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Originally Posted by Bronxwood
The ferris wheel idea is a great one but I seriously think you're pushing it. Pecked all over with beautiful old mansions? San Franciscan streetscapes? I just don't see it. Most of what I saw last time I was in St. George was run down, crappy looking buildings with hardly any architectural significance. Theres room for development, that's the good part. This can be the start of something good for "downtown".
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The core of St. George is very banal and governmental, this I grant you. It's the neighborhoods just beyond that I'm talking about...Stapleton Heights, Van Duzer Street and St. Pauls Avenue, Fort Hill, Westervelt Avenue and New Brighton, Henderson Avenue...I've been all over this island so many times, I promise they're there, just hidden. Gives a new meaning to the term "hidden gems" ...the problem with many of those areas now is that they are still somewhat poverty stricken, like Brownstone Brooklyn before it was discovered by the hipsters and yuppies.
What is great about the whole of greater Downtown SI, as you said, is that this exceptional old housing stock surrounds the somewhat barren core, which is ripe for development (and was recently rezoned for taller, thin residential and mixed-used towers by the way). There's an opportunity for a great and unique mix of land uses and cityscapes that will create a district unlike any other in New York. Maybe it sounds like I'm overselling it, but needless to say, I've been waiting to SI to get its moment in the spotlight for a while.