That's the word in an article posted today at Crain's New York, which provides all sorts of details on what will be happening to the two buildings at 9 and 11 Second Avenue.
Here are some excerpts from the article by Jeremy Smerd:
Ten dollars buys two cold Budweisers at the Mars Bar. For those who live above the graffiti-scarred East Village dive, it's the price of a new, luxury apartment.
An octogenarian playwright, a drag queen and a kvetcher provoked nightly by the bar's cacophony are among the nine tenants in two adjoining buildings at the corner of Second Avenue and East First Street who will receive this sweet deal.
At the end of the month, they will vacate their 1920s building, which will be demolished in August. When they return in about two years, each will pay $10 (tax free) to buy an apartment in a 12-story luxury high-rise.
John Vaccaro, 81, is the only resident here who was willing to be interviewed. He has lived in the East Village since the late 1950s; in the space above the Mars Bar since 1977.
"Look at this stuff all around us, all these high-rises. Everywhere you look. Behind us. West of us, It bothers me that New York has changed so much. It's not the New York I came to."
And one more passage:
Neighborhood blogs have covered the story with the requisite antipathy for yuppie scum. Locals have mostly lamented that the Mars Bar will come down with the building, but the protests of earlier years have given way to resignation. At a February City Planning Commission hearing, no one spoke in opposition.
"The bar's closing. Oh, well," said a Mars Bar bartender named Amy. "You move on. I dislike this neighborhood now."
Mr. Vaccaro, like his building, is old and frail. "I'd rather be young and directing shows," he said while sifting through memorabilia he is giving away. He pays $294 a month but has spent thousands renovating his space.
His kitchen, though, sits on a platform because the floor is unstable. Illuminated by track lighting, it could be the set of one of his plays, with Mr. Vaccaro playing the character who doesn't recognize the neighborhood he calls home.
And when will the Mars Bar close? The article doesn't say, but one date has been repeated in the gossip: June 30.
Read the whole article here.
