On Wednesday, June 25, in a special awards ceremony featuring music by Dimitri Bartholomew and a rousing inspirational speech by former Planning Center director Micaela Birmingham, MAS honored this year’s crop of CITI Youth Map Technicians. The CITI Youth program trains high school students in the use of Geographic Information Systems and places them in paid internships at their local community boards to provide on-the-spot electronic maps (www.myciti.org) at board and committee meetings.

Map Technicians Jackson Hidalgo, Eric Kenny, Caron Nazairo, and Peejay Howard of Brooklyn; Ahmed Dirhalleh and J. Little Horse Hollingsworth of Queens; Dolly Ou, Dorian Valentine, and Jesse Pan of Manhattan; and Latoya Herndon and Shaquana Staton of the Bronx received awards for the commitment and skill they displayed while providing a much-needed service to their community boards. Continue Reading>>

For the third year in a row, the Landmark’s Preservation Commission budget will include $300,000 to fund six positions to survey NYC’s neighborhoods for potential landmarks and assist with other critical LPC duties.

In past years, this funding was instrumental in enabling the LPC to give many unprotected historic neighborhoods the attention they deserve. It was because of this funding that the LPC was able to survey and begin the process this week of designating the Prospect Heights neighborhood, a project MAS had urged them to take on. Continue Reading>>

With so much focus on trains, tracks, and station design it can be easy to forget about the critical state of the pedestrian environment around Penn Station. This is a major mistake. According to the Tri-State Transportation Campaign’s “Penn for Peds” initiative up to 1,100 people use the Penn Station entrance at 32nd St. and Seventh Ave each minute during the average weekday rush hour. That’s about 18 people a second!

MAS believes the Moynihan Station project provides an opportunity to create a lively underground network in the Penn Station/Hudson Yards area similar to Rockefeller Center. At one time, Penn Station had its own network connecting to the Hotel Pennsylvania, Gimbels Department Store, the Farley Post Office, and other nearby buildings and subway stations. In fact, there was a weather-protected route from Bryant Park all the way to Penn Station. Re-opening and rehabilitating these tunnels will alleviate the horrific pedestrian congestion on the sidewalks around the Herald Square area and enhance the connections between Penn Station and the subways.

Read more about the Penn Station underground here.

MAS and the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Corporation (PHNDC) recently partnered to advocate for a new historic district in Prospect Heights. This hands-on collaborative experience resulted in LPC’s consideration of 750 contributing buildings, and the decision to move forward with the designation a new historic district in Prospect Heights. The partnership revolved around a community mapping initiative that produced a unique tool that anchored discussion among multiple stakeholders and helped mark the boundaries of the district proposed to the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC). Continue Reading>>

MAS in the Press:
MAS Director of Advocacy and Policy Lisa Kersavage speaks about the likely designation of Prospect Heights as an historic district, a long time project of MAS and the Prospect Heights Neighborhood Development Corp (Brooklyn Daily Eagle). MAS Urbanists celebrated sustainability in preservation last night at a fundraiser at the new LEED certified Galapagos Art Space in DUMBO, Brooklyn (DUMBONYC, Gothamist).

MAS Issues in the Press:
- Celebrity neighbors of St. Vincent’s Susan Sarandon and Tim Robbins spoke out against the proposed redevelopment at the Landmarks Preservation Commission (NY Times) however City Council speaker Christine Quinn, Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, state Senator Thomas Duane, and Rep. Jerrold Nadler spoke out in support (Crain’s NY Business). Continue Reading>>

Each year at the MAS Annual Meeting individuals, groups, events and extraordinary efforts are celebrated that have contributed to the quality of life in New York City. Honorees are awarded the MAS Certificate of Merit. Amongst those honored this year were American Ballroom Theater’s “Dancing Classrooms.”

This company has much to celebrate and to be proud of. Since Pierre Dulaine taught the first ballroom dance class in one public school in l994, the outreach program “Dancing Classrooms” has developed into an amazingly popular and successful Arts-in-Education initiative in New York City’s public schools. Continue Reading>>

MAS joined hundreds of others today in testifying before the Landmarks Preservation Commission regarding St. Vincent’s hardship application. To be sure, the hardship application is one of the most challenging and complicated issues that have come before the LPC in recent decades. St. Vincent’s must prove that maintaining the 1961 O’Toole building “prevents or seriously interferes with carrying out the [hospital’s] charitable purpose.” MAS believes that more alternatives need to be thoroughly scrutinized before the LPC can make the determination of hardship.

The LPC asked tough questions of the hospital officials, trying to figure out if indeed a hardship exists. Although today was the last opportunity for the public to speak on the hardship issue, the LPC did keep the record open so that additional comments could be submitted to the LPC in writing. Continue Reading>>

When a great craftsman designs a building for his own use you can be sure of an imaginative and highly personal design. Picture a kitchen with black walls and pale wood counters, a high deck for socializing set under a curved stucco wall the color of autumn woods, a live-work space with a captain’s bed tucked into an alcove.

I think any bedroom with a view should have a view that can be seen from the bed. Esherick’s view could be enjoyed lying down. He looked out through double-paned windows at hills, trees and sky. It’s the perfect set-up for an insomniac: a view, a good reading lamp and a supply of books and sketchpads at arm’s length. Continue Reading>>

Q: When do you know you really love New York?

A: When you join fellow New Yorkers to celebrate the people who help make NYC the greatest city in the world.

The 115^th annual meeting of the Municipal Art Society of New York, held last Wednesday (July 9) at the TimesCenter, gave MAS members a wonderful occasion to revel in their collective devotion to New York City. MAS president, Kent Barwick, called the meeting to order with the wooden walking stick from the first MAS annual meeting in 1893 and which once belonged to Benjamin Franklin. Awards were given to the Dancing Classroom program for NYC’s 4^th graders; the customer service line for all New Yorkers: 311; Solar One, the Long Island City Cultural Alliance, and the amazing comeback of the very mammal that appears on the seal of New York City, as a symbol of industriousness, but has not been seen in the city since the early 1800s. On behalf of Jose the Beaver, the award was presented by Justin Rockefeller (whose family arrived in New York around the same time that we last saw Jose’s!)

MAS was also especially proud to give its Third Annual Yolanda Garcia Community Planner Award to Jeanne DuPont. Jeanne founded the Rockaway Waterfront Park Project in 2005 to build a grassroots movement dedicated to protecting one of New York’s most unique neighborhoods. Commissioner Adrian Benepe awarded MAS’ prestigious W. Allison and Elizabeth Stubbs Davis Award to Andrea Williams of the City’s Parks Department.

On Tuesday, July 15 the Landmarks Preservation Commission will “calendar” the Prospect Heights Historic District, the first step toward protecting one of Brooklyn’s finest – and most endangered – historic neighborhoods.

“MAS applauds the Landmarks Preservation Commission for moving to protect this very special and threatened neighborhood,” said Lisa Kersavage, director of advocacy and policy for the Municipal Art Society. “The process by which the historic district was created is a model of civic partnership coupled with cutting-edge technology.”

Prospect Heights is rich in historic architecture, with blocks of beautiful Italianate and neo-Grec rowhouses, interspersed with churches, small commercial and apartment buildings. Located just north of Prospect Park, the neighborhood has seen few changes since it was first developed in the late-19th Century. Today it is threatened by the Atlantic Yards project, a proposal by the developer Forest City Ratner to build 16 towers and a sports arena on a 22-acre site adjacent to the neighborhood. Continue Reading>>