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In the News: Our high positivity rate
COVID IN TRIBECA
There’s no definitive theory on why our rates are so high in the neighborhood, but a few news outlets have tried to figure it out. “While cases are rising in Manhattan, ‘it’s hard to tell whether that actually really represents where the virus is going versus that’s just where tests are occurring,’ said Dr. Bruce Y. Lee, a public-health-policy expert at CUNY. That’s apparent in the data: In both Manhattan and Brooklyn, where testing is generally more accessible, the positivity rate is right around 15 percent; it’s 7 percent in Queens and 6 percent in the Bronx.” — Curbed
ELIZABETH STREET GARDEN AS HOUSING
The Times did a recap on the Elizabeth Street garden fight, where the city is about to build 123 affordable apartments for older residents. The plan does have a public garden in the back of the building. The city is also building 100 apartments on a nearby Hudson Street lot.
G.O.T. LEAVING THE NEIGHBORHOOD
The Real Deal reports that David Benioff, who created “Game of Thrones” with D.B. Weiss, has sold the Tribeca loft he shared with actress Amanda Peet for $4.65 million. The off-market deal closed a week before Thanksgiving.
MORE ON THE TRIBECA GALLERY DISTRICT
The New Yorker includes the neighborhood in its wrap-up on the city’s art scene, with a shoutout to PPOW: “The rapid expansion of Tribeca—from some twenty spaces in 2019 to more than double that in 2021 presented a seismic shift among gallery destinations this year. In January, P.P.O.W. gallery, a champion of queer and activist artists (David Wojnarowicz, for one) long before it was fashionable, relocated from a third-floor space in Chelsea to a gleaming storefront on lower Broadway.”
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Unfortunate to hear to the latest on Elizabeth Street Garden. I hadn’t known the most recent decision on this special place.
It’s an absolute travesty. One of the more unique green spaces in the entire city in a neighborhood with very few. Stupid, shortsighted decision that will benefit a handful of people at the expense of a great many.
Some local billionaire should make the city an offer they can’t refuse and preserve the garden forever.
I hope it’s misinformation not malice that led @person to characterize a project that will provide 123 truly affordable housing units for low-income seniors as benefiting “a handful of people.”
Losing open space is always gut-wrenching (though the Elizabeth St Garden only became open to the public less than a decade ago, as this 2019 NYT article points out: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/07/nyregion/garden-little-italy-senior-housing.html). But the benefits are many.
In addition to the senior housing, there are set-asides of office space for Habitat for Humanity and of 1/3 of the site for open space. These are all big pluses. I’m glad this project is going through.
It’s most certainly neither. 123 people *is* a “handful” in a city of 8-9M and compared to the tens of thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, who enjoy that park on an annual basis.
The city should never destroy any existing green space in order to build anything other than better green space for the simple reason that they don’t have to. There are plenty of other places where a whole lot more housing can be built without destroying existing green space, both in centrally located dense neighborhoods and in public transit accessible neighborhoods further from the city core.
Imagine if the city tried to carve away a slice of Central Park or Riverside Park or Hudson River Park or Battery Park or even something like Bogardus Plaza to build some new housing for 100 people, 1,000 people, or even 10,000 people. Would you be on the side of housing? I sure wouldn’t be.
Just for the record, the Elizabeth Street Garden was not public green space. It was a locked, privately leased (but city-owned) space that the lessee opened at his own schedule. Of course, the city could have chosen to make it a permanent garden, like it has with community gardens in the city, but this one was not run by the community and was always scheduled to be housing. So the connection to the parks is not accurate.
I assumed that the Gothamist Tracking Covid ZIP Code maps show positivity based upon where people live, not where they test. I say this because the vaccination and hospitalization maps they also produce which makes us no sense otherwise. Does anyone know for sure?
Nonetheless, ZIP Code 10007 what is 0.37% positive just after Thanksgiving statistics today or rather different
December 18-December 24:
13.03% Positive
101 People Positive
775 People Tested
Few corrections:
There is still no decision, not sure why the Times article insinuated otherwise. The fate of the garden is still very much in the hands of the court.
The space was not always scheduled to be housing, not even sure where you got that from but it’s simply not the truth.