Sunday, June 27, 2010

BABA'S DELI a hybrid delight with a coffee shop too






Baba's Deli located just over the border in Park Slope has joined our roster of eateries in our website mall. What makes Baba's rather interesting is that hidden in the back is a patio with chairs and tables giving it a relaxed air as you sip your coffee and perhaps read a paper or cruise the web on your netbook. Baba's joins a number of other rather eclectic hybrid coffee shops opening in our area and creeping up towards the direction of Sunset Park proper. The owner has told us that he intends to install WIFI in the very near future to service his clients and patrons. With the lack of any Starbucks and Mc Donalds recent introduction of free WIFI more places like this are needed in the neighborhood. So if you happen to be in the are, drop in and say hello and tell them you saw them on this blog and on our website. Remember, only your patronage can keep our local businesses open and competitive in this economy.





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Saturday, June 26, 2010

Sunset Park (the park) faces budget cuts



The Brooklyn Eagle has an article on a report by the New Yorkers for Parks, and its report “Supporting Our Parks: Alternative Strategies for Revenue Generation.” The report outlines different ways in which the community could raise funds to help maintain the park in this period of budget cuts and economic adversity. It is well worth reading if at least to give some active local residents some ideas on how to become involved and perhaps organizing to keep the park a vibrant part of the community and preventing it from deteriorating as it has in past times of economic adversity.


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Dollar vans in Sunset Park may be here to stay..



According to a piece at Streetsblog those dollar vans that clog up traffic in the mornings along 8th avenue and 7th avenues will likely increase in their operational scope.According to the article :

Mayor Bloomberg announced a new pilot program to provide livery van service for transit-starved neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Queens, a proposal stemming from his 2009 campaign transit platform. The push to provide more mobility options in the wake of MTA service cuts is to be applauded, as is the administration's willingness to experiment with something new.


That's all well and fine, but as anyone in the neighborhood knows those vans are a pain in the *ss. The only reason they exists is not to supplement the MTA, it's because they provide direct service to the other Chinatowns in New York. They skirt the law by picking up passengers just as taxis are supposed to do driving slowly up the avenue and stopping whenever it suits them to pick up passengers. The result is a commuting nightmare if you happen to be driving by in the morning as I do. The reason there has been no enforcement of the taxi laws is purely political so as not to aggravate interests in the community. The vans only benefit those whose destination is the other Chinatowns in the city. How will this alleviate the problem for other residents of Sunset Park who need transit to other parts of Brooklyn or Manhattan. Are they going to clog the streets with more expanded dollar vans? And who is going to inspect these vans insofar as safety and other issues? Are we going to set up another bureaucracy while we cut the MTA budget to oversee the problem? What about liability? If you think are streets are clogged now, wait till this brainchild takes off. I personally think it's a bad idea who's time hasn't come.

The problem with our city is that too many agencies have come to exists to provide jobs for political cronies. The reason our MTA is in the red is because it was not designed to make a profit as it is constituted now. It has become a machine to provide employment and n expanded membership base for transit unions who are powerful backers of the politicians in city hall. Aggravating the problem by "legalizing" these dollar vans is not the solution to our transit problems. If the MTA was run as a private enterprise the cuts would not come in service, it would have meant lay offs. Nobody wants to make sacrifices in this town any more, or for that matter in the rest of the country either. The result is that we are broke, robbing Peter to pay Paul.




Commuter_Van.jpgCommuter vans, like this one in Sunset Park, could become a more common sight on New York's streets. Image: The Brooklyn Ink.

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Casa Vieja joins our roster of restaurants


Mariachi bands Play every Sunday Evening to accompany your food.


Casa Vieja has been open just over a little more than a Year and has picked up a good reputation among the locals. It now joins with a select group of restaurants that can be found on our online mall. She has an inspiring story that was covered by the new York Times and more recently by Chowhound relating the story of owner Lourdes Pena and her husband who in a previous life were street vendors in Red Hook. If you want  to try authentic Mexican food her place is the go to.This coming Sunday Jun 27, Casa Vieja will be featuring their Hometown team Mexico as it takes on Argentina in the World Cup..


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Thursday, June 24, 2010

Copa Mundial means World Cup here in Brooklyn



Watching the USA game at the Black Horse Pub



As the World Cup enters the second final elimination faze two of or favorite teams have made it into the semi final. The neighborhood is a buzz of beehive activity as our locals favorite teams have made it into the semi finals.A couple of local places will be featuring the coming soccer games. The Black Horse Pub above @ 16th street and 5th Ave. just over the edge of our nabe. Casa Vieja Mexican Restaurant will be showing the Mexico vs. Argentina game this Sunday @ 2:30 PM. For some other places to watch the games check out the following article in Crain's. This article is subject to revision as people might want to contribute other spots or we discover them.


 
Casa Vieja will show the Mexico vs. Argentina game.

T-shirts of the teams on display at local businesses.



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