Champagne on 13th Street

Sales are hot hot hot at 27 East 12th St., the upcoming skyscraper on the site of Bowlmor Lanes. Even though the building doesn’t yet exist, at least 20 of the 53 units, including both zillion-dollar penthouses, are sold. Movin’ on up.

Reminder: The annual shareholders’ meeting will take place on July 22nd at 7PM – 9PM at the usual place: The Seafarers and International House at 123 East 15th St. on the second floor.

DNAinfo reports:

 

The streets around Union Square will get a set of new protected bicycle lanes this summer in an effort to fill holes in the neighborhood’s bike network, according to the Department of Transportation. 

The DOT will install a new protected bike lane going north along Fourth Avenue, a protected two-way lane on 17th Street between Union Square East and Sixth Avenue, and a series of unprotected lanes on East 15th and East 16th streets that will allow bikers easier travel between Union Square and the east side, according to Ted Wright, director of the agency’s Bikes and Greenway Program.

The new Fourth Avenue lane will be installed on the west side of the street, allowing cyclists to turn left at East 17th Street without having to leave their bike route or cross lanes of traffic, according to the proposal.

As the bike network currently exists, bikers have a protected lane on Fourth Avenue until 12th Street, where the lane loses its buffer and ends at East 14th Street. The new lanes will extend the protected lane with a buffer of flexible bollards until 15th Street, where an unprotected lane will continue north on Union Square East and connect with the new two-way protected lane at East 17th Street, according to the DOT.

The crosstown lanes, meanwhile, will help cyclists access northbound and southbound protected lanes on First and Second avenues, as well as a new protected northbound lane on Sixth Avenue, which the DOT is set to install this summer as well.

The agency’s goal is to have the lanes completed this summer, according to Wright, speaking at a Community Board 5 Transportation and Environment Committee meeting on Monday.

“That’s how we like to do it, quick and dirty,” he said.

In addition, patching up holes in Union Square’s bike lane network will help calm traffic and give cyclists more options to access other parts of the city’s maze of bike routes, but pedestrians will also benefit from the narrower roadways, Wright said.

“Protected bike lanes do make streets safer,” he said. “We see pedestrian injuries go way down with these kinds of projects.”

There was a 15 percent drop in pedestrian injuries along Second Avenue between 14th and 34th streets from 2010, when a protected bike lane was installed, until 2015, according to NYPD crash data.

Community Board 5 Transportation Committee voted on Monday to recommend approving the DOT’s plan, which was long in the making, according to board member Nancy Aber Goshow.

“We’ve been asking for something like this for a decade,” she said.

Still, some members, including Goshow, raised concerns that the plan could add to traffic problems on 17th Street, where they said a construction site and a bus pick-up zone for the Shield Institute, a school for students with developmental difficulties, regularly snarls traffic.

“Have you thought about how this could complicate traffic on East 17th Street?” Goshow asked. “It’s already a very congested street.”

Grub Street reports the not incredibly surprising news that Union Square restaurant Irving Mill will close on January 1. The restaurant, known for its chef turnover, a major lawsuit, and its one-time super porky menu, has been, how shall we say, underpopulated of late (or, the last year of its life really). Regardless, the owners—two brothers and one’s wife—meant well and it’s a beautiful, large space. And that Ryan Skeen burger had some serious potential back in the day. Life goes on, and this space will go on, reopening as a Brother Jimmy’s BBQ, the fratty barbecue chain, in March. Just think: a new TGI Friday’s and a Brother Jimmy’s? Union Square is looking like the place to be in 2010.

The latest gossip from The Villager:

While the fate of two prime-time storefronts on the south side of Union Square has yet to be determined, recent whispers have indicated that more big-box stores could be headed for the space currently occupied by a pair of retail behemoths.

Electronics retailer Circuit City, which filed for bankruptcy late last year, will shutter its location on 14th St. at Fourth Ave. at the end of next month as part of plan to auction off all its properties and leases nationwide.

A sales associate at the store said that Walmart was interested in the space, which is owned by developer The Related Companies, although a New York-based spokesperson for Walmart said the big-box chain currently has no announced projects in the city.

Best Buy, which has a store less than a mile away on W. 23rd St., is another name that has been floated as a future tenant. A company spokesperson said the electronics-and-entertainment retailer does not currently have any plans for the site and could not speculate on potential deals.

Rumors have also swirled for months over the possible departure of the adjacent Virgin Megastore, where Related — which owns a controlling interest of the Virgin stores — is also the landlord.

“We’ve made no decision about that property,” Related spokesperson Joanna Rose told Mixed Use, echoing her statements to this paper from last May regarding Virgin’s long-speculated exit. However, Rose did confirm that brokerage Winick Realty Group continues to handle the leasing assignment for the nearly 60,000-square-foot property.

A spokesperson for the Union Square Partnership did not have any information on who could open in either space, where brokers have pegged asking prices for the marquee addresses at upward of $300 to $350 per square foot.

Gotham Bar & Grill, the longest-running high-end dining establishment in the neighborhood, is done.

According to Eater.com…

After 36 years — and one major, recent chef change — fine dining trailblazer Gotham Bar & Grill is closing. Saturday, March 14 will be its last night of service, according to an email sent to customers.

Restaurants across the city are closing temporarily as new measures to curb the coronavirus outbreak have led to declines in sales, but Gotham will not be reopening.

The closure follows a brief tenure from its new chef Victoria Blamey, who started leading the kitchen only last year — and was a significant change for the longtime regulars of the storied American fine dining restaurant. The previous chef, Alfred Portale, ran the kitchen for more than three decades and through its many accolades, including Michelin stars and James Beard Awards. He left to open his first solo restaurant, Portale, in Chelsea.

Blamey did not come into an easy situation. Much of the staff and the clientele were intensely loyal to Portale, who created dishes that became icons, like a riff on tuna tartare. He’d also been there for most of the restaurant’s tenure. Gotham opened in Greenwich Village in 1984, and he took over the large, white tablecloth establishment a year later.

Moreover, Gotham is a fine dining legend; its menu shaped what American fine dining looks like in New York. The pressure was on for Blamey, who was expected to bring a younger crowd to the restaurant. And under her, Gotham retained its three stars in the New York Times, with Pete Wells delighting in her additions to the menu.