54-46, that's my number: the Queens thread

Oh-uh. Somebody just slapped a Closed By Order of the Department of Health for Operating Without a Permit Sticker on the front door but she just assured me it is merely a clerical error and the manager is running down to Borough Hall to renew.

have you looked at property listings there hurting? I would rather live there than fh.

― iatee, Wednesday, April 17, 2013 1:37 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I've talked to a few people who lived there -- they say there are fewer young couples with kids than in FH. I've been though, it's not bad. And I've been curious about that Odradek's place. Still find it weird that FH doesn't have something like that.

https://nextcity.org/daily/entry/letter-from-flushing-on-gentrification-in-an-unhip-place

Interesting, thanks.

“Flushing was dying in the 1970s.” Jack Eichenbaum, the Queens borough historian, said of the neighborhood when New York was at the brink of fiscal insolvency. Flushing then was an overwhelmingly white middle-class community with an established core of large department stores. However, suburbanization and economic stagnation crippled commerce in the heart of its downtown. “Long Island and its suburban-style malls siphoned people and businesses away,” Eichenbaum recalled. “When Wallach’s closed downtown, people wrung their hands and prepared for the end.”

Here is really long article about Main Street. Don't have time to read it now but I'm sure something interesting is in it. http://forgotten-ny.com/2010/10/remember-the-main-main-street-in-queens/

The Hurdy Gurdy is in this photo from February 1967, between Dilbert's and Woolworth's
http://swc-biogon.smugmug.com/photos/594537646_YoZEq-XL.jpg

I dunno if that author really knows what he wants to say. like he highlights how the 'traditional gentrification story' doesn't work when you're talking about ethnic enclaves but he's still stuck on flushing's lack of hipness for whatever reason (how many chinatowns anywhere are 'cool'?)

this paragraph is basically nonsense considering that flushing is a good example of immigrants *not* really assimilating. like the fact that it's not cool is not some saving grace that can be adapted by crown heights, it's not cool because most immigrant neighborhoods 'aren't cool'

Ultimately, the key to being a “good” gentrifier is to do what minorities, immigrants and poor people have had to for generations: assimilate. This is the difficulty that lies at the heart of all the exciting nightlife, creative industries and refined consumption that gentrification often brings to a poor neighborhood. Can our new city dwellers make some sacrifices in their personal tastes and desires? Can they live in a thrifty, uncool neighborhood — and resist the urge to do something about it? Can they abide by the ground rules of a poor neighborhood, take the idea of social mobility seriously and respect the necessary infrastructure? If so, they will not only enjoy cheaper rent, but something that’s even harder to find nowadays: An urban experience defined by fluidity and dynamism rather than a preserved state of “diversity.”

Another foto of Roosevelt Avenue http://www.wideimaging.com/img/spacer.gif

Sorry, messed that up. Here is the image along with the whole archive:
http://www.wideimaging.com/Queens/Flushing-Archives/3273609_LGDM9v/594537646_vCn46mn#!i=594537646&k=vCn46mn

That's actually the original image I posted but just make your way through that gallery you won't regret it.

I found it interesting but my issue is that flushing is cool. And I don't mean just white foodie tourism. There is a degree if hip young Asian culture, like shops selling a mix of hipster toys/skate culture and several bubble tea spots. And places like Biang. Maybe I just give more cred TI Asian youth culture than to say, the euro cafe's in Astoria, which might be somebody's idea if "hip" but not mine!

p much the only hipstery looking people I see in FH are asian

http://i.imgur.com/AHkqXKx.jpg

god dammit

http://i.imgur.com/j1pQRMz.jpg

http://www.phawker.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/The_Replacements_All_Over_But_The_Shouting_By_Jim_Walsh1.jpg

I don't mind people moving here I just hate the 'lots of parking' line

everyone should move here, it's the best

they probably will, cuz brooklyn is getting obscenely expensive now. I kind of wish I told my co-worker to look there instead of Brooklyn, because stupid outdated me didn't realize the closest place she would remotely be able to afford was Crown Heights. I would definitely move to Sunnyside before Crown Heights.

I was getting some dinner at Xian foods near my shop in williamsburg/greenpoint area and ran into some young hipster foodie tourist types who admitted to never going to the original in flushing. Then they started talking about checking out Tito Rad's which was bizarre until I overheard that they lived in Sunnyside.

Sunnyside needs a lot of work though. My girlfriend txtd me a picture of some goofy longhaired dude playing acoustic guitar in front of Cafe Marlene and said "this is how Sunnyside fails us".

Favorite place in Sunnyside these days though is the russian jewish market on queens blvd with all the good beer.

lol @ your gf's text

We used to have running jokes/commentary about the "walking around playing guitar guys" of williamsburg, young guys who looked like they literally just got off a bus from Omaha with nothing but their guitar and an outfit put together from a bad hearsay description of what a hipster looks like, and then they just stroll the streets playing their hippie dippie guitar music

another lol at gf text

You think sunnyside need work, you should see the veritable ocean of leopard print that is forest hills

I don't even understand how some of these stores and restaurants exist. It's like a low budget soundstage version of mid-90s manhattan.

Ha. You know what I like in Forest Hills? That one bakery on Austin Street. Used to pick up rugelachs on my way back from Kew Gardens.

Speaking of which, do you have any friends who became ADAs?

which bakery?

Um, yeah, I think a few people I know are ADAs. None in Queens that I'm aware of -- Manhattan and Bronx iirc.

btw FH does have a legit craft beer bar now, or at least something aiming for that (Station House). Pictures make the environment look kind of meh. Probably annoying at peak times but a good place to go off peak for the beers.

Banter (new Irish "gastropub") was not particularly "gastro." Just ordinary brunch, but it wasn't bad. An improvement on what was there before to be sure. Decent atmosphere.

On Austin Street after you make right coming from 71st off the subway. Corny name, Martha's Country Bakery, but at least it doesn't seem to belong to the time warp you describe

Made a note of Banter a few weeks ago. Seemed like it might be a good place to watch soccer.

About 130 pages into book Jordan recommended on ILB, A Naked Singularity by Sergio de la Pava, about a son of Colombian immigrants who is a public defender living in Brooklyn. Really enjoying it so far, well-written, funny and bleak and seems to describe pretty well certain aspects of living in NYC, as well as helping maintain my newly acquired knowledge and appreciation for legal jargon. Because Iphigenia of Forest Hills was not enough.

this looks interesting:
http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Arcadia-Frederick-Olmsted-Gardens/dp/155849443X/ref=sr_1_6?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1367513685&sr=1-6&keywords=forest+hills#_

Colemeco (weird PBS food show from guy who used to look like Deniro until he grew his hair questionably long) did a queens episode recently. Ayada and Fu Run were decent picks but he went to some French bakery in Forest Hills that looked legit.

Oh yeah tbf that french bakery is really good (La Boulengerie?) -- I've only gotten take-out pastries, which were excellent. Lousy coffee, but that's authentically french.

Good music at Terraza 7 tonight, Juan Carlos Formell, originally from Cuba and son of the guy who started Los Van Van. He started on bass but now plays a twelve string guitar like it was a tres. His bass player lives in the neighborhood which I guess is what brought him out this way.

is that french bakery on austin?

anyone itt who hasn't been to cannelle yet is missing out, best bakery

it's on a side street right off austin, btw austin and queens blvd, I forget which one. It probably is something with a 70 or 71 in it followed by either rd, dr, st, or ave

this seems like a pretty solid beer list:

http://www.beermenus.com/places/9416-forest-hills-station-house

want to try the maresdous brune and the sixpoint killer crisp

Been a few times to Cannelle, but I dunno. Find that mall a little depressing. Even when nobody has to go to the medical lab over there. We have a really good bakery closer, Lety's on 37th. She's Latina, used to work in Italian bakery on the Lower East Side, Viniera's (sp?) I think.

Veniero's?

not really LES, more like east village I guess. Sort of famous, iirc. My ex-New Yorker parents used to take me to Ferrara's and then that was the place that was supposed to be "as good as the OLD ferrara's" or something

Lety's opened another location in a doomed spot in Sunnyside on Skillman near the Woodside border, or maybe technically Woodside. Next to Thai Malay (crappy takeout/delivery thai/malaysian that used to be solid for such things but was gross last time)

Coolest bakery in Queens is Artopolis in Astoria. I also like V&V or whatever it's called, little old-school bakery just past the 61st st 7 stop/LIRR, on Roosevelt. They have great Black and Whites, but I don't eat any of this stuff because I'm sans-Gluten.

Yeah, that's it. Looks like Lety has another bakery in Woodside since end of last year.
(xp)
Heard rumor that empty space on 37th where a restaurant was is going to be- guess what?- a ScottishIrish gastropub.

This may not be canonical but I only like black & whites if the white aide is lemon-flavored. None of that nondescript white sugar frosting.

*white side

http://ia.media-imdb.com/images/M/MV5BMjA2NDQ0ODI4Nl5BMl5BanBnXkFtZTcwODMzODU0MQ@@._V1_SY317_CR5,0,214,317_.jpg

black and whites just not very good when it comes down to it

also egg creams

Agreed. For black and whites the flavor to bulk and effort to eat ratio is unsatisfactory. For egg creams the thing is so ethereal, is consumed so quickly, that you hardly have time to taste it. Perhaps according to the Goldilocks formulation there is a third related treat that is just right.

Band is back from break. Guy just played what sounded like a highlife inflected quote from "Four."