Week in Grieview

Posts this past week included (with a photo on First Avenue by Derek Berg) ...

• Renovation watch: This is what the inside of the former Hells Angels HQ looks like now (Thursday) 

• New bike lanes next for freshly paved Avenue C (Tuesday) 

• Brooklyn Bean Roastery closes on Avenue A (Monday) 

• Wegmans makes it OFFICIAL, will take over the former Kmart space on Astor Place (Thursday)

• A short tribute — sob — to the World Famous Pee Phone™ (Friday) 

• Advocates urging City Comptroller to withhold approval for East River Park reconstruction — with update (Tuesday) 

• Report of a slashing outside 7-Eleven on Avenue A (Tuesday) 

• 787 Coffee debuts on 10th Street (Thursday) • Post debuts in new 3rd Street space (Wednesday)

• Now You're Clean, offering self-service dog washing, opens on 10th Street (Wednesday) 

• An encore presentation for the Pyramid Club on Avenue A? (Wednesday) 

• Karma's newest 2nd Street gallery is open (Tuesday) 

• Mochinut bringing mochi doughnuts and Korean-style hot dogs to 2nd Avenue (Monday) 

• "I see you over there" — the return of a Zoltar and words of wisdom (Wednesday) 

• XOXO 2nd Avenue (Sunday) • At long last, workers remove the sidewalk bridge from 75 1st Ave. (Friday) 

• East Berlin set for 169 Avenue A (Thursday) 

 ... and B&H Dairy unveiled a new line of t-shirts this past week... with a logo modeled after the lunch counter's longtime neon sign... $20 at B&H, 127 Second Ave. between Seventh Street and St Mark's Place...

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Follow EVG on Instagram or Twitter for more frequent updates and pics.

A short tribute — sob — to the World Famous Pee Phone™

Many of you likely already noticed this disheartening disappearance this summer. 

On Avenue A at Seventh Street, the long, distinguished reign of the World Famous Pee Phone™ has come to an undistinguished end ...

Back in March, workers started removing the open-air pay phones on Avenue A... though the World Famous Pee Phone™ was spared at the time. 

Anyway, the booth was a recurring character through the early years here in these pages — and elsewhere! (And I don't honestly remember who bestowed the booth with the Pee Phone moniker. Eden? I retain the Pee Phone™ though for merchandising and the forthcoming bingeworthy Peacock series.)

A quick look back... when it served as a lending library...

... when there was a price increase...

... and just a day in the life...

Thank you for always being there for us.

The disappearing pay phones along Avenue A

In the last week or so, workers have hauled off the open-air pay phones on the northwest side of Avenue A at Fourth Street (above) ... the west side Avenue A at Third Street...

... and the west side of Avenue A at Second Street...

The one on the east side of A at Third Street is also gone. However, the pay phones remain on the south side of Fourth at A... 

... and the south side of A at Fifth...

So you still have a place to take a _____ or put down your bottle of ______ or roll a _____.

Thankfully, for now anyway, the World Famous Pee Phone™ is still on duty on Avenue A at Seventh Street.  

Anyway, all this was expected... in late February 2020, Gothamist reported that the Department of Information, Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT) was going to uproot nearly 3,000 pay phones around NYC that are maintained by CityBridge. A few non-CityBridge phones are likely to remain. And expect to see some new LinkNYC kiosks in some of these spaces.

EVG Etc.: Tossing a SantaCon coma suit; playing at the 11th Street Bar

[Photo on 7th Street by Derek Berg]

Mayor's office releases report on legalized pot in NYC (Curbed)

Questions over the future of Mitchell–Lama residential buildings in NYC (City Realty)

Lost Clause! "A SantaCon reveler who landed in a coma after falling down a flight of stairs at a Manhattan bar only has himself to blame for the drunken tumble, a judge ruled." (New York Post)

The city's worst landlord? The NYCHA, says Letitia James's office (amNewYork)

Michael Che, Michelle Wolf and other entertainers coming together on Jan. 11 at the Irving Plaza to raise money for NYCHA (Daily News)

Why musicians love playing at the 11th Street bar (The Villager ... previously)

A Tompkins Square Park landmarks quiz (Off the Grid)

Pier 35 is (partially) open! (The Lo-Down)

Small fire at the Con Ed substation on Avenue C (Town & Village)

Space Invader's tiled mosaic of the Ramones is being chipped away in Soho (Flaming Pablum)

Two chances to see "A Clockwork Orange" in 35mm on Christmas Day (Quad Cinema)

Brooklyn’s 315 Gallery relocating to the LES — Henry Street to be exact (ARTnews)

EVG turns 11 today (First post)

And a fond farewell to Slum Goddess, who's retiring her blog after nine fun, action-packed years! (Final post here) Thanks for chronicling those good times at the Mars Bar... and the the World Famous Pee Phone™...

A visit to former East Village mainstay Love Saves the Day in New Hope, Pa.

Photos and text by Shawn Chittle

Tucked neatly away along the Delaware River not far from where Washington made his famous crossing lies a lovely little town called New Hope, Pa. I took a two-hour car ride (it goes by fast) here and found an old friend: Love Saves The Day, the former vintage store on Second Avenue and Seventh Street made famous, in part, by its appearance in the 1985 film “Desperately Seeking Susan.”

I introduced myself to the the manager, Stasia Kauriga. “We love our East Village fans,” she told me.


[From left: Stasia Kauriga, manager; Adam, music associate; Jill Edge, asst. manager]

She told me about the day when her phone wouldn’t stop ringing with people worried about the store after the deadly Second Avenue explosion in March 2015, which destroyed three buildings including the original Love Saves the Day location at No. 119.

“I had to tell them we actually weren’t at that location anymore.” she said.

The East Village Love Saves the Day closed on Jan. 18, 2009, after 43 years in business. Word was their rent tripled.

However, Love Saves the Day already had a presence in New Hope. "We just moved the Second Avenue inventory here when we couldn’t maintain that location,” Kauriga said.

That news was a surprise to me. I had always thought that the store closing in 2009 was for a move to New Hope. But the New Hope storefront has been around a long time, and it looks at home on the town's Main Street.

As I look around the store, it looks all so familiar, but so much larger.





Then I spot something familiar in the corner: the original Love Saves the Day awning from Second Avenue. It’s peeking out from behind a corner, looking worn and forgotten, but a welcome sight nonetheless.



All my "Star Wars" toys from the 1970s are here, along with Beatles records and collectables, everything KISS, Pee Wee Herman, lunch boxes, and kitsch galore. Frankly, the prices are affordable and I left with a few treasures.



The sense of humor and adventure, all the charm and pure East Village that was the store on Second Avenue is here in abundance, and I do mean abundant. The store has both an upstairs and downstairs.





Love Saves The Day is located at 1 S Main St, New Hope, Pa., and is open Mon-Fri: 11 am - 6 pm, Sat 11 am - 7 pm and Sun 11 am - 6 pm.

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[119 2nd Ave. from early 2009]

Do you need that open summons for, say, public urination, cleared from your record?

[NOT LinkNYC but rather the World Famous Pee Phone™]

Then do we have an event for you.

Via the EVG inbox...

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., the New York Police Department, the Office of Court Administration, the Legal Aid Society, and Grand Street Settlement announced the second “Clean Slate” event, an upcoming warrant forgiveness opportunity where New Yorkers with open summons warrants for qualifying crimes can have them cleared from their record, without fear of arrest.

The types of summons warrants that can be cleared at this event include:

· Disorderly Conduct

· Public Consumption of Alcohol

· Public Urination

· Littering

· Unlawful Possession of Marijuana

· Others, including some subway offenses

In addition to the outstanding warrant, the underlying summons can also be resolved at this event without fines or other penalties. The presiding judge will issue Adjournments in Contemplation of Dismissal, or ACDs, which require the recipient to avoid new arrests for six months, before the dismissal and sealing of his or her case. Warrants for felony or misdemeanor charges cannot be resolved at Clean Slate, but Legal Aid attorneys will be present to offer free legal advice in an effort to help individuals resolve such cases.

Despite the minor nature of the offenses, people with outstanding warrants can be arrested and placed in jail for 24 hours while they are they are processed through the system.

More than 700 New Yorkers came to the first Clean Slate event in November 2015 in Harlem, at which 409 summons warrants dating back almost 20 years were vacated.

Clean Slate will take place this Saturday, April 30, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., at the Grand Street Settlement on 80 Pitt St., near Rivington Street.

Find a PDF with the Clean Slate FAQs here.

City changes way it will treat people drinking or urinating (or both) in public

[Pee Phone™ photo from 2014]

Well, we somehow missed this announcement on Tuesday... via the DA's office...

Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance, Jr., New York City Police Department Commissioner William J. Bratton, and Mayor Bill de Blasio today announced a new initiative to change how individuals who commit low-level offenses are processed in Manhattan.

Beginning on Monday, March 7, 2016, the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office will no longer prosecute most violations or infractions, and the NYPD will no longer arrest individuals who commit these offenses – such as littering, public consumption of alcohol, or taking up two seats on the subway – unless there is a demonstrated public safety reason to do so.

This initiative will enable the NYPD to devote its resources to investigating serious crimes, while further reducing the backlog of cases in Criminal Court. The issuance of summonses instead of arrests is expected to result in the diversion of approximately 10,000 arrests that would be prosecuted in Manhattan Criminal Court.

Public urination is also on the list of low-level offenses, per published reports.

Will the city's new policy make you more likely to urinate in public?

Yes

Yes, and when is SantaCon?

No

If you don't like urinating in public, then move to _____

Beer store!

personality test

A few details about the Tompkins Square Park igloo

[Photo yesterday by Bobby Williams]

Here's more info about this price piece of real estate located in the middle of Tompkins Square Park…

Via reliable sources on Twitter…

@evgrieve Its okay this apartment is available for $6000/mo plus utilities. sNOw deposit necessary. pic.twitter.com/O09RKJAHzO

— EdenBrower (@edenbrower) February 22, 2015

And!

@evgrieve look what's in the igloo! It's the new pee phone! pic.twitter.com/J1ZCy2JBJ5

— EdenBrower (@edenbrower) February 22, 2015

No word yet what the going rate will be for a summer sublet…

Farewell, some day maybe soon, to the World Famous Pee Phone™

[Do you remember the times that we had...]

Meant to mention this sooner... On Monday, Mayor de Blasio announced the winner in a competition to replace the city's pay phones.

Meet your new WiFi Internet hotspot stand thing via a consortium of companies called CityBridge:

LinkNYC is a proposal for a first-of-its-kind communications network that will bring the fastest available municipal Wi-Fi to millions of New Yorkers, small businesses, and visitors. The five-borough LinkNYC network, which will be funded through advertising revenues, will be built at no cost to taxpayers and will generate more than $500 million in revenue for the City over the first 12 years.

By replacing the aging network of public pay telephones with state-of-the-art Links, the City aims to transform the physical streets cape — and New Yorkers’ access to information — while also creating new local jobs for the development, servicing and maintenance of the structures.

And they will look like...



The city will eventually replace the pay phones around the city ... with a few exceptions. Via the Times:

The city also plans to remain hospitable to the cape-wearing set. CityBridge said it would maintain three existing “Superman pay phones” scattered along West End Avenue, where a small number of traditional phone booths have survived.

Anyway, you have a little time left to bid farewell to the World Famous Pee Phone™ on Avenue A at East Seventh Street. Maybe one more winter together.

And no word yet if those fancy interstellar, download-25-years-worth-of-the-Simpsons-in-47-seconds LinkNYC things will have a little shelf to hold the vodka like the World Famous Pee Phone™.


[EVG file photo via Bobby Williams]

Previously on EV Grieve:
The Miracle on Avenue A™: World Famous Pee Phone™ has a phone again

Out of order: World Famous Pee Phone™, others, face a future without quarters, whiskey

All is well at the World Famous Pee Phone™

World Famous Pee Phone™ now with lending library

New amenity on Avenue A and East Seventh Street, of course.

Photo by Bobby Williams.

Previously on EV Grieve:
The Miracle on Avenue A™: World Famous Pee Phone™ has a phone again

Out of order: World Famous Pee Phone™, others, face a future without quarters, whiskey

All is well at the World Famous Pee Phone™

Noted

World Famous Pee Phone™ imposter on Third Avenue.

All is well at the World Famous Pee Phone™

Avenue A at East Seventh Street today. Photo by Bobby Williams.

Previously on EV Grieve:
The Miracle on Avenue A™: World Famous Pee Phone™ has a phone again

Out of order: World Famous Pee Phone™, others, face a future without quarters, whiskey

Tonight in Tompkins Square Park

Filming the HBO series "The Newsroom."

Jeff?! Jeff! I love Jeff Daniels! Jeeeffffff! I love you! Shit, I lost my phone. I gotta pee. Oh shit...

World Famous Pee Phone now getting in on the farm-to-table craze

Broccoli? That's so 2007. Where's the kale? Seventh Street and Avenue A.

Photo by Bobby Williams.

Week in Grieview

[10th Street at Fourth Avenue]

New owners for Joe's Bar (Thursday)

316 E. Third St. has been demolished (Wednesday)

The Life Cafe trademark is for sale (Tuesday)

Former East Village resident releases new record (Monday)

Another message for the landlord at 35 Cooper Square (Tuesday)

A spring 2011-2012 now and then (Tuesday)

More about renting the Patricia Field boutique on the Bowery (Monday)

A new phone for the World Famous Pee Phone (Friday)

At the Coney Island USA Spring Gala at Webster Hall (Monday)

A Bleecker Bob's Update (Wednesday)

The Miracle on Avenue A™: World Famous Pee Phone™ has a phone again

Pee Phone™ watchers have been distraught since last August (carefully documented by our Melanie at East Village Corner), the last time that the Pee Phone™ actually had a working phone.

[August 2011 via Melanie]

And with the recent news that the city is getting rid of payphones (or payphones as we knew them) ... this sighting yesterday comes as a surprise... A phone! A phone that works!

[Bobby Williams]

Meanwhile, will these prices return for the summer season? (It's less expensive in the off-season.)

Week in Grieview

[East 13th Street yesterday morning]

Former P.S. 64 on the market... again (Thursday)

The end of the line for the World Famous Pee Phone? (Monday)

Tenants joining forces at 50, 54 and 58 E. Third St. (Tuesday)

City fixes Avenue C Sinkhole, Jr. (Thursday)

The bloodcurdling late-night screams continue (Wednesday)

DOH temporarily shutters Japadog (Monday)

Work permits on file for the Mystery Lot (Thursday)

Nino's for sale (Friday)

Spring began (Tuesday)

Redeveloped funeral home looking for a few live tenants (Thursday)

Another makeshift shelter arrives alongside the Liz Christy Garden (Tuesday)

And there was a lot of debate about saving Kate's Joint ... Three posts and 74 comments. Read them all here.

Out of order: World Famous Pee Phone, others, face a future without quarters, whiskey

Well, to no surprise, it appears the end is nearish for the World Famous Pee Phone (above) on Avenue A at Seventh Street and other pay phones in the neighborhood. According to the Post today, the city is ready to welcome the next generation of pay phones:

New Yorkers stuck with a battery-drained iPad or BlackBerry will soon be able to turn to the city’s newest “pay phones” — computer kiosks that let users buy access to the Web, e-mail and various apps.

The Jetsons-style setup — dubbed MIKE, or My Internet Kiosk Everywhere — will soon replace every single antiquated pay phone throughout the city, The Post has learned.

The Post reports that workers will install 100 MIKE systems (MIKE? Really?) around the city, starting at Penn Station.

A California-based company called Pacific Telemanagement Services took over Verizon's stock of public pay phones "after the communications giant decided it wasn’t making enough money off them."

Thanks Verizon. Now where are people supposed to hang their dry cleaning?

EV Grieve Etc: Mourning Edition

[By East Village-based photographer James Maher. Find his work here]

What could drive Yonah Schimmel out of business after 101 years on East Houston (The Lo-Down)

A map showing all of Ben Shaoul's East Village properties (Occupy East 4th Street)

The history of Blimpie Base (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

The World Famous Pee Phone on Avenue A hasn't worked since August (East Village Corner)

Inside Five Napkin Burger on 14th and Third (Eater)

At Otto's Shrunken Head (Tripping With Marty)

The BBC preps a series on 19th-Century Five Points (BoweryBoogie)

More change on 12th and Broadway (Flaming Pablum)

Manhattanhenge dates for 2012 (Gothamist)

The Pee Phone's humanitarian tone

Yesterday at Avenue A and Seventh Street.