The Landmarks Preservation Commission is set to demolish a historic home in the East Village. The light-blue-colored home – located on East Seventh Street – demolition protestors are arguing should be given building landmark status, or the row of houses between Avenues C and D should be preserved.
Protestors are arguing that this is part of a land preservation matter since it was built in the 19th century, but the Commission’s argument is that such structures do not “rise to the level” of a landmarks designation. Still, in the past it has been home to various political figures as well as merchants who worked in the shipyards in the East River and thus has a story to tell. Indeed, Green Village Society of Historic Preservation’s Andrew Berman argued that: “these houses really are the last piece of the old ‘Dry Dock District’ which was the heart of New York City’s working waterfront in the early 19th century, and in the late 19th century they were at the center of New York City’s political life.”
Moving over to the West Village, the plan for a mansion on Jane Street was approved by the Landmarks Preservation Commission once the designer overturned his idea for tall glass and concrete towers with which Greenwich Village preservationists took issue. Andrew Berman said that the revised plan was a vast improvement over the original plan, which would have been a woefully out-of-place and precedent-setting intrusion in the Greenwich Village Historic District.”