of more than 500 events taking place in the park this year from May to August with concerts, sports clinics, plays and more. “From tennis clinics to ‘Movies With A View’, from kayaking to concerts, we’re keeping the waterfront vibrant by expanding our roster to include new programs, and by bringing back crowd favorites year after year,” Nancy Webster, executive director of the conservancy, said in a statement. The park will kick off their events on May 5 with their annual waterfront kite festival at their Pier 1 Harbor View Lawn. The programming also includes their 19th annual, eight-week film series “Movies With A View” this time highlighting the work of female directors, according to the group. – Brooklyn Heights Patch

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A and C train service has resumed following an earlier incident involving emergency teams assisting someone struck by a train at High Street.