Updated! Mysterious, low-flying helicopter returns...

I moved this post up top from yesterday afternoon... getting more reports that the thing is back hovering over the neighborhood this afternoon...




Circling now for like 20-30 minutes. Doesn't look like a police helicopter. I followed it to Avenue C after seeing it fly over Tompkins Square Park...

Previously.

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning edition

"Planning commish Amanda Burden has rezoned a fifth of the city, championed good design and driven developers nuts" (Crain's)

Saturday afternoon in TSP (Neither More Nor Less)

Slutty Halloween costumes for girls (Runnin' Scared)

An Ellis Island tour (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

TMBG celebrate the 20th anniversary of "Flood" (Rolling Stone)

The following photo was taken by Slum Goddess in one of the women's stalls in the Tompkins Square Park restrooms...



As she notes: "There seems to be a war brewing between the East Coast and West Coast Junkies in the park."

What's behind the German-themed plywood on Second Avenue?

So that plywood that shares the same colors as the German flag... on Second Avenue and Second Street.





Will soon be home to Heartbreak Cafe, which will apparently feature German/Swiss fare. And they were up for a beer/wine license this past March. A liquor license is pending. One of the names on the liquor license belongs to Christos Valtzoglou, the owner of the Greek eatery Pylos on Seventh Street.

How bazaar!: First retailer coming soon to E2E4 on the Bowery

Hmm... The Bowery Bazaar. Between Fourth Street and Third Street on the Bowery. Street level at the 15-story tower. I sent an e-mail to the address listed here to find out exactly what this will be. No response yet.

Previously.

A good question

As we pointed out Saturday, Third Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue was closed off while a crane brought in stuff for the Economakis family tenement-to-mansion conversion.

And a reader brought up a good question about some neighbors down the street who may not appreciate the street being blocked off for eight hours:

any word from the hells angels?

Looking at the work that will "enable St. Brigid's Church to last another two hundred years"

Work continues on St. Brigid's on Avenue B at Eighth Street...Can't tell a whole lot from the outside...



Here's the latest message from Edwin Torres, chairman of the Committee to Save St. Brigid's:

"The entire foundation is being strengthened; this will enable St. Brigid's Church to last another two hundred years."

He also posted these photos of the work being done in the lower portion of the church...

Seventh Street, 2:14 p.m., Oct. 10

Economakis mansion renovation shuts down Third Street today

No traffic today on Third Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue. At 47 E. Third St., the Economakis family is creating their 11,600-square-foot dream home from the former 15-unit tenement.





One neighbor watching the crane at work wondered how many more Saturdays would be affected by the construction.

Previously.

How long was that stretch Hummer on Seventh Street last night?

Um.

It was so long, that when the last person finally got out, there was daylight.

Hmm.

It was so long, that when the driver got to the Lincoln Tunnel, a passenger was still back on Seventh Street throwing up between cars.

Oh, you try then.

I don't know where we're going, but...

Or.

Noted (Bring it on edition)

Now on Craigslist:

Kirsten Dunst....Your Eyes Wont Quit! - m4w - 27 (East Village)

Maybe it was all those drinks you were drinking last night but you kept glancing over at me in the fire place at your secret hipster pizza speakeasy Was it something I did? When you danced around in your black tuby dress I thought you looked like a beautiful downtown caterpillar
OH Kirsten let's go to a loft party together. I will gladly be your leaf.

[Photo via.]

On the increased criminal activity in Stuy Town

We've had several posts in recent weeks/months about the increased crime in the neighborhood. We're certainly not alone. Our friend Lux Living has chronicled the increased criminal activity in Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village. On Sunday, a 28-year-old woman was attacked outside 8 Stuyvesant Oval. As LL reported, "the tenant was grabbed from behind and dragged into the trees near the building's M level where she was choked. She was able to fight off her attacker and nearby neighbors made enough noise to scare him away. Unfortunately incidents like this one are becoming all too common in Stuy Town."

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning Edition

At the New York Art Book Fair (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

"On average, the economists don't expect unemployment to fall below 6% until 2013; unemployment hit 9.8% in September." (The Wall Street Journal)

Birthday wishes for John Lennon (Flaming Pablum)

Noted from Page Six today:
Our story on "I Slept With Joey Ramone," the new memoir by Joey's brother Mickey Leigh and co-author Legs McNeil, mixed up two of the late band members. It was Johnny Ramone, not Joey, who said of Charles Manson, "He's like Hitler, only cooler." Leigh says, "I guarantee you that while admittedly not the most religious of the Jewish people on our block, Joey and I certainly reviled Adolf Hitler as much as any yarmulke-wearing neighbor. Nor were we delighted by the murderous mayhem of Charles Manson. We were basically peace-loving hippies."

The Bowery Mission turned 100 (BoweryBoogie)

Pete Wentz lookalike fails in Broadway bank heist (Runnin' Scared)

"Mischa Barton getting out of a taxi in front of the Black & White Bar on East 10th Street, yelling, 'I need a drink!'" . . . (Page Six)

World Series madness in Times Square circa 1920 (Ephemeral New York)

Bikini-clad bartenders wanted in Washington Heights (Eater)

"Then I got trapped in one of the Jewish Sukkah houses that have popped up all over downtown..They really can sense when you are a Jew..They all surrounded me yelling, 'You're jewish! Come in here! Now!'" (Slum Goddess)

Copper Building penthouse will now cost you an extra quarter-of-a-million dollars

When everything seems to be going down in price... As the listing shows, the penthouse at the Copper Building at 215 Avenue B is now $3,850,000 -- up $250,000 from its previous price.

Here's what you get:

This 4 bedroom 4 bathroom Penthouse is one of a kind. With soaring 22 foot high ceilings and an enormous private outdoor space, this duplex is unrivaled in East Village apartments. Upon entering the apartment, you are struck by sweeping views of southern Manhattan. You will truly feel on top of it all. The apartment features a state of the art chef's kitchen, which opens to the formal dinning room. With western exposure and towering 22 foot high glass windows, the living room will capture magnificent sunsets. When you ascend the wide oak staircase to the second floor you will find 2 additional bedrooms and 2 additional full bathrooms. This penthouse is part of an absolutely unique and exceptional… building.

You can see for yourself during the open house Sunday from noon to 2 p.m. If you can't make it, here are some renderings...






And, as this rendering shows of 215 Avenue B, BIG changes may be coming to the north end of the block...what, exactly, are those two new mystery buildings to the left of the Copp? Curbed also made note of this earlier, wondering why Stuy Town was replaced "with, uh, an office tower parachuted in from downtown Dallas."



Previously.

Now you can own "THE ONLY REAL FRAT HOUSE AT NYU!"

Cool! The already legendary home of the Delta Phi House/East 12th Party Crew is for sale! You may recall some of the Greek-life hijinks from last month here between Avenue A and Avenue B.

Anyway! As the Massey Knakal site notes:

Each unit contains designer bathrooms & chef kitchens, featuring GE stainless steel appliances, black granite counter tops & floors. The 32,870 SF new construction building consists of (13) studio apartments, (7) one bedroom apartments, (5) two bedroom two bath apartments, (1) three bedroom three bath apartment with rooftop terrace and 7 community facility units. Located in the heart of the East Village, just 3 blocks from the subway.

What? No mention of the multiple pong and flip cup tables?

Oh, and it's $17.3 million. For the building.

About Angelina Jolie's 'semi-crusty phase' in Tompkins Square Park

As Scoopy writes in this week's issue of The Villager:

We were surprised to learn, recently, ... that none other than Angelina Jolie also went through her own semi-crusty phase, hanging out in the park and smoking pot ... During the L.E.S. Slacktivists/veterans' "adoptathon" outside Christodora House last month, Lara Mascara ... told us how she used to run with the young Jolie. "We were friends of the band Sick of It All," she said. "We called ourselves the Alleyway Crew." The members each had a Sick of It All dragon tattoo. "Angelina Jolie was skinny, no figure — just straight, she had no boobs — hair in her eyes," but did sport her trademark big lips even back then, Mascara recalled. "Her dad didn't pay child support. ... She was just not going to high school, like all of us. She was known as Angie."

[Top photo via; Bottom photo via]

Posts that I never got around to posting: With 879 dessert choices in a three-block radius, something had to give...

On Second Avenue near Ninth Street. As Jeremiah pointed out in August, some homemade "for rent" signs went up, though the shop remained open...and more recently, Tasti packed up and left...Eater said the owner was facing a rent hike and had hoped to move elsewhere.

Related:
Tasti D-Lite (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Noted

The Times takes us on a vinyl-shopping tour of the East Village, from Other Music to Academy Records. The piece ends with a stop at St. Mark’s Church in-the-Bowery, where you can "watch the local tramps with bottles in brown bags come and go from the front steps."

Marketing tools: Packaging the East Village as a processed, luxury lifestyle

And as we turn our attention today to Columbus, Ohio, let's take a look at a new luxury apartment complex going up near the Ohio State campus. And what might this oasis of student life and luxury be called...?

Welcome to The East Village. It’s not in Manhattan, but it is inspired by the city’s once dilapidated neighborhood transformed by the artists, poets, and writers of the 1960’s. Like the original East Village, our project invites the creatively inclined or aspiring into a modern, urban village in a revitalized neighborhood on OSU’s campus. The East Village is where urban means community, where local meets luxury, and where people define the experience.

What blather. Of course, in reality, the "artists, poets, and writers" are driven out because of escalating rents caused by new luxury housing such as this... (I think you can even draw some parallels to this project to Red Square.)

As The East Village Web site notes, "luxury amenities such as 42-inch flat screen televisions, complimentary cable and wi-fi, fully equipped kitchens, washers and dryers, security and off-street parking distinguish the East Village community from much of the campus living experience."

And, if you happen to be in Columbus on Saturday, you can swing by for the official "ground-breaking" that includes a tailgate party and screening of the Ohio State-Wisconsin football game.

UPDATE:
Thanks to Mike Spence at NYPress for picking up this item... and he has more to say on the topic. "A housing complex near Ohio State University is calling itself the East Village. By the time this blog is posted, NYU plans to own half of it."

Worldwide exclusive: "For lease" signs have been removed from the Seventh Street tumor!

Aug. 19!



Now!



Good lord, what will it be? -- What will it be!

Previously. What we know. Per a construction worker -- some kind of bar/restaurant. From the listing -- 2,000 square feet (plus a basement and outdoor space).