Tag Archives: News

Looking for love in all the wrong places

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Bufo americanus, American Toad, by Henry McLin.

The NYC Health Department issued an alert today about an illegal aphrodisiac derived in part from toad venom. A man died last week after ingesting it:

The Health Department today warned New York City residents about an illegal aphrodisiac known as “stone,” which can cause serious poisonings and death. The product is also known as Piedra, Jamaican Stone, Love Stone, Black Stone or Chinese Rock. Last week, an area hospital alerted the New York City Poison Control Center that a man had died after ingesting the aphrodisiac. Similar products were linked to poisonings and deaths during the 1990s.

These products are banned by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) but are imported illegally. Selling them in New York City is also a violation of the New York City Health Code.
– PRODUCT ALERT: ILLEGAL APHRODISIAC CALLED ‘STONE’ CAN CAUSE SERIOUS POISONING AND DEATH

Stone, a hard dark brown substance, is typically sold as a solid chunk less than a square inch in size. It may be packaged in a clear plastic bag with some labeling. The product is sold in some adult stores and can also be found in other neighborhood stores. Its active ingredients include several chemicals known as bufadienolides. They are derived from toad venom and some trees and can disrupt the normal rhythm of the heart.

Stone, a hard dark brown substance, is typically sold as a solid chunk less than a square inch in size. It may be packaged in a clear plastic bag with some labeling. The product is sold in some adult stores and can also be found in other neighborhood stores. Its active ingredients include several chemicals known as bufadienolides. They are derived from toad venom and some trees and can disrupt the normal rhythm of the heart.

Stone can cause serious heart problems or death when ingested, but can also be harmful when applied to the skin – its typical use. Symptoms of poisoning may include chest pain, abdominal pain and vomiting.

Links

Press Release

Flatbush Rezoning Proposal

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Update, 2008.06.13: Read my report from the preliminary hearing.

457 Rugby Road, Ditmas Park West, Flatbush, Brooklyn
457 Rugby Road, Ditmas Park West

This was just a bullet in my listing of upcoming local events earlier this week. CB14 has scheduled a preliminary public hearing of DCP’s proposed zoning changes for the northern half of CB14, ie: Flatbush, for Thursday, June 12, 2008 at 7pm at Public School 249 at the corner of Caton Avenue and Marlborough Road.


CB14 just released additional information about the study area:

Brooklyn Community Board 14 has scheduled a preliminary public hearing to receive public input in the matter of the New York City Department of City Planning’s Flatbush Neighborhood Study proposes to make certain changes to the zoning map in the Flatbush section of Community District 14, which includes Coney Island Avenue to the west, Caton Avenue/Parkside Avenue/Clarkson Avenue to the north, Bedford Avenue/Nostrand Avenue/East 32nd Street to the east, and the LIRR tracks to the south.

I’ve sketched a preliminary map of the study area based on this description and the boundaries of CB14.

View Larger Map

At the hearing, the Department of City Planning will make a presentation on the changes currently under consideration. Following this preliminary public hearing, the Department of City Planning will submit a formal zoning map amendment for certification under the City’s Uniform Land Use Review Procedure (ULURP). After which, Community Board 14 will hold a final public hearing to receive comment on the application.

DCP won’t publish maps or other details until their formal submission of the proposal to the ULURP process. Here’s what I know abut the latest draft of the proposal:

  • My neighborhood of Beverley Square West would be largely rezoned from its current R3-2 and R6 to R3X.
  • Ditmas Park West would be rezoned from R3-2 and R6 to R4A.

DCP’s justification for the R4A designation is that a larger percentage of existing structures within DPW would comply with R4A than R3X. Residents of DPW have started on online petition to call for the R3X designation instead:

We, the residents of Ditmas Park West and its environs, petition the City Planning Commission to adopt the R-3X designation as they consider rezoning. This would allow only one and two family detached homes and limit the floor-area-ratio to 50 percent. We feel this is the ideal designation to preserve our neighborhood as built.

I agree. I signed the petition with the following comment:

R-3X more accurately reflects the built environment of Ditmas Park
West (DPW) than either the existing R3-2 or the proposed R4-A. It
would also be consistent with the R3-X proposed for Beverley Square
West, where I live, which lies immediately north of DPW on the other
side of Cortelyou Road.

I believe that DCP’s measure of “compliance” is based largely on lot widths and existing expansions of homes, even if those expansions were not done in compliance with the zoning already in effect. In addition, with the Yards Text Amendment, the difference in zoning between R3 and R4 will have impacts not just on housing construction but on open space between buildings and the streetscape, properties which define neighborhood character at least as much as the homes themselves.

If you would like to speak at the public hearing, you may pre-register for time by calling the District office at 718-859-6357. You may, in addition, register at the hearing on the evening of June 12th.
If you have any questions regarding the above, please do not hesitate to call the Community Board 14 District office at 718-859-6357.

Related content

City Planning Commission Unanimously Approves Green Initiatives, April 2, 2008
Victorian Flatbush at risk from inappropriate zoning, October, 2007

Links

There’s an article in Flatbush Life, but the new Your Nabe Web site is not making it available. Boycott all Murdoch media.
Flatbush Rezoning Push Not Sitting Well With Some Locals, Brownstoner, May 23, 2008
Rezoning Victorian Flatbush, Ditmas Park Blog, May 21, 2008

Forbes discovers foodies

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The story comes out of Associated Press, but I came across it first on Forbes:

High prices at the pump and the produce aisle have sent home gardeners into their yards with a mission: Grow-it-yourself dining. Sales of vegetable seeds, tomato transplants and fruit trees are soaring as enterprising planters grow their own food.
– As economy stumbles, gardeners turn to yard-grown produce, Ellen Simon, AP

One of Brooklyn’s own gets a quote:

GRDN, a shop in the New York City borough of Brooklyn [specifically, Boerum Hill], is getting a lot of questions about which edible plants can be grown on a fire escape, said staffer Cindy Birkhead. “There’s lots of interest in herbs, blueberry bushes, tomato plants, any transplants or shrubs that bear edible fruit.”

No news is not good news: Courier-Life Publications Web sites displaced

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Earlier this afternoon, Brooklyn Junction noticed that the Web site for Flatbush Life was down:

No one ever accused www.flatbushlife.com of being the most regularly updated website in the world. Coming from me, that doesn’t mean much these days. But gone? Say it ain’t so.

At first, the Flatbush Life Web site was responding with “404 – Not Found.” Shortly after, it was redirecting to an unfamiliar Web site: YourNabe.com. I contacted the Webmaster for courierlife.net and got this response:

www.flatbushlife.com [is] redirecting to the newly-designed www.yournabe.com. www.YourNabe.com combines the newspapers of the Courier Life publications, Times Ledger publications, and Bronx Times/ Times Reporter.

The YourNabe.com domain is owned by Courier-Life’s parent company, News Community Newspapers Holdings, Inc. Within YourNabe, there are sections for different neighborhoods. For example, the new URL for Flatbush Life is http://www.yournabe.com/flatbush/front/.

All Web sites for Courier-Life Publications‘ Brooklyn neighborhood newspapers are affected by this change:

  • Bay News
  • Bay Ridge Courier
  • Brooklyn Graphic
  • Canarsie Digest
  • Flatbush Life
  • Kings Courier
  • Park Slope Courier
  • Brooklyn Heights Courier
  • Carroll Gardens / Cobble Hill Courier
  • Fort Greene / Clinton Hill Courier

amNY profiles Flatbush

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Tomorrow’s amNY includes an extensive profile of Flatbush in their City Living (real estate) section:

Good luck trying to get a straight answer on where Flatbush is. Encompassing 11 neighborhood associations, all of which can claim some stake in this emerging community, the boundaries are amorphous–something in which local civic leaders seem to take pride, given the great diversity that exists here.
– New York real estate: Flatbush, amNY, May 8, 2008

In a refreshing change, the article expands the focus beyond “Ditmas Park.” A photo of a halal meat store on Coney Island Avenue illustrates the article.

While most of the recent attention has focused on the historic neighborhoods around Ditmas Park, other areas of Flatbush are thriving and on the radar for capital improvements.

One of several humming commercial strips that reflect the rich diversity of the neighborhood, Flatbush Avenue is lined with businesses catering to Dominican, Spanish, West Indian, Jamaican and Haitian populations (as well as blocks-long stretches of Pentecostal storefront churches). Indian, Pakistani and Afghan restaurants and markets occupy blocks of Coney Island Avenue. Target will be the anchor tenant in a new mall at Brooklyn Junction. And the long-closed historic Loews’ King Theater, a 1929 Art Deco movie palace ( Barbra Streisand worked the doors here as a teenager) may get a renovation.

All eyes are on the Newkirk Plaza area, one of America’s oldest pedestrian shopping malls, spruced up with decorative pavement and fencing, lighting and planters. The French bistro, Pomme de Terre, recently planted a stake near here, signaling to the rest of Flatbush that Newkirk is ready for its photo opp.

City Planning Commission Unanimously Approves Green Initiatives

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Update: The City Council approved the Yards Text Amendment on April 30, 2008.

54 Stratford Road, Caton Park, Flatbush, Brooklyn. This is not a parking lot.
54 Stratford Road, Caton Park, Brooklyn

I learned yesterday that last week NYC’s City Planning Commission unanimously approved two initiatives proposed last fall by the Department of City Planning.

I wrote last year about the Yards Text Amendment, which will prevent paving over front yards for parking, among other things. The other proposal mandates street trees – one for each 25 feet of lot frontage, and a minimum of one per lot – for new development and significant renovation. I’ve written several posts about street trees, though none about this specific DCP proposal.

These now go to the City Council.

246 (left) and 240 (center) Westminster Road, Beverley Square West, Flatbush, Brooklyn
246 (left) and 240 (center) Westminster Road

Related Posts

Preserving Livable Streets: DCP’s Yards Text Amendment, November 7, 2007
Basic Research: The State of the Forest in New York City, November 12, 2007
Factoids: NYC’s Street Trees and Stormwater Reduction, November 15, 2007
Barbara Corcoran Hates the Earth, November 18, 2007
The Luminous Streets, November 25, 2007
Factoid: Street Trees and Property Values, December 2, 2007

Links

Residents square off about new driveway limits, NY Daily News, April 1, 2008

Northeastern Bats in Peril

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Bat House at the East 4th Street Community Garden in Kensington/Windsor Terrace
Bat House

A discussion thread about mosquito control on the Flatbush Family Network led to this question:

I heard that bat houses are a possible long-term solution for mosquitos. I guess you put a bat house up and hope that they come and live there. It can take a few seasons to get them to do it but an average bat eats lots of mosquitos a day. Seems strange to try and seduce bats to your house but those mosquitos are terrible. Anyone else heard about these bat houses?

The photo above is of a bat house in the East 4th Street Community Garden, which I visited for the first time last November. One of the questions they get when they explain what it’s for is, “Where do you get the bats?” If you build it, they will come. We have bats here in Brooklyn. Whether we will continue to have them is in question.

A newly emerging epidemic is wiping out bat colonies. First discovered last winter in a single cave near Albany, New York, this winter it’s been found to have spread to more locations, including sites in Vermont and Massachusetts. Mortality has been as high as 90% in some caves:

Thousands of hibernating bats are dying in caves in New York State and Vermont from unknown causes … The most obvious symptom involved in the die-off is a white fungus encircling the noses of some, but not all, of the bats. Called “white-nose syndrome,” the fungus is believed to be associated with the problem, but it may not necessarily contribute to the actual cause of death. It appears that the affected bats deplete their fat reserves months before they would normally emerge from hibernation and die as a result …

“What we’ve seen so far is unprecedented,” said Alan Hicks, DEC’s bat specialist. “Most bat researchers would agree that this is the gravest threat to bats they have ever seen. We have bat researchers, laboratories and caving groups across the country working to understand the cause of the problem and ways to contain it.”
– Bat Die-Off Prompts Investigation, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation

Bat populations are particularly vulnerable during hibernation as they congregate in large numbers in caves-clusters of 300 per square foot in some locations-making them susceptible to disturbance or disease. The vast majority of the hundreds of thousands of bats known to hibernate in New York do so in just five caves and mines. Because bats often migrate hundreds of miles to their summer range, effects on hibernating bats can have significant implications for bats throughout the Northeast.

Indiana bats [Myotis sodalis], a state and federally endangered species, are perhaps the most vulnerable. Half the estimated 52,000 Indiana bats that hibernate in the state are located in just one former mine-a mine that is now infected with white-nose syndrome. Eastern pipistrelle [Perimyotis subflavus], northern long-eared [Myotis septentrionalis] and little brown [Myotis lucifugus] bats also are dying. Little brown bats, the most common hibernating species in the state, have sustained the largest number of deaths.

Related Posts

Bat Houses, April 13, 2008
Other posts about bats

Links

Chronology
Bat Die-Off Prompts Investigation, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation
Mystery Disease Kills U.S. Bats, Bat Conservation International
Something is killing our bats: The white-nose syndrome mystery, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Wikipedia: White-nose syndrome

Flatbush Family Network (requires membership)

News

Dying Bats in the Northeast Remain a Mystery, USGS Newsroom, May 9, 2008
First It Was Bees, Now It’s Bats That Are Dying, Natural News, April 11, 2008
Bats in the Region Are Dying From a Mysterious Ailment, Litchfield County Times, April 3, 2008
Bats Perish, and No One Knows Why, New York Times Science Section, March 25, 2008

New York invests in California’s carbon

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US carbon asset manager Natsource LLC said on Monday it has invested in the first forest-based greenhouse gas emissions reductions under California rules. Natsource paid a private owner of a redwood forest in Humboldt County represented by nonprofit group the Pacific Forest Trust for credits representing 60,000 tonnes of carbon emissions. – NY Company Buys First Californian Forest Carbon Credits, PlanetArk

The emissions reductions were created through sustainable forestry on a permanently conserved property in California. This deal illustrates the significant role that management of existing forests can play in addressing climate change. The transaction is the first commercial delivery of certified emissions reductions under the Forest Protocols adopted last fall by the California Air Resources Board (CARB). The Protocols are the first rigorous governmental accounting standards in the U.S. for climate projects embracing forest management and avoided deforestation, while ensuring emissions reductions are real, permanent, additional and verifiable. – Joint Press Release (PDF), NatSource and Pacific Forest trust

Links

California Air Resources Board (CARB) NatSource Asset Management LLC (NatSource) The Pacific Forest Trust

Wanna Fight Crime? Plant Trees

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Do street trees increase or decrease crime? In an urban setting, does increased vegetation interfere with police surveillance of criminal activity? Or does the increase in community “surveillance” from more people spending more time outdoors, because it’s more pleasant, deter crime even more than police surveillance would?

According to Joseph Murray, biology instructor at Blue Ridge Community College in Weyers Cave, Virginia, it’s the latter:

Police tend to believe more vegetation means less visibility. A study in 2001 looked at subsidized housing units with varying amounts of vegetation around them. The most calls to the police came from the building with the least vegetation. Those with more vegetation tended to draw residents who demanded benches and well-maintained playground equipment. Then, people were out there watching.
– Urban Forestry Has Crime Prevention Role, Patricia R. McCoy, Alliance for Community Trees, January 22, 2008

We need to internalize more sophisticated models of the impact greening and gardening can have on urban communities. It’s much more than “neighborhood beautification”; at least, when it’s done well, it is. People need green growing things around them to be healthy, to reduce stress, to connect with neighbors, and to feel positively about belonging where they live. Gardening builds and supports community resiliency to respond creatively and constructively to internal and external crises and pressures. Gardening builds community. As it should.

amNY takes a look at Prospect Park South

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170 Stratford Road, Prospect Park South
170 Stratford Road, Prospect Park South
Tomorrow’s edition of amNY has an article on Prospect Park South, my neighborhood neighbor to the north, in their real estate (what else) section:

Deep in the belly of Flatbush lies an enclave of colossal freestanding houses, characterized by turrets, oriel windows, grand entrances flanked by columns and expansive wraparound porches.
– City Living: Prospect Park South, amNY, January 3, 2008

I don’t know about “deep in the belly”; PPS lies rather to the northern end of Flatbush.

171 Marlborough Road, Prospect Park South
171 Marlborough Road, Prospect Park South

Unusually for a real estate piece, the article hints at some of the disparities and tensions with which Flatbush is challenged:

Though the neighborhood never fell into disrepair, relations between Prospect Park South and the less-wealthy surrounding areas have seen some rough times in the past.

In the 1970s, muggings and various thefts occurred along Church Avenue and Cortelyou Avenue, the main drags of the area. It had gotten bad enough that Prospect Park South’s residents began paying for private neighborhood security. According to residents, things have improved since then.

Still, some have their doubts about the relationship between Victorian Flatbush — a blanket term for Prospect Park South and the cluster of ritzy neighborhoods to the south [I don’t feel that “ritzy, but okay] — and other parts of Flatbush.

“To be honest, it’s separate,” said one resident, who did not want to be named. “There’s just not much interaction between the two; a silent hostility, perhaps.”

The article includes a brief interview with local realtor and long-time resident Mary Kay Gallagher.

145 (left) and 155 (right) Argyle Road, Prospect Park South
145&155 Argyle Road

Related Content

My Posts tagged Prospect Park South
My Flickr Collection of photos of Prospect Park South
My Flickr photos tagged Prospect Park South