NEARLY HALF THE KIDS HERE GO TO PRIVATE SCHOOL
The Wall Street Journal crunched some data from the DOE and learned that District 2 — us — has one of the higher rates of students in private schools in the city at 42 percent (Williamsburg is 60 percent, mostly due to yeshiva enrollment). No shocker given the wealth of the neighborhood, but still interesting since so many of us moved here for PS 234 — or at least I did. “Among families residing in affluent District 2, which includes Tribeca and the Upper East Side, for example, about 42% of roughly 57,100 children attended private schools, although many public options there are high-performing. Within easy traveling distance are more than a dozen well-known independent schools. Some have annual tuition and fees topping $50,000.” Citywide the number was 18 percent in private or charter. (Those are Leman graduates celebrating at Federal Hall, above.)

DAILY NEWS OPED CRITICIZES JAIL PLAN
Mitchell Moss, the professor of urban policy and planning at NYU Wagner School of Public Service, has an oped in the Daily News saying the jail plan for White Street is ill-considered and rushed: “The community has good reason to be worried. The jail is projected to cost $1 billion, but that seems more like a best guess than a precise estimate. The proposed site is a densely populated area with nearly 160,000 residents and 70,000 workers — adding to the challenge of building along the narrow, busy streets of lower Manhattan…No private developer would be allowed to advance a project in as rushed a manner as the city is trying to do with this new jail… The city’s plan for this new jail has the potential to change the Manhattan skyline for the next 100 years. It is better to do it right than to do it too fast.”

CONCRETE FACADE GETS NOTICE
The Architects Newspaper has a detailed story on 30 Warren and its concrete facade.

LEE MINDEL’S PLACE AT 56 LEONARD
AD has a fun video walk-through of architect Lee Mindel’s place on the second floor of 56 Leonard (if it every gets installed, the Anish Kapoor bean will be wedged under his terrace). Mindel designed the sales office for Herzog & De Meuron, the architects behind the Jenga building, and that drew in Mindel and his partner, designer José Marty. There’s mid-century furnishings from the original Four Seasons restaurant and a bicycle sculpture by Ai Weiwei.