Watching Out for You, Williamsburg

This concept leaves Williamsburg nostalgia to inanimate copies of life in photographs for Williamsburg's children and all the future generations of the world.

Scout's pictures in "Forgotten Storefronts in Williamsburg" on Scouting New York (see link) really brought back some old memories for me. When I was a kid, I had two Aunties who lived together in Greenpoint. Most every weekend, me and what seemed like 100 cousins but was really about 20, would liven, or perhaps madden, the streets while the grownups played poker. Now, my Aunties are gone and my cousins are grown and scattered all over the country.

Real estate's "Big Boon" that intended to revitalize Wiliamsburg has created luxury condos and "the highest concentration of stalled development sites in New York City," according to "The Real Deal" (see link). And Free Williamsburg has some depressing photos in a post titled "All That's Missing is the Tumbleweeds" (see link).

Development in Williamsburg may be stalled, now, but what will happen if, and when, it picks up again? What will be left of Williamsburg, the real Williamsburg, the old nostalgic play-stickball-in-the-streets' Williamsburg for your children, grandchildren, and beyond?

Will they only experience it through pictures? You, Williamsburg, are deciding their future today. It's something to think about.

Watching out for you, Williamsburg, and your future.

One "out with the old and in with the new" development you might want to check out is the new, long-awaited movie theater on 285 Kent Avenue and 2^nd Street. Apropos, it's named IndieScreen and it's showing an interesting list of Indie films beginning tomorrow, September 3rd (see link)..

Watching out for you, Williamsburg, till next time.

Sources:

Scout, Forgotten Storefronts in Williamsburg, Scouting New York
Sarah Ryley, Stalled projects come cack from dead, The Real Deal
Nathan Kensinger, All That's Missing Is the Tumbleweeds, Free Williamsburg
IndiScreen