I moved here just 2 months shy of 17 years, at that time, it was a small town feel next to a big city.
There was no talk, planning or conversation about development then. I had also had many friends who are lifers here. I used to dog sit or visit on a weekly basis. Im assuming your a resident of the towers because almost none of the native resident agree with this kind of mentality. Ask ANY of the locals who own businesses here. Most complain that the thousands of New residents have yet to make a dent in their business. Most of us notice the hordes of whole food bags coming off the subway. lets face it Most dont shop here. its almost as if its a crash pad for a people who live their lives in manhattan. Hunterspoint wines is a great barometer. Heres a gorgeous store with premium wines at an affordable price. Paul who owns the store in the most knowledgeable guy when it comes to wine.
Yet he's struggling to keep the door open. Why? because most people would rather go to their lobby for a bottle of wine then go get an education and experience in a store 2 blocks away. City dog lounge, they are struggling. Why? because while their are many new pet owners, then seem to just skip by because they dont carry the "latest dog fashions" but do carry the best organic foods and have a truly wonderful staff.

Theres no way your going to convince anyone that Duane reade is better than a local pharmacy. convenient , yes. better, never.

Its all about luxury and laziness and from what I gather, the inability to see the other sides point of view.

I love the CVS on 3rd and 42nd, its fantastic. but i would never use it for my prescriptions. because it would help to put my
local hardworking time invested pharmacist out of business.

Of course i have met lovely New residents who seem concerned that its a little overwhelming and I praise them for their concern.
It would be nice to know that its an integration and not an invasion. which is quite frankly what it has felt like for all of us.

Ps the last time i was in duane reade, I waited on line for 10 minutes while the fresh out highschool clerk talked on the phone
about her boyfriend. If thats the kind of service you like, enjoy it. Ill stick with Josh at vernon.

You seem to keep focusing on the local businesses.

What about the ones that are thriving?

Dr. Moitri new resident and Dr who gives excellent care?

Karen and Little Ones which teaches our children?

Lloyd and Lounge 47 is a great spot?

Talitha and Vine Wine?

I support Josh and his Pharmacy but there is a point at which he can't carry everything and doesn't have the sq ft area to carry it. For those types of things, Duane Reade will be welcome.

I support Paul and his store, but there are 4 places within 5 blocks to get wine two of which were here before he opened up.

City Dog Lounge moved from a smaller place on 50th to the corner and now has joined in opened up City Vet. Is that struggling?

Not every business is going to survive, but that has much more to do with the business, choices, pricing and the fact that 9 out of 10 small businesses go out of business in the first year.

Jake

Hey Jake,
actually the business slant was aimed at Pep's post. Of course business is paramount to a thriving community but like i said in earlier posts its more about finding unity among old and new. Dont think for a minute i havent thought about how over priced e.i.deli is, imagine how much i would have saved over 17 years if a reasonable market were here. As for the amish market while im sure will be fantastic, it will be priced at a premium.

Talitha opened the 2nd wine store in the neighborhood, Vine Wine. The reason she opened it was because she was evicted from 10-63. because they were going to "renovate" the should have been landmark building. Ask her how manipulated she was. Ask her how she tried to save the power station from becoming the unrecognizable thing it is today. By the way shes not native to LIC but cared deeply about the history here. she even made t shirts to help the cause.

THe investment in the city doc was huge for city dog lounge and time will tell if it works out, but the store struggles to the point that they cant order certain treats because the minimum order is too much for them to lay out. Imagine if they get bumped out for a petco, a vile chain that sells animal like accessories.City dog lounge has now been in that space for over 3 years more than enough time to develop steady cliental.

A good start is to convince newcomers to try as much as possible to patronize the locals instead of manhattan shopping on the way home.
Go to the wine tastings and meet your neighbors, try to convince the real estate companies that parking should be included or discounted for tenants already playing such exorbitant rents and service charges. The problem with the housing market today is that people are willing to pay all that money without setting the groundrules. If people told the big machine to stick it, they would have no choice in this down turned economy but to reduce rents and offer more for your buck.

another reason why rents are so expensive here is that foreign companies are employing talent from other countries. Relocating them here and paying the rent with their stronger currencies, which is cheap comparatively. When the dollar tanked east coast certainly looked elsewhere to make it bottom line..

10-63 the coffee shop was established after Citylights was built, not 15 years back, I am still sad that it is gone.

I look forward to the opening od Sweet Leaf.  We don't need a Starbucks here for sure.  The place still does need a place where you can get a good cup of coffee.

And a place to hang out, read a book would be nice.

It is sad to see some of the beautiful building get torn down, and frankly the new Powerhouse is an atrocity to look at, but some of the older building were not livable or fixable either.  Dangerous, contaminated etc.

We do still need a convenience store, it does not have to be a chain, it does not have to have Duane Reade or CVS on it.

We need a store that is open more hours and has a bigger item selection.

We don't need a wine store, Maybe the guy who opened the wine store, Paul, should have opened a convenience store.  Maybe he got taken by the glitter of the new buildings.

I moved into EC1 a while ago with several hopes after the UWS had turned into an overcrowded place where chain stores (or a landlord's desire to get the kind of rent they are able to pay) ran old stores aground.  I now stop to chat with the man who cuts my hair and know the guy who sells me wine.  There is less joy when it comes to groceries.

I generally agree with D Battaglia.  While Jake accuses of "stereotyping", I see more stereotyping on the other side of the discussion, which should merit some debunking.  The new buildings, which are predominantly rentals, are likely to be shelters for transient renters.  The number of one-bedrooms that are shared by otherwise unrelated persons not only leads to overcrowding, but is also indicative of make-shift arrangements.  The new arrivals from the last one and a half year often live up to the "sterotype" of the renter displayed in the advertisements of Rockrose and others: an immediate-post-college partying type.  There are many exceptions, but the shape of things to come is, at best, up in the air.

Because I am afraid that the new, young families here will probably be forced away from the area in light of insufficient school resources, I believe that this will turn into Queenswest dorm.  This may not be unintentional on the developers' side.  This may be the crowd to which these buildings can be literally sold as "luxury" rentals--despite a dog urin smell at the entrance and certain regulars smoking late night cigarettes, where things start to look run down and window cleaning is the tenant's obligation.  But, alas, it has a "lounge."  I am, in any case, rather less excited than Jake, but then again, I don't have an 'equity stake' here.

I found PEP's reply particularly insulting, and Jake's remark that new businesses in the area ipso facto ARE the neighborhood trivializing the issue (under that theory, you can never destroy a neighborhood, you simply always HAVE one).  There is enormous change that has been foisted on people who have lived here a long time, as a result of the massive development of which no end is in sight; and those long-term residents have not been fully apprised, nor has anyone else for all I can tell from the prurient curiosity about the latest real estate development feats that permeates this site.  At issue is not a "small-town" or "never changing" place, but whether the people who lived in this place should have participated, under the full disclosure, in shaping the changes of their place of residence.

As I understand it, D B's post is about self-determination and mutual respect, and not, or not primarily, about pharmacies.  It is almost comical to see how the persons D B sees as the invader lecture him of the goodness of the things they bring: the tree-lined streets (as if there hadn't been many before) that are trash free (not as trash free as Vernon) and full of "nice" "high-quality" stores.  The former two could have been achieved by the existing residents (if they really wanted) without the architectural bombast on the waterfront; the latter is nothing they asked for and, as D B is justifiably concerned, probably not conducive to the existing economy.  Is this then colonialism?  But, as Jake reminds us, this is New York City, which changes forever and, unlike Queens West, is a thing or person.  And what are a few New Yorkers against Moloch?