••• “The Dept. of Education said yesterday that because of continued kindergarten space problems, the city could no longer guarantee it would be able to open a middle school in Spruce Street School in 2011, as they had planned.” (Downtown Express)

••• “P.S. 234’s infamous kindergarten wait list is shrinking, but not without questions over where the remaining children will attend school in the fall. New, more distant options, were announced.” (Tribeca Trib)

••• “The Department of Education and Manhattan Youth have reached a tentative agreement that will allow P.S. 234 to continue to use classrooms in Manhattan Youth’s Downtown Community Center for the next three years….” (Broadsheet Daily)

photo by Milo Hess (courtesy Downtown Express)

••• “The tip of the new, longer Pier 25 got a coat of green Tuesday as Hudson River Park Trust contractors installed an artificial turf field. When the rebuilt Tribeca pier opens this fall, the field will be used for peewee sports and T-ball, along with passive recreation. The rest of the pier’s features are steadily taking shape as well, with the volleyball court already in place and the playground construction underway.” (Downtown Express)

••• “The planned skyscraper once known as the Freedom Tower was scorned for years by urban planners, downtown residents and real estate executives who regarded it as an oversize and unnecessary exercise in waste and hubris. But the acrimonious debates, cost overruns and lengthy delays in building the tower appear to be over. More than 1,400 workers are pouring concrete and installing girder upon girder. And with the red steel latticework for the obelisk-shape building now rising more than 240 feet at ground zero, it has turned into an object of desire. Four major real estate developers are vying to buy a minority stake in the $3.1 billion project and to take over the leasing and operating of the skyscraper. This week, the developers submitted their final offers to the owner, the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which plans to pick a winner by June.” (New York Times, which also has panoramic photos of 1 World Trade, the transportation hub, the WTC memorial, and two of the construction zone’s “bathtubs”)

••• Purvis Young, the folk artist whose work is being shown at the Grown & Sewn/Skot Foreman pop-up shop/gallery on Duane Street, died. (New York Times)

••• “Greenmarket, which runs dozens of markets around the city, is considering a new site in Battery Park City, said Cathy Chambers, Greenmarket’s director of operations.” (Downtown Express)

••• Councilmember Margaret Chin doesn’t jaywalk. (Downtown Express)