[Updated] Sketchy pink boxes starting to fit right in!

After less than a week on East Village streets, we noticed that people have welcomed those sketchy pink boxes to the neighborhood…



DNAinfo's Lisha Arino dug into these boxes, so to speak, and spoke to some property owners who said they had NOT given permission for the sketchy pink boxes to be installed on their land.

And the response from the company?

Our Neighborhood Recycling manager Bernard Jones insisted that the company, which has a warehouse in Jersey City, got permission from all property owners to install them.

“We tell them exactly what we’re doing and it’s up to them to say yes or no,” he said.

And what about the clothes, shoes, etc., that people leave in them?

[Jones] added that the company plans to resell donated clothing to other clothing vendors, as well as to companies that use the clothing to make rags. The signage, he said, makes it clear the organization is not a charity.

“It doesn’t say ‘donations.’ It says ‘recycling,’” he said.

The Department of Sanitation could not say whether the Our Neighborhood Recycling bins are illegal, per DNAinfo.

Updated 9:50 a.m.

BoweryBoogie reports that the Department of Sanitation has swung into action against the Sketchy Pink Boxes.

Updated 1:45 p.m.

A reader says that the box along the Verizon building on East 13th Street has been removed...

Previously on EV Grieve:
About those new sketchy pink boxes around the East Village

Then the eerie, after-storm glow

From East Sixth Street and Second Avenue … via EVG reader Vinny

[Updated] Zapped!

Via @greally — Lightning strikes concentrated around the East Village.

And here is one of the strikes captured by James and Karla Murray ...



Updated 10:11 p.m.

Two more strikes via James and Karla...





Updated 7:30 a.m.

And via EVG reader Andrew … using the iPhone's slo-mo cam...

Report: Financial help on the way to stabilize, expand the Citi Bike program

Dana Rubinstein has the scoop at Capital New York.

While the deal is still said to be tentative, this is how it is expected to go down:

REQX Ventures, a company run by individuals affiliated with Equinox and Related Companies (the real estate company that owns Equinox) would buy at least 51-percent of [Alta Bicycle Share, Citi Bike's operator.]

And let's keep cutting-and-pasting:

It would ... help resurrect a system that has lost millions of dollars over the course of its short existence, thanks to bad software, Hurricane Sandy and the sheer scope of running the largest bike-share system in the country, one with more than 100,000 annual members and more than 14 million miles on its odometer.

In New York City, where bike-share users now pay $95 for an annual membership and $9.95 for a day pass, REQX would have the freedom to raise rates without city approval, though the contract might include some sort of percent-per-year cap on the size of those hikes.

Public housing residents and some credit union members would retain access to a discounted rate of $60 per year.

One more piece from the article: The Citi Bike operating costs "exceeded expectations by about $9 million through last September."

There are many more details here.

H/T Gothamist

Locked bike, street sign meet untimely end

Boo. Anyone see what happened here on East 10th Street at First Avenue?



Photos via BagelGuy...

Noted

EVG reader MP spotted this outside Mudspot Café on East Ninth Street this morning.

[Helpful background]

Out and About in the East Village

... will return. Taking the July 4th week off. Slackers!

End of the road: Golden Cadillac closes tomorrow night

Golden Cadillac, the 1970s-themed bar that opened in the former Boca Chica space on First Avenue at East First Street, is closing after service tomorrow, Zagat reports.

The too-concepty bar, which just opened this past November, served snacks like knish fondue and drinks such as the Hot Buttery Nipple.

The same ownership will return with a new concept here in the months ahead, per Zagat.

Any suggestions for new concepts?

Previously on EV Grieve:
Boca Chica apparently won't be reopening on First Avenue; and the return of Golden Cadillac

Last day for First Avenue Pierogi and Deli

[EVG file photo from December 2011]

As we noted back on June 16, First Avenue Pierogi and Deli is closing. Today is the last day.

After 30 years here at 130 First Ave. near St. Mark's Place, proprietor Wieslawa Kurowycky and her family decided to retire.

While a rent hike can't be blamed (the Kurowycky family owns the building), sales have fallen in the past few years, as DNAinfo pointed out.

Otherwise ... per DNAinfo:

Kurowycky said she is looking forward to relaxing and spending time with her family.

“We’ve had a good run and it’s time for us to leave [and] take a break,” she said.

The shop will be missed.

Previously on EV Grieve:
After 30 years, First Avenue Pierogi and Deli is closing

529 E. 13th St. is on the market

There's a new listing for this walk-up building between Avenue A and Avenue B.

Per Massey Knakal:

The building has 11 residential units of which 3 are Rent Stabilized and 8 are Free Market. The ground floor has 3 apartments. Floors 2 through 5 have 2 apartments per floor all of which are identical in size. The building has a new gas boiler (approximately 2 years old) and most of the Free Market apartments have been renovated recently ... The subject provides an opportunity for an investor to purchase a well maintained apartment building with remaining upside potential in an area that is quickly appreciating in value.

Asking price: $7.8 million.

Finger-painting Bounty ad namechecks the East Village

EVG reader RobbieTheK spotted this ad the other day on the 2 train.

Finger painting playdates in East Village Apartments are tough
Bounty is tougher

So, East Village apartments are small, making them difficult (tough!) to have people over to finger paint? Is that the point? Are we talking children, or like, young adults on a date?

If we are taking children, then it would be tough for me to have a playdate in my EV apartment, mostly because all my friends who decided to become parents moved to Brooklyn/Queens/elsewhere because they couldn't afford the rent here any longer.

Anyway, don't you think there are tougher things to do in and around an East Village apartment that would require paper towels, Bounty or otherwise?

Rooftop ragers in East Village buildings with crumbling staircases are tough
Bounty is tougher

'Charming studio in the heart of the East Village' will eventually have a kitchen

We're just looking around at apartments and came across this listing for a place on East 12th Street ... described as a "Charming studio in the heart of the East Village!!!"

Eventually, sure! Once the kitchen arrives, definitely.



Staging tragedy aside, the listing is upfront about the place "being gut renovated!"



With a promise of new appliances and cabinets on the way, the place will probably be pretty nice for $1,850. Anyway, just be happy that you have a ceiling now.