Park Slope and Manhattan Transplants

i moved here 3 years ago as well and it was because it was the most connected subway station in brooklyn outside of atlantic terminal. i have the 2/3/4/5 right outside my door, but the S that gives me the C/B/Q within minutes. I also could afford it... when i moved here, i went into park slope or the city to drink/eat/hang out. but now my friends from elsewhere come here to eat/drink/party. it's a huge change in that regard since moving here....95 south, franklin park, abigails, etc. etc...

Emily-

I'm not sure that you'll get the best input about this topic on this board because this topic in general usually inspires hostile exchanges. I'm assuming that when you say "Manhattan and Park Sope folk", what you mean is "white folk". So why not spend a day or two canvassing the neighborhood, talking to white people and asking them how long they've been in the neighborhood and why they chose the neighborhood? You might get more honest open input that way.

I'm not sure what your angle on the story could be, but if you look at the timing of the real estate bubble in the country and in NYC and if you look at the rise in prices and rent in P. Heights, as well as the timing of the new businesses and development of 5th Ave in Park Slope and Vanderbilt Ave in P. Heights, you'll probably be able to come up with a better sense of when this trend really began and what the reasons for it are. It really isn't a mystery. The rents in Crown Heights are generally cheaper than in nearby P. Heights or P. Slope or F. Greene.

I'm not sure if a "wave" of people were coming to Crown Heights this past summer/fall. I'd bet that the opening of Franklin Park on St. John's near Franklin in spring of 2008 just made the trend more visible. Certainly the bar was filled immediately upon opening and generated a fair amount of press. It was a strange thing to witness at the time-- a yard instantly filled with mostly white people on a block and corner where you were used to seeing black people almost exclusively. (Key word there is almost. There were white people moving onto that block for at least a few years before the bar opened.) That was pretty dramatic and may have caught the attention of a lot of people. Certainly the color of the pedestrian traffic on St. John's and Franklin Ave was noticeably changed at this time. The restaurant on St. John's and Classon also opened around the same time too.

I think the conversion of the Jewish hospital into rentals might be more of a marker of the trend of more young and white people moving into neighborhood and that might have happened as early as 2004 or 2005?

All the construction that was going on in the winter of 2006 into 2007 on Washington Ave/near Pacific, etc must surely indicate something? In my mind, that was around when Washington Ave was really becoming much more notably mixed in terms of the black/white ratio of people on the street at any given time, but it wasn't as if all white people had just gotten on a bus together and moved into the neighborhood right then. I think it was just when there was a critical mass large enough that you could not avoid acknowledging the trend. It was also about when the hyper-inflated real estate market was either peaking or beginning to crash.

If you live in the neighborhood, then I'm sure you have your own timeline too based probably on what was happening on your block or the surrounding blocks. You could also go back and look at the volume of real estate listings or rentals for Crown Heights in papers like the Village Voice or NY Times. Then you might get a sense of when the area started to come into vogue, so to speak.

(Of course all of this is just the opinion of one gal based on her own subjective observations but maybe it gels with your own personal observations and will be helpful to you.)

Check out this post from the past:

http://www.brooklynian.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=2063&highlight=&sid=c0f8e45baed715a4b86107fdb9bb4f7c

gotta get roommates.

or a gf

I moved out to CH (though the brokers all told me St. Marks & Classon was Prospect Hts. HA!) from Hell's Kitchen/Manhattan back in March of 2007 because, simply, I got priced out of Manhattan. Was in a $1300 studio in Hell's Kitchen, and the landlord wanted to jack my rent up to $1800. Which I wouldn't've paid for a studio, even if I could've afforded it.

Ended up at 475 St. Marks in a new rent-stabilized 1.5 bedroom for $200/more than I was paying for one room in Hell's Kitchen. It took some adjusting to leave Manhattan, but I'm quickly learning to like living here.

Plus, the 'hood has changed A LOT (constituency-wise) in the past 12-14 months. Heck, when I first moved out here, you *never* had to wait for a table at Chavella's...!

Obamanut wrote: [quote=Cool The Kid]


Alma Realty complex (Jewish Hospitals) will only get more hip.. I was in 475 St Marks when the methadone clinic was still running

Place is transforming.

That's great. I hope it gets so "hip" that even its own residents can't stand it anymore.

You know, there was a time where even you didn't live in BK.