Changes in Brooklyn
I began my career in King Plaza, Brooklyn. We lived in Brooklyn when our kids were young before making our short (although too long) journey to the suburbs. The neighborhoods today do not look like they did back then. Then they were grungier, dirtier and not as safe. Every time I walk around Brooklyn I am always amazed on how much has changed. I go often so I am sure everyone is sick of me saying it.
I was out in Prospect Heights over the weekend. There are so many pregnant women and young children who 30 years ago would have never chosen Prospect Heights as a place to set down their roots. We have seen urban areas around the globe change. I tend to think of the changes in Brooklyn directly related to the Bloomberg years.
What happens when all of these kids get to school age? Is anyone in the local and state Government pulling any data on how many more kids live in these Brooklyn neighborhoods vs 10, 20 and 30 years ago? Are there enough public schools? There is certainly aren’t enough private. Con Ed didn’t rise to the occasion to the shifts in BK population and certainly, there wasn’t much forward planning on the subway or public transportation. I am assuming this issue is happening in other urban and even hip rural areas vs the suburbs which is not the place of choice for many of this generation.
I have not read any data or info on planning for this. Wondering if anyone is working on this issue as it isn’t something that happens overnight.
Comments (Archived):
Superb questions. Hard to imagine the public school systems are even remotely equipped for the new bulge in population. Also hard to imagine the new young families can afford private school plus the big cost of NYC life. Maybe a new, deja-vu migration to the burbs is coming?As an aside, I agree the Bloomberg admin deserves a ton of credit for NYC urban revitalization. But, while I’m often repulsed by the weird clown he’s become, I think Rudy Guiliani and his admin also deserve a lot of credit for reasserting, after decades of neglect, that urban dwelling need not be overly filthy and dangerous
Agree. An evolution from one mayor to the next
would be nice if the government allowed charter/private schools to flourish
It certainly would
My young family lived and worked in Bklyn from mid Seventies (“Ford to City:Drop Dead”) to mid/Eighties and I feel like a “ Leftover” whenever I visit the borough. “Prospect Heights” wasn’t a recognizable thing in those days. You had to watch it when leaving BAM events. Even some streets in Bklyn Hts at night could be dicey.The areas you talk of—Mill Basin—were white middle class with decent public schools.But in our situation. as for schools, and private school tuition expense, we had to have the benefit of rent stabilized apt,, we could barely afford one, but certainly Not two, tuitions at St Ann’s private school…. so that’s when we had to move to burbs. At time, it was as if the City evicted us, we wanted to stay.Now, NYC landlords have eviscerated rent stabe laws, so now young families have housing expenses we didn’t have. I know a developer who is upgrading housing in greater Crown Hts area and thinks gentrifiers like him are on side of angels.Meanwhile, if a unit has a rent in excess of something like $2600/ month and there’s less than a certain number of units, each time lease is renewed the rent goes to *market* rent.Who can live with that rent expense uncertainty? I told him that he was no angel, he was pricing the middle class out of the city and that the housing shortage of post WWII which made rents too expensive for middle class is exactly what brought in the NYC rent control laws this mensch developer so detests…in other words, these people in Prospect Hts of whom you write, they may find it’s the housing costs not schools that will drive them out of NYC, once the pre-K years are done…
It might but I hope they stay. 🙂