Meanwhile, 24 Avenue A remains empty

Well, while on the topic of Avenue A retail... I recently noticed new(ish?) plans in the window of the former Graceland space at Second Street... (And it seems longer than six months that Graceland has been gone...)

Anyway the space can be chopped up into one, two or three storefronts... (Here's the listing.)



The one storefront might be best suited for the threatened 7-Eleven. And what do you think life would be like here had the CB3 approved Frank's plan for fast-food Italian (Raguboy) back in June?

Meanwhile, the FDR cheap pizza place behind the space on Second Street is ready for action... as you can see from the canopy, you can get 99-cent pizza, Indian snacks, tea...



Previously on EV Grieve:
"All uses considered" at former Graceland

More here.

Grade inflation at Ray's?

Thanks to an EV Grieve reader for this photo outside Ray's... a little marker mischief provides a boost to the Health Department's A, B or C ratings...

DBGB's decorative planters finally receive a warm welcome to the neighborhood

A tin ceiling and Vermont veal meatballs for Goat Town

The Times had an update last week on Goat Town, the new restaurant taking over the former Seymour Burton-Butcher Bay space (Le Tableau closed in December 2007) on East Fifth Street between Avenue A and Avenue B:

The restaurant will hew to the current shoestring restaurant formula of repurposed materials, including a weathered copper bar and a tin ceiling, and ingredients that are often local, perhaps even grown in the restaurant’s own garden, and pickled on the premises. The menu is fairly straightforward American, with a raw bar, and dishes like Vermont veal meatballs, seared Block Island swordfish, and braised Flying Pigs Farm pork shoulder.

Nicholas Morgenstern, late of General Greene in Fort Greene, and Joel Hough, a former chef de cuisine at Cookshop, are behind this venture.

I caught a look inside the other day...



Goat Town opens Thursday.

Yes, yes, yes — Christmas is coming, we get it

We'll always have the MTA

From today's Post:

An MTA bus bully slapped a $100 summons on a Manhattan woman deemed too slow to show her ticket for the new express M15 Select Bus -- a service that has increasingly become a cash cow for the money-strapped agency.

Since 2008, NYC Transit cops have handed out more than $1 million in summonses on the two Select Bus lines, the M15 and the Bx12, whose riders buy tickets from a sidewalk machine rather than pay on board.

The machines are supposed to speed the passengers' trips, but some straphangers gripe that the speediest thing about the Select Bus service is how quickly officers ticket customers.

Celebrate the Bowery on Tuesday evening

From the EV Grieve inbox...

BOWERY HISTORY: A CELEBRATION
A lively evening of talk and entertainment honoring the cradle of American popular culture. Birthplace of tap dance, vaudeville, and punk rock, the Bowery is being nominated to the National Register of Historic Places. Hosted by Bowery Alliance of Neighbors & Two Bridges Neighborhood Council

Tuesday, November 30, 2010
@ Dixon Place, 161A Chrystie Street (Btwn. Rivington & Delancey)
SUBWAYS: F to 2nd Ave., 6 to Spring, B/D to Grand, J to Bowery

6 - Happy Hour (Cash Bar), featuring vintage Bowery cocktails
7 - Showtime

HOSTED BY:
Kent Barwick,
President Emeritus, Municipal Art Society

PERFORMERS:
Poor Baby Bree, Chanteuse (w/Frankllin Bruno, piano)
Bob Holman, Poet, Bowery Poetry Club

SPEAKERS:
City Council Member Margaret Chin
Kerri Culhane, Architectural Historian
Peter Quinn, Novelist, BANISHED CHILDREN OF EVE
Eric Ferrara, L.E.S. History Project, author of upcoming book on the Bowery
Anthony Tung, Author, PRESERVING THE WORLD'S GREAT CITIES
Trav S.D., Vaudeville Historian and impresario

FILM:
THIS IS THE BOWERY (rare film from the 1940s); fascinating footage of
the Bowery Mission, street life, etc. In many ways anticipates Lionel
Rogosin's classic 1956 documentary ON THE BOWERY.

TICKETS:
$20 - General Admission
$15 - Student/Seniors
$50 - Sponsors (Priority Seating)

Via here or 866-811-4111

Another day, another Deitch Wall update

Previously. GammaBlog has more here.

Santa baby

At the Morrison Hotel Gallery on the Bowery .....A Mick Rock photo.

Angelina Jolie up close

Ad on the M14 Cemusa shelter on Avenue A in front of Lucy's.

Chilly scenes of winter

Somewhere on East Ninth Street.

Your daily Deitch Wall update

Kenny Scharf continues his mural here on Houston and the Bowery. Check out some great photos of Scharf at work on GammaBlog.

Christmas is coming, still

Christmas trees arriving at St. Mark's Church in-the-Bowery, Second Avenue and 10th Street...






...and there are even trees that will fit inside apartments...

First Street, 9:09 a.m., Nov. 27

Christmas is coming

Two scenes from First Avenue tonight...

Window shopping on 14th Street

Between Avenue A and Avenue B.

Thanksgiving marathon continues

Bowie's puffy-pants, puffy-hair phase circa 1987.

Avenue A, 12:22, Nov. 25

Breaking: Delivery bike removed from Stuy Town

We just noted the presence of an abandoned restaurant delivery bike that has been locked to this tree in 4 Stuyvesant Oval in Stuy Town since.... Halloween!



EV Grieve reader Nixta now reports that, as of this morning, workers removed the bike!

Dora Park Apartments getting a bath

One of my favorite apartment buildings, the Dora Park on Seventh Street across from Tompkins Square Park, is getting cleaned up... watching workers on the scene this morning... hope no one wanted to sleep in...




Here's a shot from the invaluable Forgotten New York showing the detail above Dora Park's doorway...

Scharf attack

On Wednesday, BoweryBoogie noted that Brooklyn-based artist Kenny Scharf had started his work on the Deitch Wall at Houston and the Bowery... here's a progress report...

The work continues at St. Brigid's

There have been several "alarming rumors," according to The Villager, about the renovations at St. Brigid's on Avenue B and Eighth Street....I walked by the site earlier this week.... and there was a lot of work going on...Still continues to look like a major operation....

Remembering what St. Brigid's looks like

Seems like forever since we last saw St. Brigid's on Avenue B at Eighth Street with the scaffolding and sidewalk shed, etc.... Here's a shot (via) from 2000 or so...



And from the NYPL digital archives... a view of the church in 1928...



...and 1935...



Photos from NYPL. 1928-35

The suspects list has been narrowed down to 8 million people

Waiting for the N/R at Union Square.

FDNY Twitter account pulled after Post article?

Per the Post today:

The firefighters of Engine Co. 28 and Ladder Co. 11 in the East Village have begun posting unsanctioned tweets to alert local residents when the company is unable to respond to emergency calls, The Post has learned.

"We're just trying to let people know when we're not around," said a source familiar with the instant-messaging tactic, which has nothing to do with the FDNY's official Twitter account.

According to unofficial Fire Department logs obtained by The Post, Engine Co. 28 and Ladder Co. 11 were pulled out of service on 20 occasions last month for everything from mechanical failure to training, and to cover other firehouses when other units are pulled from service.

"Technically, you're going to increase response times," said the source. "People should know when their fire company is out of service. It's the taxpayers' money. It's your money."

The FDNY claims that units are routinely pulled from service for various reasons and it does not present a danger to the public.
"There is ample coverage on the Lower East Side," said an FDNY spokesman. "There are redundancies built into the response."

I've been following the feed too... Unfortunately, it appears that someone removed the account...

Thanksgiving dinner at the Hotel Manhattan

Circa 1900... click the image to increase the photo size... $1.25 for venison steak in chafing dish? Outrageous! Damn yuppies...



The hotel was located at 42nd Street and Madison Avenue.

[Via NYPL]

Children of the damned

If you do go to Rolf's for a drink or some pig fat this holiday, then please do not play with the dolls. They are evil.

Birds

An army of pigeons ready for action on Avenue A at Seventh Street...

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning edition

Inside Bird's house on Avenue B (The New York Times)

The gingko trees of East Eleventh Street (Jeremiah's Vanishing New York)

What Guss's Pickles on Orchard looks like now (Racked)

Wall Street types have regained their swagger (The Dealbook)

Tracking an LES burglary suspect (BoweryBoogie)

More on former Butcher Bay space on East Fifth Street (Diner's Journal)

And case you missed the new-look Deitch Wall news from yesterday... here's what it looks like now... 12ozProphet has more on the tribute... which was short-lived.


[Photo via Eddie Brannan]