Another NYC 1950’s landmark is being scooped up by Southern architectural preservationists.

The Daily News reports today that Jay Dee owner Amnir Yelizarov has not only closed the historic Jay Dee bakery, but is selling off the architecturally-significant components to preservationist entrepeneurs Pat Miller and Joel Owens.

Rego-Forest Preservation Council’s leader, Micheal Perlman, met with Mr. Yelizarov, but could not convice him to save any of the features intact.

Miller and Owens bought the venerable Cheyenne Diner and will add Jay Dee to their dream of recreating a back-in-time town in the south.

Whatever your opinion about Jay Dee’s products or the closure, I’ll miss the plaster cakes, colors faded by the sun, and the tiny plastic ballerinas that I always coveted as a child.

(Photo from Etsy)

Autumn on Austin Street is coming to a close, and my foot is not completely healed yet! Argh, 12 weeks and counting. Nevertheless, I did manage to take a little stroll around Austin Street to check out the scenery on an unseasonably warm day.

Speaking of fall, Rouge has officially fallen off Restaurant “Road.” Anyone know what’s going in that space?

 “La vie sans rose…”

Great colors in the falling leaves of the Bradford-Callery Pear trees.

But don’ t blink! Since the Feds are bailing out the turkeys this year, we’re jumping from Halloween to the Winter Holiday Shopping Season. Do not stop at Thanksgiving, go directly to Christmas!

The snowflakes have been strung across Austin Street…

…and the winter blossoming of temporary closeout stores is starting already.

Fox’s? U-bet!

The only thing that’s not turning white and wintery is the nursing home on 110th Street and 71st Road. Hooray! One less horrid white-brick building! Great face-lift.

Hmmm, would that make this a “phlog?”

Not much color - foliage or otherwise - to photograph this week. Most pics here are simply confirmations of the new stores popping up around the area, plus some intriguing bits of scenery around the nabe.

Halloween fun in front of Renegade salon. I hope your haircut doesn’t come out scary!

Pink Tree in honor of Breast Cancer Awareness Month

The Tap Room (the old “Cafe Moda”) - open for business, just in time for football!

Overheard: “That’s cool, but I can live without one more sports bar in my life.”

Site of new Fro-Yo competitor, OKO (where ColdStone Creamery used to be.)

Dollar Chic on chic Austin Street. Gimme LotLess anytime…

“This has nothing to do with the bailout! Really.” - TD Waterhouse buys Commerce Bank

New and improved Broadway Bakery on 71 Road! Still great coffee and cleaner equipment!

коли под наемThe new GameStop location on QB and 63rd Road, next to gas station, north side.

Menorah on top of T-Bone diner. Was this ALWAYS there, and I just never noticed it?

Newsflash, it’s Williamsburg.

They’re paying $150 per square foot. On Bedford Ave. In the “North Side.” At N. 7th Street, near the subway station.

Anyone who is familiar with Williamsburg knows how incredibly choice that location is.

Next location for a Ricky’s? Surprise, it’s Park Slope.

 Here’s a reminder of what Ricky himself wrote to me in February about why they’re not in this area:

We looked on austin. Speak to the landlords and tell them not to ask for rents higher then we have in the city. Let them know they r in forest hills not manhatten, until they see this, u will only see what u see now. Rents in queens should be $35-$50 for prime not a penny higher. They r aslong $85-$125. More then triple what the market.

Sorry
Ricky

If you’d like to participate in the Willets Point hearing, here are the details:

City Planning Commission
Wednesday August 13th
*NYU *Tishman Auditorium in Vanderbilt Hall
(south side of Washington Square South (West 4th Street), just east of
MacDougal Street).

The hearing should begin about 12 noon and each speaker will have 3 minutes

More information here:
http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcp/html/subcats/cpc_notice.shtml

Wow, I am shocked, shocked that this is being allowed to happen!

OK, enough sarcasm. The New York Times has an article about Bukharans building McMansions in the Cord Meyer area. Thank you to Sarah on our forum for posting the link.

In typical New York Times fashion, by the time the story is covered, it is usually about 3 years too late, the issue is usually over, not trendy anymore or there’s nothing that can be done about it.

So much for the news flash and purple bunting. AJ’s Pizza was open for business tonight, at 9:15 PM. Same signage, same menu, and a few customers waiting on line. (Sorry I didn’t have my camera-phone charged up.)

A sign of the times at the corner of Church Street and Warren Street in Tribeca, Manhattan.

“Would you like a large Slurpee, Mr. DeNiro?”

A report from the field, otherwise known as “my work neighborhood.”

This large commercial space has been empty since before Sept. 11, 2001. For a while, it housed a closeouts store and a temporary Chirstmas decorations store. Otherwise, this juicy piece of property right above a major subway station laid dormant for over eight years, in one of the hottest, trendiest, most popular neighborhoods in all of NYC.

During those intervening years, in addition to ever-increasing numbers of tourists, the neighborhood has experienced tremendous residential growth (mostly via the conversion of office buildings into luxury rentals), including a massive baby-boom enough to make the sole elementary school in the nabe dangerously overcrowded.

Now that Robert DeNiro’s brainchild, the Tribeca Film Festival, is “Tribeca” in name only, and the WTC site (sorry, “Ground Zero”) is considered “boring” by tourists because it is just a construction site, perhaps the “riff raff” felt they could finally move in. There goes the neighborhood!

EXTRA! EXTRA! READ ALL ABOUT IT! The new newsstand arrives on a rainy Wednesday evening,

and after-work commuters congratulate Jai on his new home!

See the slide show of the event here.

News stands are a whole social scene!  You should have seen have seen the number of local folks congratulating Jai, shaking his hand, giving him the thumbs up. Many passers-by were pleasantly surprised that the news stand and Jai were coming back. Many thought, like myself, it had closed forever and he had simply moved on. One guy even told him, “When I saw the new cement platform, I praised God that you were finally getting a new place!”

These newsstands will have an upgraded Lotto machine and phone lines.

Just like Weegee used to do, it’s important to be at the right place at the right time, and have your camera ready.