Dutch Elm Disease inoculation continues in Tompkins Square Park

[Photo Friday via EVG reader Steven]

Tree technicians arrived in Tompkins Square Park on Friday… hanging the above banner to explain the inoculation process to combat against Dutch Elm Disease and those nasty Elm Bark Beetles. (Can't the rats eat those?)

Anyway, one worker said that June and July marks elm disease season.

Here, EVG correspondent Derek Berg shares some inoculation-in-action photos from today…



The tree technician also inoculated the Hare Krishna Tree in the middle of the Park…

189 Avenue C is converting to condos

Residents who arrived home to 189 Avenue C Friday had the following notices awaiting them… the landlord is converting the 10-floor rental building at East 12th Street to condos…



"It was very shocking," a resident there told us via email. The above notice accompanied a 200-plus page offering plan documenting specifics. On the top of this packet, it states, "This is a non-eviction condominium offering plan. No non-purchasing tenant will be evicted by reason of conversion to condominium ownership."

And the pricing? Studios for non-tenants are starting in the $700,000 range. (Existing tenants will receive about a 10 percent discount.) In the tenant's estimation, the pricing "seems outrageous — not affordable for me."

Interestingly enough, there's a listing for the building at Cushman & Wakefield. Asking price (following a recent cut) for the building that includes a vacant retail space: $32.5 million.

Rentals at the building, which has 35 units, hit the market in March 2011. Of the 35 apartments, five are studios, 13 are 1-bedrooms, nine are 2-bedrooms and eight are 3-bedrooms. Building amenities including a gym and washer-dryers in each unit.

According to Streeteasy, the average rent here is $3,171.

Former Dolphin Gym will work out as medical office space

The Dolphin Gym on East Fourth Street near Second Avenue closed without any warning on March 27.

The former gym is now for lease… for professional office space…



According to the listing, the 5,800-square-foot space is asking $24,167.

The notices from Dolphin that remain on the door say that your remaining membership will be honored at Synergy Fitness on East 14th Street or Mulberry Street… or Ludlow Fitness on Delancey…



Not sure how that is working out, so to speak, three months later for people with Dolphin memberships. One former Dolphingoer told us that the Synergy on East 14th Street near Second Avenue keeps irregular hours and, despite the sign, is not open 24 hours…

Thanks to @cecilscheib for the lease tip!

Previously on EV Grieve:
Dolphin Gym abruptly closes on East 4th Street (31 comments)

Cleaning out the East 4th Street Dolphin Gym

Dolphin Gym hangs it up on Avenue B

Nonna's Pizza arrives on Avenue A

An EVG reader reports that Nonna's Pizza has opened at 201 Avenue A between East 12th Street and 13th Street.

According to the reader, the pizzeria is run by a grandson and his grandmother … the family patriarch operated pizzerias in Long Island and Westchester dating to the 1980s…



Before we heard from the reader, we thought it might be a new outpost for Nonna's L.E.S. Pizzeria on Clinton Street. However, the folks at Nonna's said that they're not expanding.

And how's the pizza? Unfortunately, the shop wasn't open yet for the day when the reader happened by. Anyone else try it?

The previous tenant, Fat Sal's, which closed in May, took over in May 2011 from APizzA.

Checking out Centre-fuge Cycle 17 on East 1st Street

Just taking a look at Cycle 17 of the Centre-fuge Public Art Project … the rotating outdoor gallery/construction trailer here along East First Street between First Avenue and Second Avenue …









The artists this time around are Erik Martinez, Hiss, King Bee, Kristy McCarthy, Ramiro Davaro-Comas, Shaun Edwards and Vballentine.

Find more info about Centre-fuge here.

Despite Grand Opening banner, Capital Laundry & Dry Cleaners has closed on Avenue B

Been meaning to note that Capital Laundry & Dry Cleaners closed earlier this month at 44 Avenue B between East Third Street and East Fourth Street.

And, despite debuting last September, management decided to keep the Grand Opening (30 percent off on drop-off and pick-up service) banner up these past nine months.

Anyway, Quick Coin apparently won this round…



H/T EVG regular Salim!

Previously on EV Grieve:
New laundromat now open at site of former laundromat

Full exposure at 212 E. 14th St.

EVG East 14th Street/IHOP Way Correspondent Pinch passes along word that 212 E. 14th St. is now plywood free following its total gut renovation with one-floor extension these past two years.

Fits right in now along here just east of Third Avenue and adjacent to the newish Jefferson retail-residential complex.



The storefront was most recently the Super Saving Store, which closed in June 2011.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Residential, retail and an additional floor for 212 E. 14th St.

The latest Cool

Outside Peter Brant's new art space at 421 E. Sixth St.

Find more Cool here.

Previously on EV Grieve:
Capturing 'Cool'

Week in Grieview

[No refunds kid! Photo by Derek Berg]

Northeast corner of St. Mark's Place and Third Avenue fetching $50 million for development site (Wednesday)

More about the 2nd branch of Tompkins Square Bagels opening in the East Village (Tuesday)

Not much progress on the all-new Tompkins Square basketball courts (Monday)

The Museum of Reclaimed Urban Space announces 3rd annual film fest for Aug. 1-8 (Thursday)

Out and About with Glenora Blackshire (Wednesday)

Ray optimistically plans to return to his store next week (Tuesday)

More condos for University Place (Tuesday)

Unidentified homeless man stops sexual assault on East Seventh Street, chases down assailant (Wednesday)

A Belgian fries place opens on St. Mark's Place (Thursday)

The retail space at 20 Avenue A is on the market (Wednesday)

Report: Workers claim that 2 Bros. doesn't pay minimum wage, offer overtime (Monday)

Ciao for Now closing West Village location (Wednesday)

Christodora House residents don't have gas (Friday)

Pushcart Coffee opening an East Village outpost (Monday)

Moonstruck Eatery makes an appearance at 167 Avenue A (Tuesday)

Pet store signage unleashed on Second Avenue (Thursday)

Superiority Burger opens on East Ninth Street (Thursday)

Bikes, By George! space is for rent (Thursday)

Is the new Marc Jacobs collection for you? (Monday, 26 comments)

Fallen limb on Avenue B (Wednesday)

Icon Realty adds the for rent signs at the former Cafe Pick Me Up (Monday)

… and a scene from yesterday morning on East 12th Street between Avenue A and Avenue B… where police were interested in talking with some people on the fire escape with a giant banana and water cooler …


[Photo via EVG reader Mike]

Said one reader: "They had an megaphone earlier and were chatting with pedestrians. (Highlight from 10:30 AM: 'Attention New York: I am day drunk.'")

Vivian isn't really lost

On Friday evening, several concerned readers sent along photos of flyers spotted all over the neighborhood for a missing miniature dachshund named Vivian.

Vivian is not really lost.

Turns out this is some kind of social experiment about kindness.

An EVG reader explains.

"I saw the dog tied up ... then I walked a block and saw the poster. I was like holy cow! So I called the number on the flyer and sent them photos of the dog and then went and waited with the dog. I was waiting a while and then a guy came over and said he was doing a social experiment with his friend on how people behave."



Oh!

And how did the reader behave?

"I was totally stressed out and missed an appointment, waiting with the dog who was not really lost!"

Where magic happens on Avenue C

From an article in The New York Times today titled Casa Adela in East Village Is the Home of the Magical Rotisserie Chicken…

The grandmother who makes the rice and beans — a great-grandmother, actually — was visible through Casa Adela’s window, with its gold script proclaiming “Authentic Puerto Rican Cuisine Since 1976.” She is Adela Ferguson, 79, and she was checking the timer on a 1950s-era rotisserie oven, with eight whole chickens, golden and peppery spices flecking the crisping skin as they rotated slowly — seven more minutes until perfection.

Casa Adela is at 66 Avenue C between East Fourth Street and East Fifth Street

Cautionary nesting instincts

Perhaps not as exciting as red-tail hawks or night herons or seagulls or people dressed like chickens or.. what were we talking about?

Oh, birds.

@SquareMusings shared this photo from Avenue D and East Eighth Street, where a nest remains strategically placed in the yellow (speed up? slow down?) slot…

Did anyone watch the 1st Tompkins Square Park ping pong tournament championship yesterday?

We only noticed the sign today…



Appears as if the 1st tournament was sponsor free.

Remembering Dorothy Day, with a call for a shrine in her honor on 2nd Avenue

Tonight at 6, the Church of the Nativity is holding a special mass in honor of Dorothy Day at 44 Second Ave. between East Second Street and East Third Street.

Day was a journalist and social and political activist in the Lower East Side where she worked with the poor and founded The Catholic Worker. Today the Church refers to her as a "Servant of God" as the canonization process has begun.

Day's granddaughter, Martha Hennessey, will share readings from Dorothy's writings throughout the service. She will also talk about the parish's request for a Dorothy Day shrine after the mass, outside of the church.

The Church of the Nativity is slated close Aug. 1. After months of fighting the archdiocese for a chance to appeal, parishioners are now asking the Archdiocese to build a shrine for Dorothy Day within Nativity, or to build a chapel/retreat center within the new building should the church be demolished. Nativity was the parish of Dorothy Day.

The New York Times has more on this in an article from Monday titled Invoking the Radical Spirit of Dorothy Day to Fight a Church Closing.

The expected closure comes amidst a massive reorganization of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York.

Under the plan, the church, founded in 1832, would merge with Most Holy Redeemer on East Third Street between Avenue A and Avenue B.

The conventional wisdom is that the Archdiocese will sell the property for retail-residential development.

One passer-by told the Times: "If you ask me, I think they’re trying to close it to make a high-rise condo so they can bring more money to the neighborhood."

And we've heard from people who figure the block from the church to East Second Street will eventually all be luxury housing…



As for Dorothy Day, here's more from here granddaughter in the Times:

Ms. Hennessy, who lives nearby at the Catholic Worker’s Maryhouse when she is in New York, said she felt “a disconnect” between the drive to canonize her grandmother and the decision to close her church. She said she hoped a way could be found to honor Day and her legacy, perhaps using the vacant rectory building, if not the church itself.

"In the East Village, with all the affluence, the party atmosphere and the materialism, we still have poverty," Ms. Hennessy said. "They are doing their best to hide it, but if there was a shrine dedicated to the history of her work, that might be more helpful. It would raise the question of economic refugees."

Previously on EV Grieve:
Parishioners fight to save the Church of the Nativity on 2nd Avenue